Description

811/3/184 NORTHGATE STREET
10-JAN-53 (East side)
16

(Formerly listed as:
NORTHGATE STREET
12 14 16)

GV II
16 Northgate Street comprises two properties which were formerly numbers 14 and 16, now combined in to a continuous range; the building is a five-bay house of two storeys and attic, dating from the late C17 with alterations to the main elevation in the late C18.

PLAN: The house is single depth on plan with parallel projecting gabled wings to the rear.

MATERIALS: The building is of stuccoed brick, and the roof is covered in plain clay tile, with brick stacks.

EXTERIOR: The five-bay main elevation is set on a slightly projecting plinth, with a moulded cornice at the eaves, and has a string course between the ground and first floors. A wide entry to the right hand side gives access to the court at the rear, and another doorway, similar but equally heavy, of Doric pilasters and entablature, surrounding a fielded and panelled door under a rectangular fanlight. The three ground floor windows are eight-over-eight sashes with moulded architraves. The first floor windows are six-over-six sashes in similar architraves. The roof has four gabled dormers, each set with side hung timber casements, and there are brick ridge stacks at either end and in the centre.

The house has group value with the other buildings along both the east and west sides of Northgate Street.

HISTORY: The centre of Warwick was radically altered by a fire on 5 September 1694; this began in the area to the west of Northgate Street, but spread to the area after householders moved valuable furniture, already smouldering, to St Mary's Church, set at the south end of Northgate Street. The church itself caught fire and then the flames rapidly spread along Northgate Street, destroying all the houses on the east side, and damaging those to the west. Some walls towards the rear of the houses on the east side appear to have survived the fire. The houses were rebuilt in the period immediately following the fire, before the end of the C17, though with some alterations later in the C18, including much of the detailing to their main elevations. The houses were evidently substantial private dwellings, but by 1896, trade directories show that several were in commercial or professional use, and some in use as lodgings, though a number were still private family dwellings. By this date, number 16 was an office for Warwickshire County Council, and in the early C21, the houses were all in use as offices for the departments of the district council, together with the later C20 offices built to the rear of the Northgate Street houses.

SOURCES: Victoria County History: A History of the County of Warwick : Volume 8: The City of Coventry and Borough of Warwick (1969) 427-34
Nikolaus Pevsner and Alexandra Wedgwood: The Buildings of England: Warwickshire (2003) 461
Fire records at Warwickshire County Record Office

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION DECISION:
16 Northgate Street is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* A largely intact house showing some quality and architectural pretension, dating substantially from the C17
* The later C18 alterations to the main elevation are of good quality and enhance the building's special architectural interest
* Group value with the adjacent listed buildings at 2-10 and 18-22 Northgate Street, Northgate House and the listed buildings to the west side of Northgate Street

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26480321

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990
• 
  Gloucestershire 2: The Vale and The Forest of Dean: Vale and Forest of Dean Pt. 2 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Worcestershire Revised Edition (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Essex: Buildings of England Series (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Building Small Projects (New Best of Fine Woodworking)