Description

CHESTER CITY (IM)

SJ4066SE NORTHGATE STREET AND ROW 595-1/4/313 (East side) 28/07/55 Nos.32 & 34 Street (The Old Music Hall) (Formerly Listed as: ST WERBURGH STREET (West side) The Music Hall)

GV II

2 shops, one to Northgate Street and the other back-to-back, to St Werburgh Street. Except for the modern frontage to Northgate Street, the building was originally the Chapel of St Nicholas, c1300 for Simon de Albo, abbot of St Werburgh's, Chester; used for a period as the church of the parish of St Oswald; closed as a church and conveyed to the Mayor and Assembly of Chester 1488; altered, with an upper floor inserted, as Commonhall and Wool Hall 1545; used for staging plays from c1750; converted as the New Theatre 1773 and the Theatre Royal 1777-8; converted as hall for concerts and entertainments by James Harrison as the Music Hall 1854-5; used as a cinema mid C20; converted to supermarket, then shops, later C20. Red squared rubble sandstone and English garden wall bond brown brick walling; grey slate gabled roofs. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys. The medieval sandstone walls of the former chapel rise 24 feet, raised a further 15 feet in 18 inch brickwork for the theatre 1773; the west wall, now within Nos 32 & 34 Northgate Street, is covered from view. The former nave had 5 bays, of which the eastern 3 on the south side are visible from Music Hall Passage, and 4 bays on the north side, all but one hidden from public view, can be seen from the rear fire stair from No.40 Northgate Street (not included). The basket-arched window openings are blocked in sandstone, with badly eroded mouldings to jambs and arches visible; 4 blocked openings remain on the north side, and 2 on the south side where the east bay is largely rebuilt and the adjoining bay altered. The upper wall of each side has bricked-up window openings of Georgian proportions with cambered brick heads and, on the north side, sandstone sills. The former chancel, now of one bay, is recessed; the masonry is not toothed-in to the east of the nave; it has a blocked window, under a 2-centred arch, to each side. For conversion to the Music Hall, Harrison added the canted east porch with central doorway and a square-headed window of 2 trefoil-headed lights in each oblique face; hoodmoulds and a moulded stringcourse

carried up over the door and window opening. Harrison inserted 2 windows similar to those in the porch in the east wall of the chancel above, and at a higher level a mullioned and transomed 3-light window. The face of Nos 32 & 34 to Northgate Street is of no quality or interest. INTERIOR: all surfaces are covered, but the outer walls and the Music Hall roof are probably intact; some plasterwork is said to survive, though inaccessible. The interior of the Music Hall is illustrated in Transactions of the Chester Archaeological Society. (Cheshire Sites and Monuments Record: Record for Chester City: Chester: 3007/3/15; Blomfield C: Transactions of the Chester Society of Archaeologists: Chester: 1854-1857: 251-263).

Listing NGR: SJ4054166387

External Links

• St Nicholas' Chapel, Chester at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q7594913

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.

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