Description

TERRACE WALK
656-1/41/1668 (West side)

No.1 The Huntsman Public House

(Formerly Listed as: TERRACE WALK No.1)
12/06/50

GV II*

Public house, formerly a shop with house attached. 1748-1750, probably by John Wood the Elder.
MATERIALS: Limestone, rendered and painted, with Welsh slate roof.
PLAN: Double depth plan, later extended into adjoining building.
EXTERIOR: Three storeys and attic, three windows to Terrace Walk, six windows to left return on North Parade Passage. Terrace Walk elevation has a notable original stone shopfront, the only one of its kind left in Bath, with four Ionic engaged columns framing three arched openings, the middle one (entrance) being three centred and side ones (windows) semicircular, spandrels of which carved with swags of drapery and foliage, keystones carved with female heads. Small paned windows, partly altered and with replaced glazing bars, radiating fans to each head, panelled door with panelled sides. First floor has three windows with architrave surrounds, centre one being pedimented. Plain four/four sashes sitting directly on entablature below, showing that sills have been dropped. Second floor has similar windows, but original size and without pediment. Dentil cornice goes right round building, mansard roof with two flat-topped dormers with six/six sashes. Return elevation to North Parade Passage has six bays, left hand three of which were once separate house (called No.6 North Parade Passage). This has three windows to first and second floors, architrave surrounds, those on first floor with cornice heads and continuous sill band. All windows have sashes of late C18 type, six/six. Ground floor has early C19 sash, eight/eight, to left in centre small eight pane window and, to right, a busily hybrid classical-cum-Gothic doorway of c1880 with heavy arched head on elaborate console brackets supported on Corinthian colonnettes, panelled door, scrolled wrought iron sign bracket hanging above. Ground floor presumably originally standard Wood one like North Parade (qv). Return wall of No.1 Terrace Walk has similar treatment but two right hand windows are blind, ground floor window heads as first floor front. Three tall ashlar stacks with weathering and set off frame paired flat topped dormers with sashes, six/six. Plain front to Lilliput Alley not intended for public view: irregular and rough-faced masonry.
INTERIOR: Much altered on ground floor, but bar interior retains traces of meander pattern plasterwork dating from Regency period. Behind bar to north is a fine open string wooden staircase leading to upper floors, with alternating columnar and twisted posts; panelling to dado height with pilasters and an upswept dado rail. Principal first floor room retains modillion cornice and vestigial panelling, indicating substantial change to the room layout, with a late Georgian marble chimneypiece inserted.
HISTORY: Copy of early deed (hanging in pub interior, undated) describes building as 'the new built shop to Mr James Jones house' and shows a single-room shop in southeast corner of building. Shop and house are now merged. This building occupied an extremely prominent position, closing the western end of the North Parade, and forming the southern termination of this very busy and public street. The notable shop front has undergone change: the entrance has not always been in centre. Prints show it to have been so originally, but one of 1824 shows door in right hand bay and it was still so in photographs of 1920s. These premises have been an Eldridge, Pope public house since 1906, but were previously known as the Terrace Walk Wine Vaults, a wine and spirits shop.
SOURCES: Lees-Milne J and Ford D: Images of Bath: London: 1982-: 631; Ison W: The Georgian Buildings of Bath: Bath: 1980-: 140; Bath Archaeological Trust/RCHM England: Georgian Bath Historical Map: Southampton: 1989-; Orbach J: Card Index of Bath Architects and Streets: 1978-; Mowl T and Earnshaw B: John Wood Architect of Obsession: Bath: 1988-: 54; The Bath Chronicle: Images of Bath: Derby: 1994-.

Listing NGR: ST7517864698

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• The Huntsman official website
• Wikidata Q17532467

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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