York Historic Environment Record

Hotel and house, now shop and offices. Early C19, incorporating remnants of earlier building in No.25, and two C17 wings at rear of No.23; remodelled c1855, with later C19 shopfronts.

MATERIALS: stucco front with timber eaves band and modillion eaves cornice. C17 wings timber-framed with brick infill. Pantile roofs, that to No.25 lower than that to No.23, and brick stacks.

EXTERIOR: No.23 has 3-storey 2-window front; No.25 has 3-storey 1-window front. Continuous shopfront on ground floor, of panelled pilasters with moulded imposts and moulded dentilled cornice on carved console brackets. Glazed shop door in centre of No.23 front, with C20 plate glass shop windows. At each end, 6-panel doors with narrow blocked overlights flank shopfront. First floor to No.23 has shallow bow window to right, with 12-pane sash between 8-pane sashes in fluted surround with angle blocks; to left, 12-pane sash in raised architraves. Second floor windows are similar. First floor window to No.25 is shallow canted bay with 12-pane centre sash, and coarsely reeded mullions beneath modillion cornice; on second floor, unequal 9-pane sash in architrave with narrow sill. The upper right part of facade to No.23 is moulded into a shallow round-headed panel beneath moulded spandrels, forming a unified centrepiece to the combined fronts of both buildings. Rear: gables to paired wings project to right, with 16-pane first-floor sashes, and unequal 9-pane second floor sashes over raised 2-course band. To left, hipped roofed extension with 16-pane sashes and small pent-roofed wing.

INTERIOR: ground floor: in No.23, staircase with stick balusters, moulded ramped-up handrail and turned newels from ground to second floor; No.25 has full-height closed string staircase with column on vase balusters and moulded handrail. Massive spine beam exposed in front part of No.23 and two chamfered transverse beams in wings. First floor: front room in No.23 has moulded cornice, interrupted by partition to passage, and folding door frame with fluted surround and angle roundels, largely blocked by party wall with front room to No.25. At rear of No.25, braced post and wall plates are visible in wall. Second floor: two C18 firegrates survive, in left rear wing to No.23, and in front room of No.25, which has fasciated surround of painted wood: in front room of No.23, plain fireplace with basket grate. 2-bay wings at rear retain wall studs and plates, together with posts with shaped heads and sole pieces. Roofs underceiled. Part of the house was known as 'The Grapes' inn in early C19, and latterly The Crown Hotel. (City of York: RCHME: South-west of the Ouse: HMSO: 1972-: 73).

Listing NGR: SE6005751617

Derived from English Heritage LB download dated: 22/08/2005

Crown Hotel and House, Nos. 23 and 25, stand on a plot held in 1282 by Roger Basy of the Master of St. Robert (of Knaresborough), paying 1d. husgable (YCA, c.60, m.5/23; YASRS, lxxxiii (1932), 181–94). The property in the 14th and 15th centuries descended to the Knottyngley and Wenteworth families (YCA, B/Y, ff. 62–62v.). There was an inn on the site by 1733 (Benson, iii, 164) and early in the 19th century this had become The Grapes. Among former owners was Thomas Varley (1693–1771), Sheriff of York 1766–7. The W. end of the original building, No. 25, had been divided from the rest shortly before 1830, when it was mortgaged by Richard Dent, a miller, who sold to Charles Robinson, druggist, owner of the adjacent property, for £512 in 1832 (YCA, E.95, f. 84v.; E.98, ff. 107, 143, 165v.).

The building, of three storeys, is of the early 19th century and incorporates part of a late 17th-century brick structure at the rear. The larger section, to E., appears to be of c. 1825, and includes the earlier structure; the smaller lower part to the W. Is slightly later in date. About 1850–60, in an attempt to give a symmetrical appearance, the whole front elevation was redesigned with a stucco rendering, a central decorative feature rising the full height, and remodelled windows. Later, shop fronts were inserted to the ground floor. The interior has been much altered but some of the early 19th-century fittings survive.

Derived from RCHME - 'Secular Buildings: Micklegate', in An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in City of York, Volume 3, South west (London, 1972), pp. 68-96. Monument 60

Information derived from NMR
BF060799 THE CROWN HOTEL, YORK File of material relating to a site or building. This material has not yet been fully catalogued.

RCHME, 1972, RCHME City of York Volume III South-west of the Ouse (Monograph). SYO64.

NMR, 2019, NMR data (Digital archive). SYO2214.