York Historic Environment Record

Formerly known as: No.34 LOW PETERGATE. House, now shop and offices. Late C14, with early C18 alteration and extension; further alteration in C20. Timber-framed front range, fronted in whitewashed plaster, with timber cornice; rear extension of orange brick in stretcher bond with partly rendered upper floor; timber shopfront with brick riser; pantile roof and brick stacks.

EXTERIOR: 3-storey 1-window front with jettied first and second floors. C20 shopfront has shallow small-pane bow window with door in right return: recessed at right end is panelled upstairs door. Windows on first floor are tripled 12-pane sashes; on second floor, paired 16-pane sashes. Moulded eaves cornice has elaborate moulded rainwater head with embossed rosettes at left end. Rear: 3 storeys, 2 bays, right bay projecting. Left bay has round-headed staircase window and squat 12-pane sash window above. Windows in right bay altered but retaining segmental brick arches.

INTERIOR: substantial remains of timber-frame survive. Ground floor: in shop, 2-panel cellar door survives. First floor: re-arranged staircase to second floor has close string, turned balusters, square newels and moulded handrail. Front and back rooms on first and second floors retain C17 and C18 panelling and 3- and 5-panel doors. Graffiti dates window in first floor front room to 1769, in second floor front room to 1761. Attic stair is of the ladder type. Roof to front range has crown post trusses with longitudinal braces.

(Cooper TP: The Old Inns and Inn Signs of York: York: 1898-: 19-21; City of York: RCHME: The Central Area: HMSO: 1981-: 193).

Listing NGR: SE6031152081

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

House & Shop. Nos. 41, 43, consists of an early 16th-century two bay timber-framed block parallel to the street, of three floors with inserted attics, and an early 18th-century L-shaped brick extension to the rea, also of three floors with attics. It may be the property sold in 1709 by Thomas Hessay, innholder, and his wife Rosamund to Mary Eskritt, when it was described as 'now rebuilded and in tenure of George Blanshard (YCA, Acc. 10. It was a coffee house in the 18th century, known as the 'Garrick Coffee House' as late as 1860, and was illustrated as the ' "Garrick's Head", Petergate' in 1897 (T.P. Cooper, The Old Inns and Inn Signs of York (1897), 19-21).

The N.E. Elevation has a modern shop front at ground level. The first and second floors, both jettied, are stuccoed and lit by closely-set sash windows. There is a bold cornice with brackets supporting a deep frieze. The roof is pantiled. The rear range, also with its ridge parallel to the street, has at right angles to it a closet block with tumbled gable. The brickwork is mainly in stretcher bond, with three-centred arches and brick tympana over later casement windows.

The front timber-framed range has posts with enlarged heads supporting wall-plates and tie-beams. The trusses have intersecting braces to the purlins and crown-post, which supports a collar but no collar-purlin. The purlins have mortices for oblique purlin-braces. The first-floor front room is panelled in three heights, with 17th-century run-through panelling below arcades wity fluted pilasters.A passage on two sides is partitioned off, with early 18th-century fielded panelling in three heights on the S.W. Wall.

The 18th-century staircase in the rear range starts at first floor level, and is built against a large chimney breast, of earlier date, in the S.E. Wall. It has a close string, turned balusters with round knops, a moulded hand-rail, and square newels with attached half-balusters, cut by the intersection of string and rail in adjacent flights. Both second-floor rooms in the rear extension contain re-used 17th-century run-through panelling. Fittings include doors of three and five panels, and a cornice, all of early 18th-century date. Panes in the front room windows are scratched with the dates 1769 on the first floor, and 1761, on the second.

An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in the City of York. Volume V, the Central Area. P 193. London: RCHME. Monument 353

NMR Information

Alternate Name (Former) The Garrick's Head

List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest. District of York, 14-MAR-1997

BF061020 41-43 LOW PETERGATE, YORK File of material relating to a site or building. This material has not yet been fully catalogued.

RCHME, 1981, City of York Volume V: The Central Area (Monograph). SYO65.

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