Listed Building: 4-10, CITY ROAD (1375748)

CHESTER CITY (EM) SJ4166 CITY ROAD 1932-1/6/48 (East side) 24/09/90 Nos.4-10 (Even) GV II 4 shops with living accommodation over, now shops and office. By TM Lockwood. Buff sandstone, timber framing with plaster panels and hard red brick; red-brown clay tile roof with 4 front gables before main ridge parallel with City Road. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys. Ashlar piers at each end and between shopfronts; wrought-iron gates to entrances of Nos 2 and 6; recessed entrances with canted 1-pane side windows, that to No.8 altered; 1-pane windows to fronts of shops and office. A painted timber console before the head of each pier supports the jettied second storey which has a moulded fascia to the bressumer carved where carried round the bases of 4 mullioned and transomed 4-light oriels with leaded glazing and shaped panes; the oriels to Nos 2 and 8 are canted, those to Nos 4 and 6 are bowed; above transom level glazing is carried through between the oriels across the heads of close-studded framing; the moulded cornice is carved above the oriels. The third storey is jettied on consoles; a row of small-framed panels with alternating shaped and herringbone bracing; a 5-light casement, with leaded glazing and shaped panes, in each gable, those to Nos 2 and 8 having canted side lights and those to Nos 4 and 6 having their 3 central lights bowed; 2 small-framed panels to each side of each casement and jettied collars on consoles above, those to Nos 6 and 4 inscribed "AD:1900"; herringbone struts, those to Nos 4 and 6 in S-shaped curves; rainwater head between Nos 6 and 8 carved as a face; moulded bargeboards; drop-finials with castellated heads; a stone-dressed brick chimney on each end-gable and 2 on the ridge. The south end of No.2 has timber framing returned to the gable-chimney and brickwork behind it; the north end of No.8, formerly built against, is rendered. The rear has no features of special interest. The front is one of the most satisfying of TM Lockwood's half-timbered designs. INTERIORS not inspected. The upper storeys of all properties and the first storey of Nos 4 & 6 vacant in July 1990 when inspected. Listing NGR: SJ4118866520