Listed Building: CROSS KEYS PUBLIC HOUSE AND RAISED FORECOURT (1376206)

CHESTER CITY (IM) SJ4065NE DUKE STREET 595-1/6/146 (South side) No.2 Cross Keys Public House and raised forecourt GV II Public house. Rebuilt 1894 by WM Boden and raised forecourt, probably earlier. Stone-dressed red Ruabon brick, pebbledash, grey slates and red sandstone squared snecked rubble. Free style. EXTERIOR: beer cellar and 3 storeys. The front to Duke Street has round-arched recessed porch at west corner with Bridge Place, having columns with foliar caps in C13 manner, crossed keys incised in spandrel and stone-banded corner buttress; porch floor of tiles and mosaic; part-glazed oak door, panelled in C17 manner; two 3-light mullioned and transomed windows, leaded above transoms; a blocked doorway, part-glazed; a 2-light casement and a 4-panel door with overlight in east wing; stone lintels and segmental brick arches. The second storey of the main block has a moulded stone jetty with carved end-consoles; pebbledash; a shallow canted oriel of 4 lights with 2 transoms and a cross-casement with frame proud of wall-face. The east wing has a cross-window. The third storey has a moulded stone jetty between stone-banded projections, a 4-light casement, a pilaster and a 2-light casement, each under a dormer gable with moulded bargeboard; the east wing has a pair of cross-casements under a timber-framed dormer gable. A red brick ridge chimney. The west face to Bridge Place has floor-bands, banded quoins, window surrounds, mullions and transoms of yellow stone. The first storey has a 1-light transomed window to each side of a leaded cross-window in the gable-end of the main block, a half-bay window against the south return of the gable-end and a pair of cross-casements with brick mullions and stone transoms in the south wing. The second storey has a slightly jettied floorband and a 5-light leaded casement in the gable-end and a timber cross-casement in the south wing. The third storey has a flush floor-band and a 4-light mullioned casement in the gable and a hipped 2-light dormer in the roof of the south wing. A ridge chimney and a south gable chimney. The forecourt to Bridge Place has west and south walls of squared snecked red sandstone rubble, double boarded doors to the beer cellar in an opening with segmental arch, looking older than the public house. One step up to blue brick pavement of the forecourt. INTERIOR: altered, but retaining some of its original features. The building is prominently sited on a street corner and makes a positive contribution in townscape terms. (Improvement Committee Minutes: Chester City Council: 27/2/1894: 1894-). Listing NGR: SJ4067265882