Listed Building: NUMBER 1 STREET THE CITY CLUB (1376334)

CHESTER CITY (IM) SJ4066SE NORTHGATE STREET AND ROW 595-1/4/276 (West side) 28/07/55 No.1 Street (The City Club) (Formerly Listed as: NORTHGATE STREET (West side) No.1) (Formerly Listed as: ST PETER'S CHURCHYARD The City Club) GV II Club premises constituted as the Commercial Newsroom, formerly with two shops beneath, now a restaurant. 1807. By Thomas Harrison. Yellow ashlar to front and Flemish bond brown brick to sides and rear; the low-pitched roof is concealed. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys to front, 3 to back. The front has a rusticated arcade of 3 bays with shopfront of no interest behind; the massive piers have plinths; fluted friezes and moulded cornices carrying segmental arches with carved keystones projecting as consoles to bear the second storey plinth. The second storey has 4 Ionic half-columns and 3 tall sashes of 24 panes surmounted by recessed carved panels; pediment above architrave and frieze; rusticated cornices with returned corners. The south side has a 2-panel door in a plain inserted surround of rustic brick and a 6-pane hopper to the second storey; the north side, slightly recessed above a rear passage, abuts No.3 Street (qv), with a cellar door of 4 broad boards in the passage. The west face to St Peter's Churchyard has the original club entrance south of centre with recessed double doors, each leaf with an ornate leaded glazed panel above a bolection-moulded projecting panel, with a leaded overlight, in a case with architrave, frieze and projecting cornice hood; the present entrance was inserted, north, in 1986, similarly detailed but with round arch and fanlight in the case. South of the original doorway is a bricked-up window-opening with gauged brick flat arch to the first storey, at the rear forming a semi-basement; a similar blocked opening between the 2 doorways. The second storey has a replaced 12-pane recessed sash and a sash with the upper leaf now a hopper; above the north doorway is a 4-pane bull's-eye window. The third storey has three 15-pane recessed sashes; the rear windows have painted stone sills and wedge lintels of red sandstone; a stone cornice to sides and rear. INTERIOR: features in the first storey are largely covered or destroyed. Each entrance from St Peter's Churchyard has an altered straight flight of stairs to the Club on the second storey, giving onto a central passage parallel with the front. From the passage 3 oak doorways lead to the former News Room, now the billiards room, 45 feet by 26 feet, which occupies the full width of the building at the front. The central doorway has double doors of 3 margined panels, opening outward in a panelled case with entablature and, to the room, a scrolled top-hamper dated 1807 bearing a replaced clock; the north doorway has double doors of 3 margined panels, the upper panels now glazed; the south doorway has a door of 6 margined panels with a vertical central reed. The apsidal north wall has a richly carved fire surround with corner terms; the south fire has a bolection surround; patterned panelling beneath dado rail; panels and panelled shutters in embrasures; enriched frieze and moulded cornice; the ceiling is a shallow panelled barrel-vault parallel with the front. The small rooms to rear of passage have oak doors of 6 margined panels. The dining room, designed to replace the News Room, entered from the north end of the passage, forms the upper part of No.3 Street. Built at the expense of Charles Brown in 1898-9 and leased to the Club, it was designed by HW Beswick; his inspiration was the great hall of the Leche House, No.21 Watergate Street Row (qv). The oak doorway has replaced glazed door in case with shouldered architrave and Ionic pilasters bearing a segmental pediment; 3 rows of panelling beneath a high dado rail; 2 fireplaces with shouldered architraves have overmantels with 3 round-arched panels between colonnettes of Ionic derivation, all of oak; architrave, enriched frieze and cornice have alternating medallions decorated with the Cheshire Sheaf and the Club's initials CCC; four false hammerbeam trusses of painted timber. A straight stair from rear of passage leading to the third storey, has closed string, turned newels, paired balusters with open panels and swept handrail. Principal third storey doors are oak, with 6 fielded panels; the landing has enriched plaster dado panels; the former rear rooms are thrown together to form a reading room, with the necessary new details facsimile; door of 6 margined panels; frieze and cornice with an inserted curve to north end; ceiling of small interlocking panels. HISTORICAL NOTE: the Committee of the Commercial News Room, which belonged to its proprietors, commissioned the building and formed the basis from which the present Club developed; the Sun Inn stood on its site and the Committee built the Commercial Tavern, now the Commercial Hotel, St Peter's Churchyard (qv), to take its place. (Bartholomew City Guides: Harris B: Chester: Edinburgh: 1979-: 62; Improvement Committee Minutes: Chester City Council: MB 1898; History of The City Club, Chester: 1980-). Listing NGR: SJ4052466318