Listed Building: NUMBER 68 STREET (1376448)

CHESTER CITY (IM) SJ4066SW WATERGATE STREET AND ROW 595-1/3/418 (North side) 28/07/55 No.68 Street (Formerly Listed as: WATERGATE STREET No.68) GV II* Town house, now shop and offices. 1729 for Alderman Henry Bennett, altered probably later C18 and front rebuilt retaining original features mid C20. Painted stone, stone-dressed brown brick; grey slate roof of 4 narrow spans with ridges parallel with Watergate Street. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys plus cellars. The front to the lowest storey, added late C18 or early C19 is of rusticated stone with moulded plinth, recessed porch to right in moulded basket-arched case with five steps to house (now office) door of 6 fielded panels and shop door, left; shop window with moulded stone surround; cornice. The rebuilt brick front above incorporates three 15-pane flush sashes to the second storey, that at centre in shouldered and eared architrave with a lion bearing a Cross of Lorraine on the face of a raised triple keystone; the sash to each side has a painted stone sill and an acanthus keystone. A substantial cornice at the base of the attic storey is returned at each end; two 4-pane sashes under cambered heads with moulded keystones; the upper cornice carries a low parapet with moulded coping. The west side to Trinity Street is of old brown brick. The first storey has a recessed porch with a half-glazed 4-panel door, a small 9-pane flush sash and 2 replaced tripartite sashes under cambered heads. 3-course brick floor-level bands to the second and third storeys. In the second storey the Venetian stair-window of 4;16;4 panes replaces the blocked openings of a pair of sashes with a pair of circular windows above; there is a small inserted second storey window and a 24-pane flush sash. The upper band is carried over the blocked circular openings. The third storey has a 4-pane sash in a rebuilt opening with cambered head and moulded keystone, and three 12-pane flush sashes; each window is under the gable of one of the four ridges; 3 lateral chimneys, the rearmost being large; a narrow 2-storey rear wing. The rear has 2 visible 16-pane sashes to the second storey and a 16-pane sash and a 12-pane sash to the third storey. INTERIOR: the cellars, in the manner of undercrofts, are ceiled with a pair of long, parallel brick barrel-vaults. The front chamber at former Row level, now a shop, has a C18 fireplace in its west wall, a former screen of 2 Tuscan columns against its rear wall and a cornice. The stair hall has a basket-arched doorway to the entrance-lobby and to the rear east room which has a panelled dado and a cornice; the rear east room and the front west room (the shop) have doors of 8 fielded panels, the rear west room a door of 6 fielded panels; the lobby door is renewed. The oak open-well stair against the west wall is probably mid C18, with open string displaying shallow overlapping steps, curtail steps, a heavy swept rail on 3 barleysugar-on-vase balusters and a panelled dado; a panelled embrasure to the stair window. The probably original but now secondary stair is diagonally north-east of the main stair, with open well, dado panelling to second storey, dado rail to third storey and probably repaired turned balusters. The second storey has a basket-arched doorway to the rear east room, which also has a basket-arched recess, doors of 8 fielded panels and embrasures with 2 panels under windows. The third storey has doors of 2 and 4 fielded panels and corner chimney-breast. (Chester Rows Research Project: Brown AN & Grenville JC & Turner RC: Watergate Street: Chester: 1988-: 33; Bartholomew City Guides: Harris B: Chester: Edinburgh: 1979-: 104). Listing NGR: SJ4033966247