Building record 10612 - Chester Rows: 52-58 Lower Bridge Street Gamul House

No 52-58 Lower Bridge Street, known as Gamul House, consists of a three storey house of brick with a rendered street level and a Welsh slate roof. At first floor level there is a raised walkway in front of all but the right hand bay. The core of the building appears to be a medieval stone built open hall with several late 15th century windows in the upper floor and a late 17th century re facing of the front facade. At street level there are three shop fronts beneath a walkway to the left, each front is identical with a glazed door to the right and a plate glass window to the left. The interior of the street level shops contain no original features in the front bay, however, there is a substantial cross beam running parallel to the street 2.77m from the street frontage. The former Row level is divided into two sections with a large open hall and ceiled service end to the north and an extension to the west of the hall. On initial inspection, the open hall appears medieval in origin, however, there are some anomalies with this interpretation; the materials used appear to be both stone and timber; the high windows on the first floor overlooking the hall appear to be original, yet of a 16th century date and are unusual in an open hall; a blocked door in the east wall that appears to have been a visible presence until the mid 19th century is also unusual and would be redundant in a classic open hall plan; there are ceiling decorations that appear early 17th century in date; and finally the present roof (itself a 1970s reconstruction) appears to include traces of an 18th century barrel vault. The traditional arrangement on the Rows consisted of a single storey stone undercroft at street level and a Row level building over it. Above the undercroft, the Row level building was more often timber built and consisted of a 'Row' level storey incorporating the Row walkway or stallboard extending over the frontage of the undercroft (this allowed extra head room for the undercroft and additional space for traders on the stallboards). The Row walkway was approximately 4-6m in width and incorporated the path and the stallboards themselves. The Row level storey formed the medieval shop opening onto the Row walkway. Due to differences in ground level between the front and back of the plots, the undercroft is at street level at the front and the Row level storey at ground level to the rear. The Row building also often included at least one further storey above it that extended forward again over the Row walkway. The upper floors were private, domestic quarters. The Rows are believed to be of medieval origin, dating at least to the 13th century followed by a gradual evolution of built form over a period of perhaps 100 years to create the present elements of undercroft, Row walkway and Row building. Survival of the built form of the Rows varies considerably and different elements of a single building can vary enormously in date from the 13th century through to the 20th century.