St Ursula's is a building at 37 Watergate Street, Chester, Cheshire, England. It incorporates a section of

Chester Rows Chester Rows are a set of structures in each of the four main streets of Chester, in the United Kingdom, consisting of a series of covered walkways on the first floor behind which are entrances to shops and other premises. At street level is ...

and is recorded in the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, a ...

as a designated Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

because of the quality of the

undercroft An undercroft is traditionally a cellar or storage room, often brick-lined and vaulted, and used for storage in buildings since medieval times. In modern usage, an undercroft is generally a ground (street-level) area which is relatively open ...

. The building originated somewhere between about 1180 and about 1280. Alterations were made in the 16th or 17th century and it was largely rebuilt above the Row level in the late 19th century and altered again in the 20th century. The building is in four storeys. It is built in

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates ...

at the street (undercroft) and Row levels and above this is

timber-framed Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large woode ...

. The undercroft has 5½ bays and it is considered that the walls date from the late 12th century, and are therefore the earliest features yet to have been dated in the structure of the Rows. The undercroft is currently in use as a storeroom for the neighbouring toy shop.

References

Buildings and structures in Chester Grade I listed buildings in Chester Medieval architecture Timber framed buildings in Cheshire {{UK-listed-building-stub

See also

References