Home > Nottinghamshire > Newark > Olde White Hart Olde White Hart
Picture source: Peter Langsdale
The Olde White Hart was a grade-II listed coaching inn situated on the Market Place, and is now used as a branch of the Nottingham Building Society. Publican in 1921 was William Burrows
The Olde White Hart is one of the best examples of a late 15th century building in England. Its highly decorated main front has tiny figures of saints in the uprights. and inside are vestiges of a 14th century great hall of an earlier inn. John Cotham Bainbridge, Mayor, mercer, draper and funeral furnisher bought the Olde White Hart in 1847, it's long glass third floor providing an ideal location for dressmaking. He employed 59 workers (18 male and 41 female) from the age of 14 as milliners and seamstresses and salesmen. After 1897 the Brothers Charles and Frederick Atter (who was once manager) took over. During WW1 they produced uniforms for the Army, and leased shops in the arcade to select retailers. After the Atters died in the 1930's, Rowell's took over, but still called it Bainbridges, they sold it to the Brotherton Group in 1968 who used it for fashion sales. The Nottingham Building Society took over in 1979.
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Listed building details:
Former hotel, now building society office. Dated by dendrochronology as follows: rear (south) wing c1312, extended c1526 and remodelled C17. East wing c1320. Front range c1470, rear gallery and stair turret early C16, glazed mid C17. Altered c1870. Main ranges restored 1983 and south wing restored 1990, by Guy St John Taylor Associates. Timber framing with rendered rubble and brick nogging, with pantile roofs and plain tile verges. Close studded 3 storey front range, 3 storeys, 4 bays, has to left a recessed unjettied bay with a 16 pane sash. The 3 bays to right are jettied and have continuous windows with wooden traceried heads. Above each billeted bressummer are plaster figures with crocketed canopies attached to each stud. On the ground floor, an open carriageway flanked to right by a C20 shopfront with 2 windows. At the rear above the carriageway, a 2 bay jettied glazed gallery with turned mullions. South wing has to right 4 bay range, C14, formerly an open hall, 2 storeys plus attics. Colourwashed brick underbuild, close studding above, with render. Similar lower C16 range to left, 2 storeys plus attics, 5 bays, has a coped gable. Both have scattered  fenestration, mostly C19 and C20. East wing, formerly a first floor hall, has a gable stack. 2 storeys, 4 bays. Painted brick underbuild with rendered timber framing above. Two 12 pane sashes on each floor, those below being smaller. The 2 right hand bays have a lower pitched roof and form part of the adjoining C19 public house, whose main range conceals them. 3 storey stair turret in return angle has C20 brick underbuild and arch braced close studding above. On the upper floors, a continuous window on each side, 6 and 7 lights, those facing the carriageway with C17 turned balusters. Interior: south wing north end has the upper parts of jowled posts, collar beam and substantial remains of a collar purlin roof. 5 bays to south have some wall studs and mainly C19 roof. East wing has framed gable and 2 trusses with arch braces. The two western bays have a restored collar purlin roof. Front range first floor has chamfered spine and span beams and central stud wall with C20 screens in the other bays. 2 western bays have wall painting. Second floor has stud walls, some with arch braces, and chamfered span beams with arch braces. Eastern bay has wall painting. Single purlin roof with wind braces except in the eastern bay. Stair turret has single  purlin roof and patterned framing in the gable. This building was an inn from c1430 to c1870, after which it was converted to a shop. Described by Pevsner as "one of the paramount examples of late C15 timber framed architecture in England".
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Other Photos
Date of photo: 1920s	Picture source: Rosemary Speck
Date of photo: 1920s	Picture source: Rosemary Speck