Pub Heritage Primrose
Pub Heritage Group have recently carried out a regrading of Real Heritage Pubs - click here for full details
Merseyside - Liscard
Three star - A pub interior of exceptional national historic importance
Listed Status: Not listed
1 Withens LaneLiscard
CH44 1BB
Tel: 07737 100286
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/680656465333101
Nearby Station: New Brighton
Station Distance: 1900m
Public Transport: Near Railway Station (New Brighton)
View on: Whatpub
The Primrose dates back to at least the 1850s, but remodelled by architects Prescott & Davies for Liverpool brewers James Mellor & Sons under plans drawn up in 1922. The work was done in 1923 as helpfully suggested by a dated rain-water head. The ground floor has large sandstone blocks but the upper part is largely faced with half-timbering which was so popular for inter-war pub-building. The layout and most of the impressive fittings survive with a public bar on the corner and a servery clasped by an L-shaped drinking lobby. Particularly striking is the panelled smoke room on the left, which opens to the lobby via a broad timber Tudor arch, clearly show on the 1922 plan and thus not a case of modern opening up. At the rear is a further panelled area, called a lounge in 1922, which, like the lobby and smoke room, is covered by a wonderfully rich plaster ceiling. At the back is a further room but here much of the work seems relatively recent. The plain ceiling here and on the corner of the public bar was installed in a 2014 refurbishment (when the panelling in the back room was painted over). Throughout the pub there is a good deal of attractive stained glass in the windows and screens.
A little-altered stone-built pub of 1923 with half-timbered first floor and containing some very elaborate plasterwork ceilings. Doors from the street lead to the lobby bar area with a passage running down the rear of the servery and with three rooms leading off. The car park entrance vestibule originally had doors leading to the right i.e. the front lobby bar area and another door to the rear of the lobby bar so a partition has been lost – look for the markings on the counter showing where it was. The counter and bar-back fitting (with leaded glass panels) are original.
Off the rear lobby is an opened-up area in the rear right part of the pub (as viewed from the street). It retains original fixed seating, fielded panelling to picture frame height and bell-pushes. Above this area and the lobby are four oblong sections of ceiling with very decorative plasterwork in yellow with detail picked out in green and claret.
At the very rear there is a wide arch which looks looks original as it closely matches the one over the fireplace and the rear room is completely fielded panelled to picture frame height. It was an inglenook style fireplace of inter-war bricks, bell pushes, another four sections of plasterwork ceiling as before and original seating around the room. On the ‘beams’ between the ceiling sections is a decorative strip of grapes and acanthus leaves – is it of wood or wood imitation.
On the front right is a room also with fielded panelling but the licensee says this was originally an off-sales shop. The fixed seating does look more like post-war as it is very different to that elsewhere and the baffles are quite plain and even bell pushes have been added. The room is served from a doorway with flap to the back of the servery. Exterior brick and wood porch. Good stained and leaded windows.
Full Description
Off the rear lobby is an opened-up area in the rear right part of the pub (as viewed from the street). It retains original fixed seating, fielded panelling to picture frame height and bell-pushes. Above this area and the lobby are four oblong sections of ceiling with very decorative plasterwork in yellow with detail picked out in green and claret.
At the very rear there is a wide arch which looks looks original as it closely matches the one over the fireplace and the rear room is completely fielded panelled to picture frame height. It was an inglenook style fireplace of inter-war bricks, bell pushes, another four sections of plasterwork ceiling as before and original seating around the room. On the ‘beams’ between the ceiling sections is a decorative strip of grapes and acanthus leaves – is it of wood or wood imitation.
On the front right is a room also with fielded panelling but the licensee says this was originally an off-sales shop. The fixed seating does look more like post-war as it is very different to that elsewhere and the baffles are quite plain and even bell pushes have been added. The room is served from a doorway with flap to the back of the servery. Exterior brick and wood porch. Good stained and leaded windows.
