CONTEXT.
An application has been made for the Vine Public House in Worksop, Nottinghamshire to be assessed for listing. It is one of 3 public houses in Worksop to be submitted by the applicant for assessment, and neither the Vine, nor the 2 other buildings are identified as being at risk or the subject of current development proposals.

HISTORY.
The building is believed to date to the early twentieth century, and appears to be a rebuild or remodelling of an earlier range of buildings, shown on nineteenth century maps as 3 properties. It is sited between early nineteenth century buildings on the frontage to Carlton Road, one of the principal approaches to Worksop from the North. Map evidence indicates that the building became a public house between 1898 and 1920, as, before 1898, other buildings are identified as 'Hotel' or 'Public House', and continue to be identified as such on later map editions. This is not the case with the Vine. The public house seems to have been developed by the brewer Hole and Co, whose name appears on the building frontage during a period of growth in the early years of the twentieth century. The building underwent alteration in the late twentieth century, with internal remodelling and the replacement of part of the exterior ground floor fenestration with late twentieth century joinery.

DESCRIPTION.
The Vine public house is a 4-bay building of 2 storeys and attics, built of red brick with painted dressings and banding. The ground floor is faced in decorative brown faience, which incorporates original signage identifying the commissioning brewery, Hole and Co. The building is an asymmetrical composition, with a narrow entrance bay flanked by 2 wider bays with 3-light mullioned windows to each floor, the attic floor opening incorporated within a coped gablet. The entrance bay has a semi-circular, arch-headed doorway with a blocked fanlight and a twentieth century panelled door. Above the door is a transomed 2-light window set within a semi-circular arch-headed recess. The right-hand bay, like the entrance bay is of 2 storeys, below a coped parapet. The original ground floor window and its faience surround have been replaced by a twentieth century 3-light bow window. The interior of the building, as viewed through the front elevation windows, appears to have been remodelled with separate room divisions removed to create an open-plan interior. The main bar and bar counter are now set against the rear wall of the frontage range, and do not appear to be original components.

ASSESSMENT.
The Vine is one of a very large population of surviving late nineteenth century and early twentieth century urban public houses in England. This period was one of strong growth and expansion in the trade, with brewery companies investing heavily in new premises, and developing 'improved' public houses which were both attractively-detailed and which offered, in often carefully planned and well-finished interiors, a range of different facilities for different classes of customer. Many were designed with dining rooms, smoke rooms, and, in some examples, such as the houses developed in Carlisle in the early twentieth century, with segregated areas for the sexes. Some brewers, such as Joseph Holt in Eccles consistently produced high quality designs for public houses, and many breweries employed in-house architects to develop a distinctive public house style. External architectural display and internal comfort and respectability characterised many public house developments of the period, and evidence of these characteristics are an important aspects of listing assessments. High architectural quality, the survival of an original and a little altered plan and original bar and back-bar fittings will usually be required to support a claim to special architectural interest, a claim which will be enhanced by original fixtures, fittings, joinery and decorative finishes in the different bar areas. When considered in a national context, the Vine public house is of modest architectural quality, and the surviving external faience decorative finish is not of high enough quality to in itself justify a listing recommendation. The external alterations and the remodelling of the original interior significantly diminish the claim to special interest, and thus, whilst the Vine remains a building of some local interest, it falls a considerable way below the standard required for listing. (1)

<1> Historic England, 2021, National Record of Historic Environment (Digital archive). SNT5271.