24-26 Cornmarket Street. Image courtesy of Chuca Cimas.

Visiting Oxford > What to See > Historical Places

24-26 Cornmarket Street, Oxford

24-26 Cornmarket Street, in Oxford, is a timber-framed building built in the late 14th century. It belonged to a wine merchant who ran it as an inn, the “New Inn”. What remains is about half of it, as the “complete” one would have had a central courtyard. The building is mostly original, although parts of it were from a restoration funded by Jesus College in the 1980s.

24-26 Cornmarket Street’s architecture is typical of 14th century Britain. For example, each floor is gradually wider than the one below – a way to maximise floor space without having to buy more land. Medieval buildings had such big overhangs that, in some cases, two households on either side of a narrow street could shake hands out of the window.

Where is 24-26 Cornmarket Street?

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