Cornmarket | |||
Location in Oxford Location in Oxfordshire | |||
Former name(s) | The Corn | ||
---|---|---|---|
Location | Oxford, England | ||
Coordinates | 51°45′11″N1°15′30″W / 51.7530°N 1.2584°W Coordinates: 51°45′11″N1°15′30″W / 51.7530°N 1.2584°W | ||
North end | George Street | ||
Major junctions | Golden Cross, Clarendon Shopping Centre | ||
South end | Carfax Tower | ||
Other | |||
Known for | Shopping | ||
Status | Pedestrian precinct |
Cornmarket Street (colloquially referred to as Cornmarket or historically The Corn) is a major shopping street and pedestrian precinct in Oxford, England that runs north to south between Magdalen Street and Carfax Tower. [1] [2]
To the east is the Golden Cross arcade of small jewellery and craft shops in a courtyard, leading to the Covered Market. To the west is the indoor Clarendon Shopping Centre that connects in an L-shape to Queen Street.
Cornmarket was semi-pedestrianised and made a limited-access street in 1999. Cycling is allowed 6pm to 10am. In 2002, it was voted Britain's second worst street in a poll of listeners to the Today programme. [3] The rating was largely due to a failed attempt to repave the street in 2001. The granite setts, which had been laid extensively, cracked and the contractor went into liquidation. In 2003, it was repaved again and new benches installed, amidst reports of budgetary problems.
26–28 Cornmarket on the corner of Ship Street is a 14th-century timber-framed building. [5] It is the surviving half of a building completed in about 1386 as the New Inn. [5] It belongs to Jesus College and was investigated and restored in 1983. [6]
Boswells of Oxford established what was the largest department store in Oxford at 50 Cornmarket Street in 1738. In 1928, the shop opened a new main entrance on Broad Street, but it still retained an entrance on Cornmarket Street. The store closed in 2020
The Victorian photographer Henry Taunt set up a shop at 33 Cornmarket Street in 1869. It was a small shop and in 1874 he moved to larger premises in Broad Street.
Zac's was a waterproof clothing manufacturing and retail firm based at 26–27 Cornmarket, established in the 1880s and closed in 1983. [7] [2]
Woolworth's bought the Clarendon Hotel on the west side of the street in 1939 with the intention of demolishing it for the construction of a new store on the site. [8] In earlier centuries, the Clarendon had been the Star Inn. It was a complex of 16th- and 17th-century buildings, one of which had a vaulted Norman cellar dating from the second half of the 12th century: possibly the oldest vaulted structure in Oxford. [9] Thomas Sharp, in Oxford Replanned (1948) a report commissioned by Oxford City Council, warned that Oxford was already short of quality hotel accommodation and the Clarendon's demolition would be a mistake. [8] Notwithstanding Sharp's conclusions, Woolworth's demolished the hotel in 1954–55. [10] After demolition of all the buildings above the surface, parts of the 12th-century vault were destroyed to make way for one of the columns of Clarendon House built in its place. [11]
Clarendon House was designed by William Holford and built in 1956–57. [12] The façade is of coursed and squared rubble masonry with panels of blue-green slate, and Nikolaus Pevsner commended the building as tactful and elegant. [12] The building is now part of the Clarendon Shopping Centre.
The tower of the Church of England parish church of St Michael at the North Gate is the oldest building in Oxford. It is Saxon and dates from about 1000–1050. [13] The church is named after the medieval gate of Oxford's city walls that spanned the north end of Cornmarket.
Near this church was the Bocardo Prison, where the Oxford Martyrs were imprisoned in 1555–56 before being burnt at the stake outside the town wall in what is now Broad Street nearby.
Chadlington is a village and civil parish in the Evenlode Valley about 3 miles (5 km) south of Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire. The village has five neighbourhoods: Brookend, Eastend, Greenend, Millend and Westend.
Nettlebed is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire in the Chiltern Hills about 4+1⁄2 miles (7 km) northwest of Henley-on-Thames and 6 miles (10 km) southeast of Wallingford. The parish includes the hamlet of Crocker End, about 1⁄2 mile (800 m) east of the village. The 2011 Census recorded a parish population of 727.
The High Street in Oxford, England, known locally as the High, runs between Carfax, generally seen as the centre of the city, and Magdalen Bridge to the east.
Swinbrook is a village on the River Windrush, about 2 miles (3 km) east of Burford in Oxfordshire, England. The village is in the civil parish of Swinbrook and Widford. Widford is a hamlet about 0.5 miles (800 m) west of Swinbrook. The 2011 Census recorded the parish population as 139.
Broad Street is a wide street in central Oxford, England, just north of the former city wall. The street is known for its bookshops, including the original Blackwell's bookshop at number 50, located here due to the University of Oxford. Among residents, the street is traditionally known as The Broad.
George Street is a street in central Oxford, England. It is a shopping street running east–west.
Golden Cross is a shopping arcade at 5 Cornmarket Street in central Oxford, England. The original structure on the site dates from 1193, when it was called Maugershall after the then owner, and consisted of shops with an inn on the upper storeys. The building structures now on the site date from the late 15th century, when they were used as a traditional coaching inn, as is clear from its layout and historical documents. The collection of historic buildings in the Golden Cross courtyard to the east off Cornmarket Street, one of Oxford's main shopping streets. Golden Cross is now used as Oxford's branch of Pizza Express. The courtyard is used as a thoroughfare which leads to the historic Covered Market and has been redeveloped as a small shopping centre, with upmarket shops, a branch of iGlasses Opticians, Holland and Barrett and a Chinese herbalist.
The Clarendon Centre is a shopping centre in central Oxford, England, opened in 1984. The centre faces Cornmarket Street, and has other entrances onto Queen Street and Shoe Lane. The fascia onto Cornmarket Street is that of the Woolworths store which had, in a decision later criticised, replaced the Georgian Clarendon Hotel; it was discovered during demolition that medieval construction had been present within the hotel. The shopping centre was expanded in 2012–14. Major tenants include TK Maxx, H&M and Gap Outlet.
St Michael's Street is a street in central Oxford, England. It runs between New Inn Hall Street to the west and Cornmarket to the east, with Ship Street almost opposite.
Woodeaton or Wood Eaton is a village and civil parish about 4 miles (6.4 km) northeast of Oxford, England. It also has a special needs school called Woodeaton Manor School.
Kidmore End is a village and civil parish in South Oxfordshire, centred 6 miles (10 km) NNW of Reading, Berkshire, an important regional centre of commerce, research and engineering. It is in the low Chiltern Hills, partly in the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The A4074 from Reading towards Oxford passes through the west of the parish and it is located 6 miles from Henley on Thames.
Lewknor is a village and civil parish about 5 miles (8 km) south of Thame in Oxfordshire.The civil parish includes the villages of Postcombe and South Weston. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 663.
Widford is a deserted medieval village on the River Windrush about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) east of Burford in West Oxfordshire. The village was an exclave of Gloucestershire until 1844.
Crawley is a village and civil parish beside the River Windrush about 2+1⁄2 miles (4 km) north of Witney, Oxfordshire. The parish extends from the Windrush in the south almost to village of Leafield in the northwest. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 155.
Harry George Walter Drinkwater (1844–1895) was an English architect who practised in and around Oxford. His work included several churches and public houses.
William Wilkinson (1819–1901) was a British Gothic Revival architect who practised in Oxford, England.
New Road is a street in west central Oxford, England. It links Park End Street and Worcester Street to the west with Queen Street and Castle Street to the east. To the south is Oxford Castle and the former Oxford Prison, now a Malmaison hotel. To the north is Nuffield College, a graduate college of Oxford University. At the eastern end on the south side is New County Hall, the headquarters of Oxfordshire County Council.
William Abel Pantin was an historian of medieval England who spent most of his academic life at the University of Oxford.
Thomas Lawrence Dale, FRIBA, FSA was an English architect. Until the First World War he concentrated on designing houses for private clients. From the 1930s Dale was the Oxford Diocesan Surveyor and was most noted for designing, restoring, and furnishing Church of England parish churches.
Little Milton is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire, about 6 miles (10 km) southwest of Thame and 7 miles (11 km) southeast of Oxford. The parish is bounded to the west by the River Thame, to the south by Haseley Brook, to the north by field boundaries and to the east by an old track between Great Milton and Rofford that is now a bridleway. Little Milton village is on raised ground above the River Thame floodplain, about 250 feet (76 m) above sea level.