50 & 52 Princes Street

50 & 52 princes street

(East Side) - An Eighteenth Century Town House

 

This former unimposing house in Princes Street, now split into two shop premises with offices over, was built towards the end of the eighteenth century. 

In 1977, Tom and Ivy Symes purchased the property at 51 Princes Street which was repurposed as a delicatessen and renamed it Symes Delicatessen. They retired in 1984/5. After their retirement Princes Street continued as a deli/grocery shop for some years before it was changed to it's current business, Café 50.

 

The following description is from the Somerset Historic Environment Record -

House, now two shops. Late C18 clay tiled roof, with no copings to gables. 2-storey. Modern shop fronts to ground floor set in ashlar surrounds, to first floor 4-plain sash windows without glazing bars in plain openings. There is a plain return to North lane with a modern galvanised steel window set high in the gable.  

 

gallery

 

A photograph of the 1950s of the block of former seventeenth and eighteenth town houses on the eastern side of Princes Street, to the south of North Lane.

 


Courtesy of Chris Symes

Nos 50 and 52 Princes Street, photographed in the 1960s.

 


This photograph features in my book 'Yeovil From Old Photographs'

Photographed (I think) in the late 1970s when 46 & 48 were Channing's toy shop, 44 was Widgers estate agents, 42 was Thorne's hairdresser and tobacconist and 40 was the WI Market (before it moved to Hendford, near to the Butchers Arms.

 

50 & 52 Princes Street in an enlargement of the previous photograph.

 


Courtesy of Chris Symes

The frontage of Symes Delicatessen at 50 Princes Street. Photographed in the 1980s. The delicatessen was run by Tom and Ivy Symes from 1977 until their retirement in 1984/5. After their retirement Princes Street continued as a deli/grocery shop for some years.

 


Courtesy of Chris Symes

The interior of Symes Delicatessen, with Tom Symes serving customers, in a colourised photograph of the 1980s.

 

A photograph of the 1990s but it isn't clear what the premises are being used for.

 

The former eighteenth century town house, now two shop premises, Lunch Box at left and an early version of Cafe Number 50 at right. Photographed in 2008.

 

Cafe Vie at left and Cafe 50 at right. Photographed in 2013.