31 Cornmarket Street: Treadwell restaurant
The building on this site has always been in the parish of St Michael-at-the-Northgate Church. The current building dates from 1912.
For many year's it was part of Boswell's. On 7 May 2024 it opened as the restaurant of The Store Hotel, and is connected at the back to the main building in Broad Street.
Former building on the site of 31 Cornmarket Street
For leases granted by Oxford City Council between 1581 and 1787 for 29, 30, 31, & 32 Cornmarket Street, see H. E. Salter, Oxford City Properties, pp. 246–248.
In the early nineteenth century Elias Tredwell or Treadwell ran a Wagon & Van Office from the former house at 31 Cornmarket Street and its yard to the south, which was known as Treadwell's Yard. He died in 1822 and his wife in 1833, and by 1839 it was run by his daughter Miss Ann Tredwell (born in Oxford in 1788/9). She was described as an office keeper aged about 40 at the time of the 1841 census, when she was living at No. 31 with Mary Ann Tredwell, who was aged about 20 and described as a female servant. Ann Tredwell retired in 1843 when she was aged about 54.
Later in 1841 the cabinet makers Herbert & Embling moved into 31 Cornmarket Street, and on 2 September 1854 William Herbert announced in Jackson's Oxford Journal that he had also taken on 1 Broad Street as a second warehouse, and these premises are still combined today (first with Boswell's and now with the Store Hotel).
On 18 October 1856 William Herbert announced in Jackson's Oxford Journal that he was retiring from business and was selling all his stock, and on 17 October 1857 the wholesale and retail ironmongers Lowe & Heydon announced that they had moved from St Aldate's to this shop at 31 Cornmarket. William Herbert, who was still the owner of the premises, took his own life at his private residence, Summertown Farm, on 23 May 1859, and three months later on 20 August another cabinet maker, William Baker, announced that he had purchased both Herbert's business and stock in trade, but would would be chiefly conducting his business at the Broad Street premises, so Lowe & Heydon remained here.
On 28 December 1859 the partnership between James Stanley Lowe:and William Heydon was dissolved by mutual consent, and henceforth the business was carried on under the firm of James Stanley Lowe & Company. The following advertisement appeared in Jackson's Oxford Journal on 20 April 1867:
On 11 October 1879 Jackson's Oxford Journal reported that Mr Lowe's premises had been “thoroughly repaired to last some years longer, and greatly improved by the addition of a new street front”, with Mr Codd being the architect and Mr T. Selby the builder.
In 1882 Arthur Pearson (who had already bought Boswell’s shop at its original premises on the other side of the road at 50 Cornmarket Street) bought No. 31 from the ironmonger Alderman James Stanley Lowe. Boswell ran his own ironmonger’s shop here until 1912, when he moved his premises to George Street.
Right: Oil/paraffin can sold by Pearson's ironmongers here at 31 Cornmarket Street. The detail below shows that the metal plate reads:
A. PEARSON & Co / IRONMONGERS / OXFORD
Present building on this site
In 1912 Pearson had No. 31 Cornmarket Street rebuilt by Wooldridge & Simpson of Oxford. The architects were Messrs N. W. & G. A. Harrison of Turl Street in consultation with Mr Payne Wyatt of London, and Treadwell's Yard to the south disappeared in the process. There is a report on the building in the Oxford Chronicle of 9 October 1914 (p. 8).
He opened the Oxford Drug Company here in 1912.
In 1929 Pearson moved from his old shop at 50 Cornmarket Street and opened a new department store at 1–3 Broad Street in the western side of the newly built Boswell House. It was only in 1958, however, that an opening was made to join the two. and they remained united as Boswell's, Oxford’s largest independent department store, until its closure in April 2020.
Both Boswell’s and the Oxford Drug Company had been owned by the Pearson family from 1882 to 2020 (albeit that they were both each in different shops in Cornmarket until 1928). The photograph below shows 31 Cornmarket Street in 2012 when it was the side entrance to Boswell's:
Planning permission was granted in March 2021 (20/02480/FUL) to convert the whole of Boswell's including this former pharmacy facing Cornmarket into the Store Hotel. The hotel's restaurant is now in this 1912 shop at 31 Cornmarket Street and has been named Treadwell after the family who ran the wagon & van office on this site in the early nineteenth century.
Occupants of 31 Cornmarket Street listed in directories etc. |
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1839–1841 |
Ann Tredwell, Waggon & Van Office |
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1841–1857 |
Herbert & Embling, Cabinet Makers |
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1857–1880 |
Lowe & Heydon (1857–1859) James Stanley Lowe, Furnishing & general ironmonger (from 1860) |
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1882–1912 |
A. Pearson (later Pearson & Co), Ironmonger |
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Shop rebuilt in 1912 |
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1914–2020 |
The Oxford Drug Company, Chemists (“Arthur Pearson, M.A.” included in the description in 1921) |
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2021–2024 |
Undergoing building work |
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2024 |
Treadwell (the restaurant of the Store Hotel) |
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31 Cornmarket Street in the censuses
1841
Ann Tredwell (40), an office keeper, and Mary Tredwell, (20), a servant, lived here.
No one lived over this shop thereafter In 1851 it is described as a “House of business not slept in”. It is listed as uninhabited in 1861, 1881 and 1891 (and not listed at all in 1871), and in 1901 it was described as being uninhabited but in occupation.