Black and White House Museum

The Black and White House Museum - also known as 'the Old House' - has been called 'a perfectly preserved Jacobean timber-framed house'. It is a place which vividly tells both it's own immensely varied story and nearly four centuries of Hereford's history.

Built in 1621 as a showpiece residence and shop embedded in the city-centre Butcher's Row, the house probably witnessed street fighting during the English Civil War. After very narrowly escaping the destruction which overtook its neighbours in the early 1800s, it was left standing alone. Then, as successively a saddlers, fish and hardware shop, it served Hereford's busy Victorian market, before being radically altered to house a bank. Generously donated to the city in 1927, it was carefully restored and furnished as a museum. This has recently been updated to give modern visitors a taste of what life was like in 17th century Hereford.