The Painted Room, 16th century
No. 1 Church Lane is one of the most interesting yet mysterious buildings in Ledbury. The spot where it stands, at the junction of the 'kings highway' and the east/west track from Hereford Cathedral to Ledbury Parish Church, has undoubtedly been the site of continuous human activity for more than a thousand years. In Elizabethan times, Ledbury was a small town of some 600 to 650 people, and the market and religious centre for a further 880 rural parishioners; some 1500 in all. Yet, despite having records for Ledbury going back to 1557 and beyond, for this building - unlike others around it, we have as yet found no exact record; neither its purpose nor who lived here.
By the end of the 15th century painted wallpapers stuck directly to the walls are known to have existed in England but none have, as yet, been found to survive. By the 16th century, in the mansions and great houses of England, wall hangings of tapestry, painted cloth or leather had long served both as decoration and draught ~ protectors. A 16th century Dutch or German School picture in what was, until recently, the East German State Art Collection at Kassel, of Queen Elizabeth I receiving emissaries from the Netherlands in her Privy Chamber in c.1585, shows the room had wall-hangings strikingly like those imitated here; a valance along each wall at ceiling height covering the tops of the main hangings that reached from ceiling to floor, all decorated with flowers and leaves on a dark blue/black background. In Ledbury, however, there are notable differences. This was not the 'great house' of a queen or a rich magnate but the working home of a townsman who copied, in paint, the trappings of importance. Below the Painted Room, the Town Clerk's office (not on exhibition) is a panelled, carved and columned room. In this upper chamber the 'hangings' have been painted only to some 3 feet from the floor. Originally below that was a painted dado (the one remaining part of it can be seen in the far corner beyond the fireplace) intended to represent another panelled room, this time fashionable with wall cloths.
Significantly, the texts were executed by a hand far more competent in lettering than that which painted the main decorations. Even the best painters of the 16th century were but 'artisans' who worked, anonymously, to order. Their work is identifiable by style and brushstroke, but this room in Ledbury is not of that level of competence and we shall, almost certainly, find it impossible to name the executant. There was, however, a purpose both to the painting and the texts -a clear intention to impress on the beholder the tenets of Psalm and Proverb.
According to Ledbury Parish Church Archives, we learn from 'The Parish of Ledbury in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth l' by the late Miss S.F Robinson, there may have been built here a Booth Hall to replace the original early 15th century one sited where the Feathers Hotel now is. Such a use for this building - with its concern for the proper conduct of Ledbury's markets and fairs; market toll gathering; the Court of Piepowder*; control of vagrants and the distribution of poor law monies -might well account for the very particular choice of texts used in the Painted Room, with their emphasis on the good citizen, duty and love.
* The Court of Piepowder

The ancient court of rough and ready justice for all-comers to fairs and markets, particularly vagrants, wayfarers and itinerants -those with 'dusty feet' (from the Old French, 'Pied poudre.')' (Chambers 20th Century Dictionary, New Ed. 1988)