Queen Street

The Improvement Commissioners (Victorian town planners) were also responsible for the construction of Queen Street, started in 1835 and completed in 1840. It ran from the High Street to the new, New North Road crossing the Longbrook Valley with a viaduct. Originally designed to link up with the Crediton and Barnstaple turnpikes, the coming of the railway, at St David's in 1844 increased the importance of the street. It was named in 1839 after Queen Victoria, who came to the thrown in 1837.

The first building on the left, Marks and Spencers has a 1980, white, precast concrete facsimile of the original building on the site, and a new corner section. Queen Victoria, who overlooks Queen Street, is a fibreglass copy of the original.

On the opposite corner, is what is considered to be one of the ugliest, modern buildings in Exeter, built for C & A and now housing Tesco and JJB sports. Wheatons and Boots both occupied this corner plot, part of the block between the High Street and Little Queen Street that was built between 1843 and 1849 by Nathaniel Cole. The demolition in 1971 was a totally unnecessary development sanctioned by a Council that is more concerned with rateable value than with a pleasant, well balanced townscape.

The Higher Market was originally designed by John Dymond, and completed by Devon born Charles Fowler, after Dymond died at the age of 38. The building displays a magnificent façade of Doric columns. Late in the 19th century, shops-fronts were installed along the Queen Street front of the market, requiring the removal of some pilasters on each side of the central Doric column area. Greenslades Tours, H Quick & Co wholesalers of leather, and others, traded from here. The market closed in 1962 and was incorporated into the Golden Heart project to construct the Guildhall Centre in the 1970s.

A little further up the street, the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, from 1869, is on the opposite side of the street. The 1879 Rougemont Hotel can be found opposite Central Station. The station was known as Queen Street Station before it burnt down in June 1927. It was rebuilt as the Central Station in 1934, with the new frontage on the road. Opposite the station, behind the Angel bar, was the Victoria Hall. Exeter's first film show was given here in October 1896 - the hall was also burnt down in 1919.

The last building of note is a lovely 19th-century stucco terrace of restaurants and offices, opposite the ugly modern telephone exchange and old job centre. The full stop of the Clocktower brings Queen Street to a close.

The artist and Mayor of Exeter in 1903, F J Widgery had his studio in Queen Street.