Historic England welcomes plans for Great White Horse Hotel.

Historic England has praised the plans to transform a listed hotel where Charles Dickens stayed into apartments as a “welcome initiative”.

Last month, Ipswich Borough Council received plans to transform the Great White Horse Hotel on Tavern Street into 21 flats.

According to planning records, the proposal “seeks to secure the long-term future of the buildingthrough sensitive conversion that respects its historic significance while providing viable uses.”

The Great White Horse has welcomed some important historical individuals. (Image:

Lucy Taylor) As part of the consultations, Historic England was approached, and they responded that they would support the application.

They stated: “The Great White Horse has seen a long process of decline in the hotel and hospitality parts of the complex, and the retail premises have also become vacant.”

“The grade II* listed building is on Historic England’s Heritage at Risk register and despite previous proposals to repair and bring the building back into use the building has remained disused, vulnerable and deteriorating.”

The Great White Horse is included in the Heritage at Risk register.(Image: Newsquest)

While they claimed they welcomed the designs, they did point out that the concept for Flat Seven’s kitchen is “presently a single space with a chimney breast and evidence of its origins as a significant room”.

They stated that the subdivision of this space will include a bathroom and a utility cupboard.

John Howard(Image: Sarah Lucy Brown)

“We would therefore prefer to see this element removed to allow an open plan and the other bathroom used as a common one for the flat.”

The building was purchased in May by John Howard Property Group, with John Howard stating that the “ship might have sailed” on it being used as a hotel again, but in July he stated that a “very reputable hotel group” was eager to sign up an arrangement to run the hotel if it was renovated.

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