The Old York Tea Room on Goodramgate revealed some sad news to their customers today.
After a 9 month conflict, the tea room shared that they had lost the appeal for retrospective planning permission, to keep the signage on the front of their cafe.
The signage reads ‘The Old York Tea Room’ in black, traditional font, paired with a teapot, which is painted above their entrance.
This issue has been ongoing since last November, when someone complained to the council stating they had damaged a historic building with the painting.
Tony and Thomas Vickers took over the building in February 2023, which was originally built in 1316.
They decided to commission an artist to paint the sign on the building, which was met with some controversy.
Tony Vickers previously told YorkMix: “At the time, naively or not, we didn’t realise we’d need planning permission so we didn’t apply for it, we just went ahead and did the sign.
“A couple of months later a certain individual decided to do a one-man protest outside our building holding up a cardboard sign calling us vandals and went to the local press with it.
“He then got his friends on board and went to the council complaining about our signage saying that it was a detriment to York and we had damaged a historic building, which we believe is complete nonsense.
“In light of that, we put in a retrospective planning application in April.”
On November 13 2023, Becky Eades, Head of development and planning services at City of York Council wrote to the pair refusing planning permission.
The letter read: “The painted signage applied to the rendered elevations of this Grade I listed building, due to the excessive scale and the extent of the signage and its role as precedent for further signage to the upper façade which cumulatively would dominate the front of the overall building, detracts from the building’s exceptionally fine architectural and historic character and its setting within the Central Historic Core Conservation Area.”
Tony Vickers disagreed with the refusal, due to the paint not touching any listed material at all.
“This is brand new render that was applied just over two years ago.
“The only thing that’s changed on the building is the aesthetic look of it.”
Regardless of Tony and Thomas fighting the decision, earlier on today, they revealed that they had lost the appeal.
Posting the update on their Facebook page, they wrote that they had an important announcement to share.
The post read: “We have lost our appeal to keep our signage on The Old York Tea Room.
Should anyone want to take a photo of this beautiful piece of York’s history then we suggest you do it soon. We are both very disappointed by the decision and it could not have come at a worse time.”
The pair are currently going through hardship, with the tea room temporarily closed due to a family illness.
Attached to the Facebook post were images of the transcript they received, which listed fourteen reasons as to why the appeal has been dismissed.
The reasons included: ‘It detracts and distracts from the simple architectural form, character, appearance of the building. It therefore has a harmful impact on the special interest of the listed building.
And: ‘Whilst all proposals are treated on their merits it seems to me that the acceptance of the advertisement would set an undesirable precedent for similar further works which would cumulatively cause very significant harm.’
The Facebook update was met with 500+ (and counting) reactions, comments, and shares from disheartened customers.
Some of the comments read:
‘That’s ridiculous and so unfair. You are the reason your cafe is popular, not the sign. The window/shop will shine still because you are behind it all.’
‘This is so disappointing. Of course, I disagree with the contention that the signage does considerable harm to the building and distracts from its historic significance. But then again, I have zero power or influence in the city of York. Sorry, my friends.’
A local artist, BethJCreate, even offered her services for free to help the much-loved business owners: ‘It probably won’t even be on your minds right now and I’m really sorry if I’m overstepping here, but in the future if you were looking to get new signage and if this required a new logo of some kind, I’d be happy to help if I can, completely free of charge.’
Judging from the reaction on social media alone, the pair have built an extremely loyal customer base who will support the business regardless of the signage.
For updates on their journey, and reopening information, follow their Facebook page here.