The Sash Rooms
First-floor rooms at the front of the house, each with a tall Georgian window over Norwich Street.
Newly acquired. Restoration pending
The King's Head, Dereham
A seventeenth-century coaching inn with a Georgian front door, soon to be brought back to life as a hotel, a bar and a place for Dereham's big occasions.
Four hundred years on Norwich Street
The King's Head has stood a short walk from Dereham's market place since the seventeenth century. It fed and housed travellers on the Norwich road, kept a bar for the town, and hosted quiz nights, wedding breakfasts and arts festival evenings within living memory.
Then it closed. We're Polla Hospitality Limited, and we've bought it to put it right: proper bedrooms, a bar that's open to the whole town, a dining room, and function rooms worth dressing up for. The brick, the pantiles and the Georgian doorcase stay exactly as they are. Everything behind them gets the care it's been waiting for.
Rooms
Bedrooms under the pantiles and behind the sashes, to be restored one at a time. Wide boards, deep beds, good showers, and windows that open onto a market town rather than a car park.
The Dormers
Attic rooms tucked into the roof, with sloping ceilings and the two dormer windows the listing mentions by name.
The Garden Rooms
Quieter rooms at the back, looking over the long garden. The pick for a wedding party or a lie-in.
Room names, rates and booking will open here as each room is finished.
Function rooms for Dereham's occasions
Weddings, wakes, christenings, birthdays, club dinners and Christmas parties. A room with a bar, a kitchen behind it and a garden outside.
Our main room is named for William Cowper, the poet who spent his last years in Dereham and is buried in St Nicholas' Church a few minutes' walk away.
| Drinks reception | 60 |
|---|---|
| Seated dinner | 50 |
| Theatre-style | 40 |
| Boardroom or U-shape | 30 |
Out in Norfolk
Dereham sits right in the middle of the county, which makes it the best base in Norfolk. The coast, the Brecks and the Broads are all within an hour.
Stay with us and spend the day on the north Norfolk coast, walking in Thetford Forest, or riding the Mid-Norfolk Railway from the station at the end of the street. We'll point you to the best of it and have the bar open when you get back.
Roughly how far from our front door
- Mid-Norfolk Railwayin town
- Norwich30 min
- Holt35 min
- Sandringham40 min
- Blakeney Point40 min
- Thetford Forest40 min
- Holkham Beach45 min
- Wells-next-the-Sea45 min
Drive times are approximate.
The restoration
We've only just taken the keys. Once work begins we'll post progress here: what we find under the floors, what the conservation officer says, and when the doors open again.
Who's leading the work
The team at Polla
Polla Hospitality Limited
The restoration is led by the team at Polla Hospitality, who bring long experience of restoring Georgian buildings and bringing them back into use, from town houses to castles.
That experience will shape the work here. Repair what's there before replacing it. Work closely with the conservation officer. And make sure the building can pay its way once the scaffolding comes down, because a listed building that earns its keep is one that gets looked after for the next hundred years.
For the King's Head, that means the brick, the pantiles, the sashes and the Georgian doorcase are repaired by people who know how. It also means a hotel, bar and function rooms that Dereham will actually use, with local jobs behind the bar, in the kitchen and across the house.
Built in brick
A two-storey house with attics goes up on the north side of Norwich Street, in red brick with a diamond pattern of dark headers.
A Georgian front
The bar casements and the pilastered doorway are added, giving the inn the face it still has today.
Listed Grade II
The building is added to the national list for its special architectural and historic interest.
Doors shut
After years as a hotel, bar and function venue, the King's Head closes and falls quiet.
Bought to be restored
Polla Hospitality Limited takes on the building, with plans to reopen it as a hotel and function rooms.
Restoration begins
Surveys, listed building consent and detailed plans agreed with the conservation officer come first. Then the work starts.
Reopening
We'll announce the date here first. Register below and you'll hear before anyone else.
Be first through the door
Leave your details for opening news, early room bookings, or to talk about a date for your function.
- AddressThe King's Head Hotel, 42 Norwich Street, Dereham, Norfolk NR19 1AD
- Emailhello@kingsheaddereham.co.uk
- FacebookThe King's Head Hotel Dereham