The upper end of Vale Street is well known for its many fine eighteenth-century town houses. Many of these are brick-built in Flemish bond with sandstone quoins and plinths.
Gelli, Vale Street was once one of the grandest brick town houses in Vale Street, it is thought to have been originally built in 1574 by Hugh Clough, brother of Sir Richard Clough, whom he assisted with his merchant trading in the Low Countries.
A date-stone at the rear pronounces that Gelli was rebuilt in 1693 by 'T. & E. S.', probably referring to Thomas Shaw and his wife Ellen. He was Recorder of Denbigh and listed as Alderman and Bailiff in the late 1680s and 1690s.
Gelli is a brick-built, two and a half-storey house, of 'T' shape central entry and stair plan, with lateral chimneys and hip-roof. It has a symmetrical five-window front façade and central stair, both of mid-eighteenth-century appearance. The rear service wing has two centred arches and is probably of sixteenth-century date, as may be the lateral stone-built chimneys to the main front part. The front window openings have flat brick arches and projecting keystones with modern sashes. There are also sandstone quoins, strings and plinth and a deeply moulded modillion eaves timber. The superior quality main front roof is supported by tie beam and collar Queen-strut trusses with rafters morticed to purlins. There is an attractive brick-built, three-storey, summer-house/dovecote of late-seventeenth-century build in the former walled garden.
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