The renovation of a group of historic buildings has turned back the centuries in one of York's oldest and busiest streets, restoring timber-framed glories from the Tudor age.

The interior of one shop, a house in the days of Shakespeare, will by the end of the work have wooden beams protruding from the walls with white plaster in between, in the style of the 16th-century.

A sports shop, First Sport, and a women's fashion outlet, Barcelona-based Mango, are already scheduled to move into two of the four retail units on Coney Street, though the unit being taken back in time, number five, does not yet have an occupant.

York-based builder William Birch and Sons Ltd has been working on the units near the Guildhall, numbered three, five and seven in the street, since last August (1998).

The use of number five has varied down the years, as in 1872 the milliner Thomas Chambers plied his trade there before handing over to tailor William Siddall.

During the 1920s it became a bookseller before Rowntree's took over the property to convert it to a drapers and later a fashion store.

Many local people will remember when all the units formed the Debenhams department store in the mid to late 1970s.

During the work on number five a wooden door, which had been boarded over and is thought to be centuries old, has also been restored as a feature of the building.

William Birch's Alan Thompson said: "Allowing new retail units to retain their historic character gives York's shopping industry the edge over nearby industrial cities and we are delighted to have been involved in restoration work on such a famous street.

"Records show that drastic alterations have been made in modern times to convert these old houses to commercial use, including the insertion of shop windows on the ground floor."

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