This collection consists of images from historic building recording work at the Air Balloon Public House, Birdlip, Gloucestershire. Works were undertaken by Cotswold Archaeology in December 2022, preserving the building by record prior to its demolition as part of the A417 Missing Link road infrastructure scheme.

The building was a public house established in the 18th century at a hilltop junction on Crickley Hill, on the former Gloucester to Oxford and Cheltenham to Bath turn pike roads. The building lies within an area that has been subject to investigations carried out to inform the Development Consent Order, which established that heritage assets would be affected by the construction of the scheme.

The recording found that the Building was likely one or two 17th or early 18th century cottages with brewing spaces (as a modest drover’s refreshment stop) prior to it being formally converted to an inn in c.1777. Its conversion was catalysed by improvements in the road network due to turnpiking and increased road maintenance, carriage technology and its strategic location on the convergence of three key historic routes accessing Wales, Gloucester, Cheltenham and the Cotswolds. The Building’s fabric has seen much refurbishment, alteration and extension, and these appear to have been directly associated with the development of the road network and the changing transport and leisure industries.