Across the river from Bath was the sprawling estate of Bathwick. This was inherited by Frances Pulteney in 1767. Her husband, William, planned to develop her estate, linking it directly to the thriving city. Bath was already experiencing a building boom, although the only existing link between the city and Bathwick was by ferry.

Pulteney began negotiations with the council about constructing a new bridge, but after consulting with the Adam brothers in 1770, the plans took on a dramatic change.

Pulteney had approached the Adams with a view to developing the "new town" of Bathwick. Robert Adam, who was well travelled, suggested a beautiful design to rival bridges he’d seen in Florence and Venice. He favoured Andrea Palladio’s Rialto design, which had been dismissed by the Italian authorities as being too ornamented. Pulteney wanted to incorporate houses onto the bridge structure, but Bath council were aghast at the idea, seeing as how London had taken years to clear slum dwellings, public houses, and brothels from the bridges that crossed the Thames.

They protested vehemently to Pulteney, but his mind was set. He envisaged a row of 11 shops on each side with Venetian windows giving view to the river below and matching doorways facing the street.

Pulteney completed the bridge in 1773. Tenants for the shops were slow to come forward in light of the American War of Independence, which had shocked local development in the city to a virtual standstill. Therefore, although the bridge was finished, the plans to develop Bathwick were shelved, leaving the bridge leading from the city to meadows rather than the envisaged new town.

Development eventually started in 1788 under the plans of Thomas Baldwin, a local architect. In February 1792, Adam died leaving the bridge to Baldwin’s mercy. He and Pulteney immediately transformed the roof and windows to allow larger shops. Commercially, it made sense; architecturally, it was a disaster.

This was the first of many such "desecrations." In 1799, a pier collapsed after a flood followed by the remaining pier in 1800. The north-side houses were so badly damaged that Pulteney considered demolishing the entire structure, replacing it with an iron-span bridge, courtesy of one Thomas Telford.

Eventually, just the north side was rebuilt, reducing Adam’s design to a shambles. The 19th-century shopkeepers replaced windows and altered designs, and by the early 20th century, the bridge bore little resemblance to its original design.

The council intervened, as it already owned several of the shops on the bridge. It bought the remainder, and its surveyors designed a restored façade, installed for the Festival of Britain in 1951. Finally, in 1975, the Georgian Group restored the south side of the bridge to return it to its original splendour.