Aykley Heads

DURHAM AND FRAMWELLGATE NORTH ROAD NZ 24 SE (East side)

4/294 Aykley Heads 30/4/71 GV II*

House, later council offices. Circa 1700 rear wing; mid C18 extensive additions; early C19 front and alterations. Rendered; rear wing sandstone rubble with brick dressings; ashlar porch; Graduated Lakeland slate roof with rendered chimneys. Irregular plan approximately 3 ranges round a yard with right set-back wing. 2 storeys; 7 irregular bays in front range; set- back 3-bay wing. Entrance porch in second bay of right wing has central half-glazed door, in wooden Tuscan porch with bracketed canopy, flanked by 2 slit windows under cornice and blocking course. Elliptical-headed sash window with glazing bars above; left bay has quadrant extrusion containing one sash with glazing bars and projecting stone sill on each floor; right bay blank. 7-bay front range further left has blank ground floor and irregularly-spaced, renewed first-floor windows. Right return of wing has cast iron loggia with scrolled brackets and balconies, Gothic capitals to columns, pierced first floor band. Steeply-pitched roofs are hipped; rear end of left rear range has small ashlar bellcote inscribed F D I (Francis D. Johnson lived here in mid C19).

Interior: hall wood-panelled below, plaster above, contains large wood Jacobean-style chimney-piece and overmantel; cantilevered stair has wreathed handrail and curtail; stucco panelling to walls and ceilings. Room to right of hall contains much Baroque stucco decoration with high relief fruit and flower garlands framing doors, mirror and decorative panels; enriched mouldings to doors and windows which have shutters and soffits enriched; modillioned frieze and elaborate ceiling decoration.

Rooms to left of hall have ornament of simpler type in stucco, with one mirror framed in stucco drapery, several cornices, and ceiling decoration. Hall at rear of this block has large fluted Ionic Venetian window and open-string stair with ramped handrail; modillioned cornice to ceiling with central acanthus leaf ornament. Rear left wing has close-string stair with ramped handrail and balusters boarded over; and a second stair with flat handrail and square newels. One rear central sash with broad glazing bars.

Empty and decaying at time of survey.

Listing NGR: NZ2651743844