Shotley Hall

Shotley Hall is a house constructed in 1863 by the owner, Thomas Wilson. It is built of dressed sandstone with ashlar dressings, featuring a graduated lakeland slate roof and stone chimneys. The design is in a playful, Gothic style.

The house is two storeys and attics, with six irregular bays, a rounded corner tower bay to the left, and a projecting two-bay right wing. A flight of three steps leads to a 20-panelled double door set within an open gabled porch, featuring granite columns and carved capitals supporting a large, cusped two-centred arch. Windows are of 1, 2, and 3 lights, some with shouldered lintels, some with cusped heads, some under hoodmoulds, and some with column mullions. The right wing has a four-centred head over the door. There are three different attic gables, one hipped and one with a fishscale tympanum over a window. The right bay is single storey and attic only, with a half-dormer. The left corner tower has a moulded eaves corbel table and a pyramidal roof. A large stack is located at the end of the right wing, and tall ridge stacks are present throughout. The left return exhibits similar detailing. A rear wing containing a conservatory and billiard room has been demolished.

The interior retains a complete and largely unaltered array of original features, including a hall screen with a Frosterley Marble column and a stone stair with a wrought-iron balustrade. The drawing room has a carved marble fireplace, a deep moulded cornice, and a centre rose. The dining room features a similar cornice, painted in original colours, a panelled ceiling and a carved stone fireplace with good interior metalwork. Connected are a study and library containing carved bookcases with embossed leather dustflaps and two further stone fireplaces with good internal metalwork. All original fireplaces remain throughout the house, as does the original woodwork including elaborately-panelled doors and shutters, with those in the dining room being vertical sliding types concealed within the lower walls. Painted glass windowheads representing musicians and portrait heads adorn the principal ground-floor rooms, along with a Victorian bathroom with an enclosed shower cupboard.

The building is designated Grade II* for its exceptionally complete and unaltered interior.