Westbourne House

LANCASTER

SD46SE WESTBOURNE ROAD 1685-1/1/316 (South side) Westbourne House

II

House, now nursery school. 1882, altered C20. Mass concrete, rendered and painted, with slate roofs. 2 storeys plus attic above cellars. Entrance front, facing west, has 3-stage tower to the right under a slated pyramidal tent roof. It is blind except for a narrow window on the ground floor and has moulded string courses, and is decorated with buttresses on the 1st floor and recessed panels with lozenge decoration on the 2nd floor. The main range, to the left, is of 2 bays and has a wide projecting single-storey porch with a blind recess, a 2-light mullioned window, and a right-hand doorway. Below the parapet are square panels decorated with quatrefoils and rosettes. The garden front, facing south, has a rectangular bay window projection against lower storey of the tower, and 2 windows to each of the upper storeys. To the right is a 2-storey canted bay window below a gable. INTERIOR: entrance hall has inscription 'EBD 1882' in mosaic tiles. The staircase has turned balusters, and pitch-pine handrails and newels. The newels are stop-chamfered and terminate with 4 gablets surrounding a central knob. The cellars have ample headroom, and the concrete of the walls is visible in places. HISTORY: built for a member of the Dawson family of Aldcliffe Hall, who are said to have experimented with the use of concrete for other buildings on their estate.

Listing NGR: SD4672061275