Rufford New Hall

A country house, now a hospital, dating to 1760 with additions in 1798, and subsequently enlarged and altered. The building is constructed of brick, originally stuccoed but now roughcast, with a low-pitched hipped slate roof hidden behind a low parapet. The main block has an irregular plan with extensions to the rear (northwest), presenting a five-bay facade to the southeast, and return walls of eight bays to the left and six bays to the right. The house is two storeys high and symmetrical. A four-column tetrastyle Ionic portico, with unfluted columns, shelters a wide tripartite doorway surmounted by a segmental fanlight (now with glazed doors). The windows are sash windows with 15 panes on the ground floor and 12 panes above. Some windows on the left return have been altered or obscured by a fire escape leading from the second window, which is enclosed in translucent corrugated sheeting. A modern two-story verandah with a glazed outer screen completely covers the left return wall. The right return wall mirrors the front, but features an extended six-column hexastyle Ionic portico covering four bays. Attached to the rear corner of the left return wall is a service wing featuring an Ionic colonnade now enclosed with glazed screening on its inner side. This colonnade continues inside, forming a distyle in antis Ionic screen at the lower end of the rear of two interconnected rooms, a ballroom and an ante-room. The ballroom has a modillioned cornice, original double doors leading to the front room, a moulded plaster cornice, and simple oval and circular ceiling moulding. The former entrance hall is a spacious rectangular room with a domed oval skylight, a flying stone staircase and landing on three sides, and wrought iron balusters. The house was built by Sir Robert Hesketh and enlarged by his grandson between 1798 and 1799, at which point the Hesketh family ceased using Rufford Old Hall as their residence.