Holme Hall

Holme Hall is a country house incorporating a chapel, dating from approximately 1720-30, originally designed by William Wakefield for Lord Langdale. A chapel was added in 1766 by John Carr, and a later servants' wing was also constructed. The main house is brick, rendered on the front, with plain tile and Westmorland slate roofs. The chapel and servants’ wing are similarly roofed.

The house faces south, and the chapel is located to the northeast, with the servants' wing to the northwest. The entrance facade is symmetrical, with two storeys and five bays, extended by an additional bay to the right. Pilasters define the angles and the space between bays five and six. The central bay projects and features a pilastered porch housing a double leaf door with an overlight, set within an architrave. This is topped by a moulded cornice and a panel flanked by consoles. Plate-glass sash windows are found throughout, the ground floor sashes within architraves, and first-floor sashes with a band. A coved cornice and blocking course complete the facade. The roof is hipped, and stacks rise through the roof slope.

To the right of the house, connected by a two-bay linking passage featuring round-headed casements, is the chapel. Splayed steps lead to a pointed double leaf door within a crow-stepped porch. The gable end contains a semicircular window and is also crow-stepped, with four round-headed windows to the returns. The servants' wing, situated to the extreme right, has two storeys and four first-floor windows. It features 20th-century metal casements, except for a French door in the second bay of the ground floor. The wing has a hipped roof.

Inside, the entrance hall is panelled and includes Ionic pilasters on the side walls and a dentilled cornice. To the left is the Bishop's Parlour, also panelled, with a pedimented fireplace featuring a coved acanthus frieze. The main staircase is cantilevered, with an open string and three column-on-vase balusters per tread, alternating with twisted columns. The underside of the staircase head is coved, adorned with plaster swags and foliate motifs. The dining room features a skirting board carved with an acanthus motif, a dado rail, and plain panelling. It contains an elaborate doorcase with an egg-and-shell motif on the architrave and a foliate frieze for the overdoors. The fireplace has an elaborate acanthus console mantelpiece, a foliate plaque on the frieze, a richly carved pedimented chimney-piece with swags, a complex cornice with egg and acanthus motifs and carved modillions, and a panelled plaster ceiling with a foliate design. A second staircase has cast-iron balusters, while the back staircase has two column-on-vase balusters per tread.

The chapel’s key feature is the altar-piece in the form of a portico with an open pediment supported by pairs of fluted Corinthian columns. It includes alcoves to the side walls, a deep cornice, and a coved ceiling.