The Old Vicarage

The Old Vicarage is a house built between 1853 and 1854 by William Butterfield for William Henry Dawnay, seventh Viscount Downe, and constructed by Charles Ward of Lincoln. Later alterations occurred in the 20th century, including the addition of an entrance porch. The building is constructed of red brick in English bond, with a Welsh slate roof. It is rectangular in plan, with a double-depth, two-room central entrance-hall to the north front and a two-room principal south garden front.

The south front has two storeys and three irregular bays, with a projecting full-height gabled bay to the left and a projecting gabled wing to the right. A tall, central six-pane square-headed stair window with 20th-century glazing is present. The wing to the right features a ground-floor canted bay window with hollow-chamfered timber mullions; three-light sash to the front and single-light sashes with glazing bars to the sides, all set beneath projecting pointed arches supporting a hipped roof. A pointed three-light first-floor window, with a brick header arch and 20th-century glazing, is also present. The bay to the left has a square ground-floor bay window with a central glazed door flanked by twelve-pane sashes in architraves, beneath a timber lintel. There are six-pane sashes to the side, a moulded wooden cornice, and a hipped roof; a three-light first-floor window with 20th-century glazing is set within the original opening beneath a soldier arch. A rainwater head in the centre bears the Downe monogram and coronet. The steeply pitched roof is half-hipped to the right wing. Buttressed and corniced end stacks are present, one to the left with tumbled-in brick to the offsets, and a similar axial stack to the right wing. Contemporary single-storey outhouses adjoin the left side.

The north front features an unsympathetic 20th-century timber porch and lobby extension over the original segmental-pointed entrance, which has a part-glazed six-panelled door in a chamfered surround. A pair of narrow sashes with glazing bars sit beneath a pointed relieving arch, alongside two 20th-century inserted windows. The first floor has a pointed three-light window with 20th-century glazing to the left and four sashes with glazing bars to the right, beneath raised eaves. The left cross wing has a hipped roof, and an axial stack is present to the right.

A single-storey and attic coach-house adjoins the right side, with a buttress to the north-west corner. Plate-glass windows have been inserted in the former entrance to the north gable end, with a two-fold pointed loft door above, and a pair of board doors to the right return. The roof is steeply pitched.

Internally, the building was altered in the 20th century, but retains its original staircase with a tall shafted balustrade and a moulded dado rail in the entrance hall. Panelled doors are also present. The building is contemporary with the neighbouring church and school, and has similar groupings at nearby Hensall (North Yorkshire) and Pollington.