School Adjoining Wesleyan Memorial Church

SE 7803-7903 EPWORTH HIGH STREET (south side)

20/78 School adjoining Wesleyan Memorial Church

GV II

School. 1888-9 by Charles Bell. Rock-faced ashlar to front and sides, yellow brick to rear; ashlar dressings throughout. Welsh slate roofs. Rectangular on plan: schoolroom with 3 adjoining single-room wings to north, main entrance lobby and covered annexe to right adjoining Wesleyan Memorial Church (qv), small hall and outhouses adjoining to rear. Forms south side of courtyard. Tall single-storey schoolroom with lower single-storey front wings and adjoining ranges. North front: 3 adjoining single-bay wings flanked by main entrance lobby to right, secondary entrance set back to left. Chamfered plinth, quoins. Gabled wings each have single 3-light ashlar mullioned-and-transomed window with pointed lights beneath pointed rusticated arches, linked by a flush ashlar band at impost-eaves level. Central gable is topped by a tall stepped stack with ashlar offsets and triple cylindrical shafts; flanking wings have string courses and blind quatrefoil panels beneath stone-coped gables with shaped kneelers and trefoil finials. Low single-storey range to right has main entrance breaking forward with double board doors with ornate wrought ironwork in pointed double-chamfered arch with hoodmould and carved stops beneath coped gable; twin lancets to right with hoodmould. Section to right adjoining church has 3-light mullioned-and-transomed window with pointed lights. Secondary entrance to schoolroom to left has chamfered rounded-trefoil arch with pointed hoodmould, and board door with ornate wrought ironwork, beneath moulded string course and coped parapet. East gable end: schoolroom has large pointed 4-light plate-traceried window with pointed transomed lights beneath moulded string course and foiled round light, hoodmould and head stops; pierced quatrefoil above. South side (rear) has projecting central gabled wing with traceried ashlar oculus, flanked by single buttresses and 3-light mullioned-and-transomed windows to each side beneath segmental arches. School room and smaller hall adjoining to east both have coped gables with shaped kneelers and trefoil finials. Interior: largely unaltered, with corbelled arch-braced roof to schoolroom, panelled ceilings, panelled doors, etc. Part of an unusually ornate group of Methodist buildings, erected in commemoration of the founder of Methodism, John Wesley (1703-91), and the Wesley family of Epworth. Included for group value.

Listing NGR: SE7812203837