All Saints School

All Saints School

A house now used as a school, built around 1850 by architects J B and W Atkinson for C H Elsey, with later alterations in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The building is constructed in beige brick in Flemish bond with a painted moulded stone plinth band and painted stone dressings. The ground floor of the centre block and porch are of painted rusticated stone. The roof is shallow pitched hipped slate with wide eaves on shaped brackets. Red brick screen walls in random bond stand at the front, with moulded brick plinth and moulded stone plinth band and coping.

The exterior presents a striking composition of two storeys on a high basement plinth, with parts rising to attic level. A three-window centre block is flanked by angled two-bay wings articulated with pilaster strips and clasping pilasters. A projecting two-storey one-bay closed porch in the centre is supported by rusticated pilaster piers at the corners, which carry an incised panel frieze and low parapet on a moulded cornice with dentils that break forward over the piers. The three-leaf panelled door has a tall two-light round-arched overlight. Ground floor windows flanking the porch are narrow twelve-pane sashes. First floor windows are standard twelve-pane sashes, while attic windows are squat six-pane sashes with painted stone lintels and sill bands. The flanking wings display round-arched sash windows with blind or radial glazed heads on both floors of the inner bays, with paired twelve-pane sashes in the outer bays.

The rear of the left wing shows a two-storey five-bay front opening onto a terrace over the basement. The ground floor features large-pane French doors or two-light casement windows with plain semicircular overlights in enlarged round-arched openings that break into the moulded plinth band. First floor windows are twelve-pane sashes over a moulded sill band.

The rear of the right wing displays two storeys with basement and attics in a one-three-one bay articulation with pilaster strips. Basement windows are unequal hung sashes. On the ground floor, the outer bays each contain a sash window—sixteen-pane to the left, four-pane to the right—framed in sunk panelled pilaster surrounds with entablatures and shallow pediments. First floor windows are single sixteen-pane sashes, with squat six-pane sashes in the attic. The centre ground floor contains a blind round-arched recess between twelve-pane sash windows. The first floor has three twelve-pane sashes, and the attic has squat six-pane sashes with shaped lintels flanking the blind recess. First floor and attic windows feature sill bands. The centre rear section rises two storeys over two bays. To the left are three tall segment-arched openings, the centre containing a glazed and panelled door and the outer ones containing sash windows; above are three tall round-headed sash windows with a painted stone sill band. On the ground floor to the right is a canted bay window with sash windows and overhanging bracketed eaves; the first floor contains a single twelve-pane sash. Unless otherwise indicated, all windows have flat arches of brick and painted stone sills.

The interior preserves substantial original features. The vestibule contains an inner front doorcase with sunk panel piers topped by domed caps. Walls are panelled with doorcases featuring sunk panel doors and overdoors of eight-point stars in moulded circular surrounds beneath segmental pediments. Pilasters with paired brackets at the head support a moulded cornice and beams to a coffered ceiling. At the foot of the stairs, pilasters with moulded capitals support a single quadripartite vault. Over the staircase are three bays of tunnel vaulting. The back staircase rises to the attic around a top-lit open well and has an open string, square bobbin balusters, and a serpentine ramped-up handrail.

The lower ground floor lobby features panelled pilasters with moulded imposts and a single column pier with paterae necking that support a coffered ceiling formed by moulded beams carried on segmental arches. At the head of the stairs is a semicircular domed niche with paterae in the spandrels and an enclosed eight-point star in the tympanum. Rooms in the right wing have moulded ceiling cornices and panelled window shutters; one contains a plain marble fireplace with an ornate cast-iron grate.

On the ground floor, the landing features twin round arches on panelled pilasters with moulded imposts providing access to upper and lower floors. An enclosed straight staircase with blind balustrades and attached square newels is approached through one. A moulded impost band forms the cornice to doorcases with panelled friezes and six-panel recessed doors in panelled reveals. A moulded cornice frames a plaster moulded ceiling with a central rose. A partitioned area has panelled window shutters and a plaster ceiling. The front room in the left wing has a segment-arched recess with moulded soffit, some panelled shutters, and a coved moulded ceiling. The rear rooms in the left wing both have panelled shutters; the small room has a plain plaster ceiling. The large room contains three richly carved doorcases with cornices on console brackets and moulded segmental pediments, with doors of six moulded panels. A white marble fireplace features pilaster jambs and a frieze with yellow and grey marble inlay and carved floral motifs. On each side are tall round-headed cupboards with panelled lower doors and small-pane radial glazed upper doors. The room is completed by a richly moulded plaster frieze and panelled ceiling.

On the first floor, the landing has panelled doors in architraves with semicircular moulded overdoors enclosing roundels and an impost band. It is lit from above by a small radial glazed domed lantern with a floret at its centre. A room in the right wing has a plain fireplace and meagre moulded cornice. The attic in the right wing has a roof carried on king post trusses.

This house represents an important work by two highly regarded local architects, J B and W Atkinson, who were the grandsons of John Carr's first assistant, Peter Atkinson. They carried on his practice, founded in the mid-18th century, which continues to survive today. The fine interior remains substantially intact.