Clay House

Clay House, now used as a museum, clinic, meeting hall, and flat, was built around 1650 for John Clay. The south front is of dressed stone, with finer ashlar to the east wing return wall and hammer-dressed stone to the west wing return wall and rear. It has a stone slate roof. The house has an unusual plan, featuring a four-roomed front with four identical gables. There are two entrances, and mullioned and transomed windows with a king-mullion to both floors of 16 lights, except for a thinner bay which has a 26-light window to the main hall, with a 20-light window above. Cross windows over each doorway have cambered dripmoulds with circular stops and shaped architraves with decorated lintels. All gables have a stepped attic window of three lights with arched heads, copings, and a finial to the apex. A continuous round building exhibits a weathered plinth and string course with a cavetto section above the ground floor windows. First floor windows have hoodmoulds over with heart-shaped stops to the front range and circles to the rear. The rear has four gables with kneelers surmounted by ball finials and some double chamfered mullioned windows.

At the northeast corner of the house is the kitchen, which has a large gable stack, and a drain spout projects from the east wall at floor level. Several other stacks are present, but the main hall stack runs horizontally along the ridge, parallel with the south front, at the junction of the third bay with the east wing, in line with the main entry door. This door leads directly into a hall that was much altered circa 1873.

The hall is lit by windows on both the south and north sides and is open to the first floor with a gallery on three and a half sides, approached by a close-string staircase with turned balusters and a moulded band-rail. A large fireplace has a depressed arch, moulded jambs, and a lintel with spiral terminals. The hall retains some original two-panel doors with round and ogee heads. A stone reset reads 'IMC 1661'. A hall window has a painted panel depicting the Clay coat of arms and the date 'IMC 1675'. Etched in glass are the lines: "Where e'er she treads the blushing Flowrs shall rise and all things prosper where she turns her Eyes." The house may have originally been designed as two dwellings. John Clay died in 1654, leaving to Margaret, his son's widow, £10 a year and the east end of the "newly builded house".