Wakefield Independent School Chapelthorpe Hall

Wakefield Independent School, Chapelthorpe Hall

A large house, now converted to a school with a flat occupying the first floor of the south front. The building is a 17th-century house that was largely rebuilt in the mid to late 18th century, with a substantial extension added to the rear around 1850 that created a new north front. It is constructed of ashlar with stone slate roofs.

The south front presents a symmetrical seven-bay facade of two storeys. It has a plinth, ground-floor sill band, and eaves cornice. The central doorway is approached by two wide shallow steps and has a Tuscan porch. The ground-floor windows are articulated with architraves, friezes and cornices, while the first-floor windows have raised plain stone surrounds. All windows retain their original small-paned rectangular sashes. A hipped roof with a ridge stack positioned between the fourth and fifth bays tops this elevation. The left-hand return displays a tall external 17th-century stack with offsets, and the roofline of the earlier gabled house remains visible above it. To the left of this stack is an added gabled bay of circa 1850, set at right angles, with a blocked doorway with tie-stone jambs to its left and a sash window above, with a matching window on the first floor. This section has a gable stack. The right-hand return comprises four bays, with the ground floor articulated by Tuscan pilasters with an entablature cornice and blocking course. The first three bays are blind, while the fourth projects and contains a window. The first floor has three square sash windows with raised surrounds, and the roof is hipped with a stack.

The north front, created by the circa 1850 extension, is a five-bay symmetrical facade. It features a chamfered plinth, rusticated quoins, a first-floor sill band, frieze and eaves cornice. A central pedimented bay projects slightly with quoined angles and a doorway having an eared architrave, pulvinated frieze and cornice on consoles. The flanking ground-floor bays contain windows with similar surrounds. The first floor has windows set in architraves with projecting sills on sill blocks. A hipped roof with two tall well-dressed stacks crowns this elevation. To the right stands a two-bay, three-storey wing, slightly set back, with windows having plain raised surrounds and a balustraded parapet. Attached to its far right is a lower two-storey service wing, now a single bay but originally longer, with similar windows and gutter brackets. All windows throughout retain their original small-paned glazed sashes. The left-hand return of the north front comprises three similarly fenestrated bays, with a single centrally-placed ground-floor window and three first-floor windows, with an end stack.

The interior of the south front is entered through a doorway leading into a large 19th-century entrance hall featuring a semicircular arch and a good carved wooden fireplace with fluted Roman Doric columns. Doorways throughout have architraves and six-panel doors, with a plaster frieze. An open-well stair at the junction of the two ranges has vase-shaped balusters, a moulded handrail and newels. At first-floor level are semicircular-arched recesses to each side, flanked by doorways with architraves. The stair has a carved ribbed ceiling with a central glazed lantern tower.

Two chambers within the 18th-century range retain their original decoration. The first, occupying the first two bays, has a panelled dado and a fireplace with architrave and cornice, architraves to windows and two doorways, and a moulded plaster cornice. The second chamber, occupying the fifth, sixth and seventh bays, is of good proportions and features a segmental recess containing a fine carved wooden fireplace decorated with festoons. This fireplace is flanked by doorways with architraves and six-panel doors with raised-and-fielded panels.