Colwick Hall

Colwick Hall is a country house, now operating as a restaurant, dating from the early 18th century. It was significantly remodelled in 1776 for John Musters, by the architect John Carr and the builder Samuel Stretton. A rainwater head dated 1776 bears the monogram JWM. A later 18th-century screen and colonnade were added to the north front. The house was converted for its current use in the mid-20th century.

The building is constructed of red brick with ashlar dressings and has hipped slate roofs. There are six ridge stacks, built of ashlar and brick, mostly truncated. The exterior features a plinth, quoins, an eaves cornice, and pierced balustrades. The windows are largely glazing bar sashes with moulded surrounds.

The central block is two storeys high with single-storey wings extending from either side. The north front has a recessed centre with five windows, flanked by wings three windows wide and two windows deep. A Doric screen and colonnade, five bays wide, covers a renewed glazed door. The south front incorporates a main block of nine windows, with Ionic corner pilasters. A central Ionic portico, topped with a pediment containing a round window decorated with Rococo leafwork, provides access. Ground floor windows have cornices, with the windows flanking the portico altered to form French windows. Side wings, single storey and five bays wide, feature round-arched windows divided by Doric pilasters. The central window of the right wing has also been altered to a French window.

The interior remains largely unaltered and is decorated in the Adam style. The entrance hall has plaster panelled walls with a frieze, a dentilled cornice, an enriched wooden fireplace, and five enriched doorcases with cornices. An adjoining room features similar decoration and a marble fireplace. The stairwell contains a branching main staircase with three fluted balusters per tread, a dentilled cornice and a ceiling with a central fan boss. The former library to the south has an anthemion frieze and columnated screens at each end. Fitted bookcases in a Chinese style are found at the east end, along with an original marble fireplace and two enriched doorcases with six-panel doors. The ballroom to the southwest has apsidal ends with Corinthian columnated screens, a dentilated cornice, and a coved ceiling, with an inlaid marble fireplace. A minor, early 18th-century stone cantilever staircase, with a wrought-iron balustrade, is located to the east.