Prestwold Hall

Prestwold Hall is a Grade I listed building of considerable architectural and historical importance. It represents a significant example of William Burn's work as a country house architect during the early Victorian period.

The hall exists largely as remodelled by William Burn in 1842-4, though it incorporates a mid-18th century H-plan house that influenced both Burn's plan and his choice of classical style. Fragments of even earlier construction may survive within. Prestwold is notable as one of Burn's earlier English commissions and one of his few houses executed in a classical idiom. The earlier brick house was replaced and extended using Ancaster stone ashlar throughout, with angle quoins, sill courses and a modillion eaves cornice with balustraded parapets.

The entrance front faces west and rises three storeys with a 3-3-3 bay arrangement, the central bays being recessed. A projecting porte cochere with four Roman Doric columns, triglyph frieze and cornice marks the centre. Beneath stands a doorway flanked by windows, all with semi-circular arched heads and moulded stone aprons. The central first-floor windows of the projecting outer bays have pediments supported on consoles, while ground-floor windows have consoles supporting sills with moulded aprons. All windows are sashes in shouldered architraves. To the left, a Doric colonnade leads to the return wall of the stable yard, which features a shallow arch with projecting keystone, cornice and balustraded parapet. The flanking wall is relieved by projecting pilasters with plain frieze and cornice.

The garden front is three storeys with a 2-3-3-3 bay arrangement. Sash windows with shouldered architraves throughout. The outer three bays feature full-height segmental arched windows at ground floor. A conservatory of elegant Doric pilasters with glass and iron roof fills the recessed central three bays and projects slightly, with a cornice breaking forward over each pilaster. The central first-floor window above carries a pediment on consoles, and all second-floor windows are set on consoles.

The east front represents a completely new addition by Burn: one bay of ashlar with tripartite windows to each floor (full height at ground floor), followed by four bays of painted brickwork with stone architraves to windows, solid parapet and panelled ashlar chimneys flush with the wall face.

Internally, the entrance hall is the finest space, displaying richly coloured marble walls and a coffered ceiling painted in imitation of Raphael's Vatican grotesques, with arabesques and miniature landscapes depicting the house before and after restoration. Small medallion busts of poets are incorporated below. An arcade opens onto a vaulted corridor leading to a top-lit inner hall, these spaces also marbled. The library, drawing room and dining room feature plaster cornices, light plaster-panelled ceilings, fine doorcases and marble fireplaces. The library contains doors and bookcases from 1875 by Gillows. The cantilevered stone staircase survives from the 18th-century house; Wilkins added bracketed brass balusters circa 1805. Much concealed constructional cast iron is employed throughout, notably supporting the lantern of the inner hall.

The service wing extends to the rear (north) of the house, forming one range of the stable courtyard. Built by Burn and extended circa 1890, it rises two storeys in brick with slate roofs and features various doors and window openings with gauged brick heads, some later altered.