Aslackby Manor House

Aslackby Manor House is a Grade I listed building of major architectural importance, representing an outstanding example of Fen Artisan Mannerism. The house has a complex building history spanning from the 16th century to the 20th century, with substantial phases of construction and alteration.

The main structure is built in a T-plan. The western part consists of a 16th-century timber frame hall house, later encased in coursed limestone rubble during the 18th century. This section is now two storeys and three bays, with a plinth. The entrance doorway to the right has a segmental head, overlight and plank door. Two two-light casements with segmental heads are positioned to the left, with three two-light casements above featuring wooden lintels.

The most architecturally significant element is the 17th-century red brick cross wing, executed in the Fen Artisan Mannerist style. This wing comprises two storeys with an attic and a rubble plinth. The south end has two bays with two three-light casements with transoms and segmental heads, featuring broad raised moulded brick keystones. Two similar windows appear above, with a single smaller comparable window in the garret. The wall space between windows is richly articulated with meandering bands, pilasters, rectangular plaques, shields and simple squat pendentives, all moulded in brick.

The east front of six irregular bays is particularly elaborate. A doorway to the left has a moulded wooden doorcase, plank door, and a raised brick moulded keystone set high above, probably originally part of an external porch no longer extant. Two two-light cross mullion windows flank this doorway to the left, with two three-light windows with transoms beyond to the right. All ground floor windows feature segmental heads and broad raised moulded brick keystones. Above runs a meandering moulded first floor brick band. The first floor has two cross mullion windows with wooden lintels to the left, with two moulded brick shields. Three shields appear to the right, followed by a three-light window with transom and flat band above, two moulded brick shields, a four-light window with transom, and three further moulded brick shields. A single three-light attic casement with segmental head sits in a small gable above the fourth bay from the left.

The north end displays a single two-light sliding sash with segmental head to the right, with a meandering first floor band above. Three pilasters alternate with four shields, with a triangle above those broken through by a single central pilaster, all in moulded brick. A brick moulded oval staircase window appears in the narrow north-west side.

An early 19th-century range is attached to the right, with a doorway to the left featuring a segmental head and plank door. Two three-light sliding sashes with segmental heads sit to the right, with three two-light sliding sashes with wooden lintels above. A 14th-century rubble wall continues to the right with a line of quoins and a simple doorway beyond.

The roof structure combines plain tiled roofs with stone coped west gables and ornate brick Dutch gables to north and south, with two gable and single ridge stacks, two having paired angle shafts.

Internally, the cross wing retains a two-storey timber frame box panelled wall just to the west of where the wing was added to the 16th-century hall. The dining room features mid-18th-century fielded pine panelling with marbling, marbled fluted pilasters between the windows, and a fireplace with three panels of studs and half circles, also marbled. The first floor parlour contains early 18th-century fielded oak panelling with a bolection moulded fireplace with mantle, moulded doorcase, and bolection moulded cornice. Various chamfered beams with triangular stops are visible throughout.

The 16th-century wing retains smoke blackened roof timbers showing signs of having been truncated to the west with some reassembling. Single purlins sit on each side, tie beams remain intact, though collars were replaced in the 20th century.