Gainsborough Quaker Meeting House

The Gainsborough Quaker Meeting House was built in 1704, with a single-storey schoolroom added to the north side in 1876, and a kitchen and toilet facilities added in the 20th century. The original small meeting house is constructed of red brick laid in a garden wall bond, with a pantile roof. The later extension is also of red brick and has a slate roof.

The building has a rectangular plan. The original meeting house is two storeys high and features a pitched pantile roof with a brick chimney stack at the south-east corner. The south front, which faces the burial ground, has rectangular sash windows on the ground floor, centrally and to the left. The central window has been narrowed and a small datestone sits above it. To the right is an upper-floor window with a small-paned sliding sash, and a blocked window below. A central doorway with an early 19th-century timber surround and a timber casement window above are on the east end wall. The west end abuts other buildings.

The north side, facing the street, is mostly hidden by the 1876 schoolroom and the 20th-century flat-roofed toilet extension behind it. The schoolroom has a pitched slated roof and a small-paned sash window in its gable end facing the street.

Inside the meeting room are plain plastered walls, a tall timber dado with perimeter seating, and a modern flat ceiling – the original ceiling remains above this. A bench for the Elders runs across the west end. It is likely from the early 19th century, constructed from painted timber with a tall panelled back, a moulded handrail with stick balusters, and a lower front rail with heavy turned end-newels. Small single seats are located at either end of the bench, an unusual feature.

A two-piered timber gallery occupies the east end of the room, with moulded capitals. The panelled gallery front has shutters to allow access to the upper space. The gallery staircase is a combination of 18th and 19th-century work. The upper space includes a Victorian cast-iron chimneypiece within a corner chimney.