Bulcote Corporation Model Farm

BULCOTE CORPORATION MODEL FARM

Farm buildings completed in 1902, designed by Nottingham City Engineer Arthur Brown. The complex was constructed by Nottingham City Corporation specifically to assist with dispersal of solid waste produced by the sewage works at Stoke Bardolph, making it an important example of an industrial farmyard.

The buildings are constructed in red brick with blue brick bands and cill bands, plus ashlar dressings. Plain tile roofs feature various ridge stacks. The layout follows a quadrangular plan. Windows throughout are metal framed with central opening casements and segment headed designs. Fire-proofed brick arched floor construction is employed throughout, with concrete floors.

The north-west and north-east ranges are two storeys. The north-east stable range features a recessed centre with 20 bays divided by pilaster strips. Every fourth bay contains a tall glazing bar window with a smaller window above, while intermediary bays have single smaller windows above. A three-window projecting block to the left has large glazing bar windows with smaller windows above. A five-window projecting block to the right contains five large glazing bar windows surmounted by a central taking-in door with a single smaller window to the left and two to the right. To the south stands a set of ornate iron gates with gabled iron gatepiers linking to a single storey office building.

The office building is fitted with two tall brick chimney stacks and a metal roof ventilator, with plate-glass sash windows throughout. The street front displays a double sash and two single sashes. The gabled south-east facade has two pairs of sashes and a door to the left gable, with a large triple sash to the right gable. The main courtyard front features an octagonal corner bay window topped with an iron weather vane, a door flanked by single sashes to the left, and beyond a pair of sashes. A 15-ton weigh-bridge manufactured by W & T Avery Ltd of London and Birmingham stands in front of this facade.

The south-east stable range is two storeys, with a single storey dairy range to the right. The stable range comprises 12 bays with alternating doors and windows from left, above a taking-in door and three small windows. The dairy features a deeply overhanging roof supported on circular cast-iron columns, with seven bays containing from left a glazing bar sash, a doorway, two further sashes, another double door, and two further sashes.

Two ten-bay pig sty ranges are located to the south-west, single storey with slate roofs. Both main fronts display ten small glazing bar windows and ten roof-lights. Rear facades contain ten small segment arched doorways. Gable ends have an irregular roofline with single doorways leading into corridors serving the individual sties, these corridors equipped with narrow gauge railway-lines for feeding trucks. Both ranges present similar facades to the inner courtyard.

The north-west storage range contains 20 bays with 13 large glazing bar windows alternating irregularly with three cart entrances and a broad entrance to the inner courtyard. To the right is a later twentieth-century extension of no special interest.

Two specialist single storey buildings with large glazing bar windows featuring segment heads stand to the north-west.