Penkridge Hall

Penkridge Hall

Farmhouse, now house. Dated 1590, with 17th-century addition and 18th and 19th-century alterations. The building is timber-framed on a high coursed grey sandstone rubble plinth with plastered infill, partly rendered and partly rebuilt in 17th-century dressed grey sandstone and 18th-century red brick. It has a plain tile roof. The structure consists of two framed bays aligned approximately north-west to south-east with a 17th-century outshut to the north-east.

The timber framing includes 16th-century closely-spaced uprights with middle rails featuring carved quatrefoil panels, remains of barley-sugar twisted shafts, and S-shaped tension braces. The first floor is jettied on three sides with a moulded bressumer. The south-east gable is also jettied, with four curved brackets supporting a bressumer carved with vine trails (also present on the wall-plate to the north-east) and a truss with two collars, queen struts, a redundant king post and parallel diagonal struts. The framing includes 16th and 17th-century square-panel work, with three and four panels running from sole plate to wall plate. The building is two storeys and attic over basement, with the site falling to the north-west.

The north-east front features a small gabled eaves dormer with a two-light metal casement. A large 16th-century dressed grey sandstone external lateral stack rises to the south-west with a chamfered plinth and tiled offset to a 19th-century brick shaft. A large roughly coursed external end stack to the north-west carries two star-shaped brick shafts with missing caps, and has a lean-to garderobe to the right with a boarded opening at the base.

On the north-east front: a first-floor three-light leaded casement to the left with small flanking casements; ground-floor wooden mullioned and transomed window to the left; a one-storey and attic outshut to the right with a small casement and partly glazed gabled porch to the left with a boarded door; basement to the right with a two-light wooden casement to the left and six-panelled door to the right.

The left-hand gable end displays a two-light wooden attic casement, two first-floor three-light wooden mullioned and transomed windows (that to the left dating from the 16th century) flanking a central three-light wooden-framed leaded metal casement, and a ground-floor four-light wooden-framed leaded metal casement to the left and two-light leaded casement to the right. A 20th-century cast plate beneath the central first-floor window is superscribed "ERECTED BY/ROWLAND WHITBROOKE/15 gentleman 90".

Interior

The basement contains a chamfered beam and plain joists. The ground-floor left-hand room (hall) is fitted with late 16th-century panelling featuring a fluted frieze and dentil cornice, with cable-fluted pilasters in the angles beneath dragon beams. It has a chamfered cross-beamed ceiling with dragon beams and 16th-century plaster panels with delicately-moulded borders. A large dressed sandstone open fireplace with a shallow moulded Tudor arch, moulded cornice and a fireback dated 1637 occupies the room. The kitchen has a square-panelled timber-framed cross wall. The central first-floor room features a chamfered cross-beamed ceiling with plain plaster panels with delicately-moulded borders, a depressed-arched doorhead and Tudor-arched doorway to the stair, and a fragment of wall painting on a chamfered post. The right-hand bedroom contains a dressed sandstone fireplace and a garderobe with a chamfered doorway. The roof comprises four bays with collar and tie-beam trusses, pairs of chamfered purlins, and two tiers of wind braces. A small timber-framed enclosure in the attic, possibly a former store or safe room, is also present.

Historical context

The house is said to occupy the site of a preceptory of the Knights Templar. It and its outbuildings once formed part of a larger settlement called Lydley Hayes, now deserted. Penkridge Hall was formerly included in Cardington civil parish.