The Gate Lodge (Formerly Golden Gates Lodge)

The Gate Lodge, formerly known as Golden Gates Lodge, is a late 19th-century lodge built as part of the Lilleshall Hall estate. It stands to the south of the 'Golden Gates', marking the main northern entrance to the grounds. The building is constructed of red brick in Flemish bond, with sandstone dressings, half-timbering, and fishscale and plain clay tiled roofs.

The lodge is a picturesque building in the Domestic Revival style, with a single storey and attic. The ground floor is brick with a stone plinth, deep rusticated quoins, and sills. Various projecting bay windows, including rectangular, canted, and triangular designs, incorporate timber-framed two-light casement windows. A large porch on the east elevation provides the main entrance; it is set on a stone plinth, topped by a timber balustrade, with moulded timber posts supporting a lean-to roof with a central cross pitch. The porch has a quarry tiled floor and contains two four-panel front doors. A recessed third entrance is on the south elevation, and a fourth is on the rear of the building, now within an outshut. Moulded consoles support the jettied upper floor, which has decorative timberwork. The roof has intersecting pitches forming gables on each elevation, with shaped bargeboards and tall finials. Pierced cresting tiles line the ridges, and there are two pairs of octagonal chimneystacks with stone dressings. A retaining wall to the west of the house defines the higher ground of the garden, and a lean-to extension has been added between the building’s elevation and the wall.

The interior plan remains largely unchanged, with a distinctive layout where doorways provide multiple entrances into each room. Some doorways, including the front door to the lounge and the doorway between the dining room and kitchen, have been blocked. The dining room retains a cast iron chimneypiece. The enclosed staircase has a stick balustrade and a chamfered handrail on the attic landing. A small cast iron chimneypiece also survives in one bedroom.