Noell'S Almshouses And Attached Boundary Wall

Noell's Almshouses and attached boundary wall comprise 23 apartments and a chapel, dating back to approximately 1660. The complex was restored in 1866 and extended in 1960 from an initial 12 apartments to 23. It was commissioned by Sir Martin Noell. The building is constructed of ashlar with a tile roof and ashlar stacks, and rendered rear wings. It is designed in a Jacobean style. The plan adopts a U-shape, centred around a chapel.

The exterior is predominantly single-storey with an attic. The symmetrical central range has six windows, with the chapel projecting forward beneath a shaped gable featuring short, embattled parapets. A plain plinth and dripcourse run above ground floor level, raised further at the chapel. The chapel entrance has pointed mouldings within a square-headed architrave, flanked by pilasters. Above the drip, a segmental pediment contains a raised panel displaying the Noell arms, flanked by Doric columns on enriched plinths, surmounted by an entablature with ogival finials and a central ogee-arched panel. The chapel also features windows with two trefoil-headed lights. The sides of the central range incorporate double-hollow-chamfered mullioned windows with leaded glazing and paired Tudor-headed entrances with large lintels and plank doors. There are two-light dormer windows in coped gables. Entrances are situated within gabled porches across the re-entrant angles. The return wings each feature three windows and dormers, alongside a pair of entrances. Six cruciform stacks are present. Gable ends of the wings are characterised by coped gables and Stafford knots, with one inverted. The rear elevations include coped gable ends and two 20th-century gabled wings flanking the chapel gable, which has a three-light ovolo-mullioned window with intersecting tracery. Similar returns are visible on the rear of the wings, with the right-hand return incorporating an attached boundary wall extending around two sides of the rear garden.

The interior of the chapel features two simple roof trusses to the ends of a barrel vault with a collar purlin, alongside 19th-century benches. The window contains 19th-century stained glass, believed to have been relocated from St Mary Castlechurch.