Wychdon Lodge And Outbuildings

Wychdon Lodge and Outbuildings

A house built circa 1807, architect unknown, with mid- and late 19th-century alterations. It is a symmetrical and restrained Regency composition.

The house is constructed of brick on a stone plinth, with stucco render and a low hipped plain tile roof with a pair of large ridge stacks and a further smaller stack to the left. The windows are 6/6 hornless sashes unless otherwise stated.

The building is a double-pile house of two storeys with basement, arranged around a large central staircase. The house faces north-west, with the former service end to the east side. This end was altered in the mid-19th century to accommodate an extra middle storey, and the floor heights were adjusted accordingly.

The front elevation comprises three bays with a central tetrastyle portico with unfluted Doric columns and deep cornice with mutules. Behind this is a doorcase with panelled pilasters and partially glazed double doors. There is a continuous flat string course at first-floor level. The south-west elevation has three-bay symmetrical fenestration to both storeys. The south-east (garden) elevation mirrors the front but with a wooden trellised porch in front of central French windows. The north-west elevation has one 6/6 sash to the left of centre on the first floor and a 4/4 sash to the right, with a 21st-century canted porch with 4/4 sashes at the centre.

Internally, the house retains cornicing, architrave, skirting, doors and shutters throughout, as well as wooden floorboards and flagstone flooring to the entrance hall and atrium, with the exception of the eastern service end which was being renovated at the time of inspection in 2008. The ground floor entrance hall leads to a central atrium through a round arch. The ground floor rooms are arranged around the atrium, which has an open-string cantilevered staircase to three sides and is top lit by a circular lantern with modern glass replacement. The stair has a swept wooden handrail and cast-iron balusters. To the left of the entrance hall is a library with fitted wooden shelving and cupboards. The cupboard to the right of the fireplace conceals a door leading to what was the service wing; that to the left opens to a writing desk and pigeon holes; that to the right of the door contains a safe. The western reception room has a segmental-arched alcove to the inner wall set on panelled pilasters. Both windows have gold-painted scrolled pelmets with shell motif. The southern reception room has a marble fire surround with flora decoration and moulded cornice. The south-eastern reception room, with French windows, has a less ornate marble fireplace and thick dado rail. The east side of the house until recently had a wooden service stair and a large kitchen with mid- to late-19th-century joinery. The entire stair and floors have been removed and the kitchen stripped. On the first floor, one bedroom retains a mid-19th-century fire surround; the other five have had theirs removed, although otherwise the rooms have not been altered. The room at the east end, previously used as a bathroom, has been denuded of any features. The basement comprises brick vaulted rooms with a bread oven.

The outbuildings and walled garden are situated to the north-east of the house. They are constructed of red brick laid to Flemish bond with slate roofs. Working clockwise from the north-west corner of the yard: a two-storey, three-bay coach house with hipped roof and dentilled eaves. Three segmental-arched windows with vertical panes to the first floor and open bays to the ground floor supported by cast-iron columns. To the rear is a single-storey lean-to containing a copper. Behind this is a haystore open to the north-east and south-east, with a pitched roof supported by cast-iron columns on brick plinths, and a two-storey brick block to the rear with an oculus at first-floor level above the door. At the north-west side of the yard is a brick barn with a central segmental-arched carriage way to the ground floor with stepped brick voussoirs. To the right of this is a shelter built against the north-west wall of the walled garden, with a truss roof supported on cast-iron columns to the left side. At the south-west side of the yard is a stable block of one and a half storeys with hipped roof and dentilled eaves. The symmetrical façade has a central round-arched doorway with an oculus above; to either side is a stable door and two six-pane casement windows. Inside are two stable rooms either side of the centre with brick floors and three oval depressions in the back wall, presumably to accommodate mangers. The central room to the rear has a winder stair to the attic. The remains of a house extension stand to the right of the stables, consisting of a stone plinth and four courses of brick, with the north side built of ashlar with moulded coping. The walled garden to the south of the farmstead has brick buttressing. It has lost its glasshouses and the coping has been replaced.

The house was built for William Moore, proprietor of the nearby Shirleywich Salt Works, in or shortly before 1807. The Staffordshire General and Commercial Directory of 1818 states that "an elegant mansion has just been erected by Mr. Moore, near Shirleywich" and lists him as resident of "Wichdon Lodge". The architect or builder is not known. The house is depicted on the Ordnance Survey 1st Edition of 1882 with formally laid out gardens to the south-east comprising circular parterres and a summer house; the walled garden was similarly laid out with a central sun dial. The 1st Edition also depicts two ranges of extensions on the north-east elevation, with what is now the lone standing porch between the two. The southerly of the two bordered the garden and adjoined the stable range. It is shown in an early photograph and comprised an Italianate three-storey tower, a two-bay two-storey range and a large conservatory. Stylistically these appear to be of mid- to late-19th-century date, and the dating of these extensions would correspond with internal upgrading of the main house. At some point during the Second World War, a plane crashed into the servants' tower and mid-19th-century extension, which were subsequently demolished. Wychdon Lodge stands near Hixon Airfield, a World War II airfield which operated between 1942 and 1957, with the end of the runway approximately 400 metres north-east of the house.