Johnson Hall

Johnson Hall

A smaller country house built in 1883 and remodelled in Tudor style for its owner W Moat, probably incorporating fabric from an earlier 18th-century house. The building is constructed of brick with stone dressings, timber framing, slate roofs and brick stacks.

The plan is square, comprising a double-pile main part with the principal elevation facing south, a garden range to the right and three ranges to the rear, all combined.

The exterior displays a half-timbered Tudor style across three, two and two-and-a-half storeys. The ground floor is brick with stone mullioned windows and timber framed bay windows. The first and second floors are timber-framed with varied framing types incorporating lancet, cusped, quatrefoil, diagonal and vertical bracing designs. The building features coved overhanging eaves, gabled and hipped slate roofs and brick stacks.

The main south-facing elevation comprises five gabled bays. The central three bays project forward and are of three storeys, with two-storey outer bays. The central entrance bay is advanced with an overhanging gable and a three-sided oriel above an open timber screen on the first floor with paired circular-headed openings and a central moulded post. In front is a balcony with balustrade supported on the door surround below. The wide ground floor doorway has outer Roman Doric style pilasters with paired corbels above supporting the balcony, and a semi-circular headed open doorway with moulded arch, keystone and spandrels decorated with carved oak leaf clusters. Convex brick bands appear above, with impost and cornice bands. Set back and up three steps is the main double door with a round-headed stone arch, similarly moulded but with reduced detailing, and a stone surround extending to paired windows at the side. These are two-panel doors with tall tripartite raised and fielded panels and plain overlights. Gabled bays either side have central replaced windows (tall five-pane casements with three square lights above to the second floor, four-pane with smaller upper light windows to the first floor) and ground floor canted bay windows on both sides. The end bays are set back with three-pane windows to the first floor; that to the left has a gabled dormer. Ground floor mullion windows comprise eight small lights over four to the right and three small over three to the left.

The garden elevation to the right has three bays, with the centre and left bays projecting forward and gabled. Both have four small light over four casements to the first floor and a three-light gable casement to the centre bay. The left bay has a ground floor multi-pane bay window and supporting brackets for the jettied first floor projection. The centre bay has a stone mullion window of six-over-six. The right bay has paired three small light over three casements to the first floor and a four-over-four stone mullion window to the ground floor.

The left return to the service courtyard shows the hipped end to the main range with a large external stack and a timbered two-storey cat-slide roofed extension. Behind a crow-stepped dividing wall is the four-bay two-storey rear range, entirely brick with 12-pane sash windows (largely replaced), two axial stacks and a later cat-slide extension to ground floor right, with a large tripartite 12-pane sash to the left. To the left stands a tall three-storey water tower with pyramidal roof, constructed of brick with a timbered upper stage. It has a two-bay return to the rear range with four-pane sashes to the second floor, 12-pane and smaller four-pane windows to the first floor and a large round-headed window to the ground floor. The elevation to the service courtyard is offset at the first floor with a cat-slide roof (mirroring the end of the main range) and an altered opening at ground floor with a later 16-pane window.

The rear elevation comprises four gabled wings. Two to the left are of brick and set forward: a single bay to the left (the garden wing) of three storeys with four-pane sash and a ground floor door with a two-windowed extension to the left; to the right is a two-storey range with oriel windows on the first floor beneath a continuous slate canopy, and three replaced sash windows below. Roughcast bays to the right align with the water tower. There are 16-pane casements, one to each attic and to each first floor. The ground floor left has a reused low wide door and window. There are two windows to the right bay. The rear of the water tower is blind.

Interior

The entrance hall contains a part-glazed lobby door and screen leading to the Great Hall, dominated by a highly ornate carved fireplace. Opposite is a quarter-turn timber stair with decoratively carved and moulded newels and combined turned and fretwork ballusters. On the first floor the stair opens into a galleried landing with arcading towards the entrance front, a coved ceiling and central raised lantern with flat stained-glass screen of geometric patterns. The garden range contains the kitchen at the rear, a dining room and drawing room. The kitchen has been altered but the remainder retains late 19th-century doors, doorcases, cornices and fireplaces. The library to the left of the hall has timber panelling and an ornamental fireplace and overmantel. The first floor has bedrooms off the main landing, largely retaining original late 19th-century fittings (doors, doorcases, fireplaces, cornices and skirtings). The rear and service courtyard ranges are subdivided into separate units, largely refitted with altered plan form. Extensive cellars retain some original doors, shelving and other partitions.