Horton Hall

Horton Hall is a house dating to the mid-17th century, with an earlier core, and altered in the mid-18th century and late 19th century. It is constructed of ashlar with tiled roofs and lead rainwater pipes. The building has a shallow ‘H’ plan, facing south-east, with hearths at the lower end of the hall and between the rooms of the two-bay upper cross-wing. The design is symmetrical across three fronts, extended by service ranges to the north-east.

The house has two storeys and an attic, with parapeted gables featuring ball-finials. A cellar lies beneath the cross-gabled solar cross-wing, likely representing an earlier feature. The south-east front has a 2:3:2 bay arrangement, with glazing bar sashes to the ground floor and first floor, all under continuous label strings which are returned as floor strings. There are three-light mullion windows in the attic, also with labels, while the central gable has outer two-light mullion windows (without labels). A mid-18th-century front door features raised and fielded panels, with a decorated lintol containing three sunk arches. This replaced an earlier inscribed lintel, now located in the garden wall. A small window is situated to the right.

The north-west front is dominated by a two-storey lean-to and a gabled stair tower adjacent to the solar cross-wing gable. There are three- and four-light mullion windows on both the ground and first floors, set below the floor strings. The stair tower has an elegant mid-18th-century arched glazing bar sash window. A large buttress supports the lower (north-east) cross-wing, which abuts the central lean-to; a back door to the left-hand side of this wing is flanked by two windows on each floor. Various blocked-in windows within a cellar/undercroft indicate the adaptation of an earlier feature. The return of the solar cross-wing has two gables and two-storey hipped angled bays added in the mid-19th century.

The interior includes a large entrance hall with deep corbels over the fireplace to the right. There is a round-arch at the back of the hall, flanked by doorcases and panelled doors which frame an excellent late-17th century staircase with splat balusters, carved pendants to the newels, and a wide moulded handrail. A secondary 17th-century staircase rises in the north-east angle, and a cellar is located below the solar.

The setting is magnificent, overlooking the valley of Horton civil parish, and includes an avenue of limes to the south-east. An inventory of Timothy Edge, dated 1683, suggests that he substantially rebuilt the house. The datestone/lintel now in the garden wall presumably relates to this work.