Lane House

Lane House is a mid-18th century house, originally a farmhouse, located in Alvechurch. It is built of narrow red brick in a distinctive bond pattern, with occasional blue bricks for visual interest. The roof is covered in hand-made clay tiles, featuring brick end stacks with cornices and yellow pots, a stepped eaves course with ball finials to the front, and a U-shaped plan with a central entrance flanked by deep cross wings. The front elevation has three windows with square panes and rubbed brick voussoirs. The central entrance features a boarded door with a small-pane overlight. Side elevations include windows under segmental arches, with some upper-level windows retaining panels of rectangular quarries tied to metal glazing bars incorporating metal-framed casements and decorative metal catches.

The interior retains many original furnishings and fittings. A wide central hall has a flag floor and a glazed, panelled rear door. A wide oak staircase with turned balusters and ball finials rises through two storeys. The drawing room on the left and dining room on the right feature spine beams with run-out stops, along with exposed joists marking a former ceiling. Doors to these rooms have deep moulded surrounds and are 6-panelled, with cross-framed windows featuring inset metal casements and dividing glazing bars. A plain dark marble fireplace surround is also present. The kitchen at the rear right includes unusual large, smooth flags, a similarly beamed ceiling with run-out stops, and very steep, narrow back stairs to the first floor. A former wash-house and dairy on the rear left also feature a flagged floor and three cross beams. Cellar access is via brick steps. Service and upper room doors have plain chamfered pegged frames and wide boarded doors, often retaining original hinges, locks, handles and keys. First-floor floorboards are original, wide and polished. Bedrooms have chamfered and stopped beams, exposed joists in the wings, plain fireplaces, and small windowed alcoves with wall-pegs. The attic storey, accessible throughout the main range and wings, features purlins supported by later inserted trusses, though with visible carpenters' marks. The left wing has lath and plaster horizontal ceilings, while the right wing is plastered under rafters.

Lane House is a substantial Georgian farmhouse displaying clear social divisions between owners and servants, and retaining a significant amount of its original fabric and interesting fittings.