Priory Lodge

A school gymnasium built c.1919 for use by the school then occupying the adjacent Council House, in use as offices after 1925 and as a council chamber after 1974.

MATERIALS The building is built of a timber frame with a brick plinth and plaster panels, under a tile roof.

PLAN The building is rectangular on plan, and is orientated roughly NW - SE.

DESCRIPTION The building is single storey and faces SW. It is understood to be constructed of a softwood timber frame and has roughcast rendered elevations with timber framed panels of varying sizes. It has timber casement windows with moulded hoods and a centrally-projecting porch, with a hipped tile roof and a louvered ventilation lantern with lead domed roof. The rear elevation facing Avenue Road has a row of high casement windows.

Internally, the building retains skirting and dado rails, and the original roof of arch-braced trusses with timber boarding is understood to survive above a modern suspended ceiling.

Standing as it does near to the site of the original entrance lodge to the Priory, the former gymnasium has a close physical relationship with the house in addition to the functional relationship it has retained throughout its history.

Pursuant to s.1 (5) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 ('the Act'), it is declared that the single storey extension attached to the northern end of the building is not of special architectural and historic interest and is therefore excluded from the listing.

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 23/10/2019