Gamlingay First School And No 10 Adjoining

Gamlimgay First School and the adjoining No. 10 form a notable school building and former schoolmaster’s house, dating from 1874 with later additions and alterations, the house likely constructed around 1880. The buildings are constructed of gault brick with stone and red and blue brick dressings, and have a 20th-century tile roof with stone coped gables. They are designed in a muscular High Victorian style, characterised by decorative polychrome brickwork and stonework.

The school is a single-storey building with a two-storey tower. The long main range is accompanied by wings to the rear. The main facade presents a symmetrical arrangement of three windows on either side of a central tower. This section features paired and triple 1/1 sash windows with Caernarvon arched heads under stone lintels. Each section has a projecting central gable with a simple plate tracery rose window above the triple sash. The projecting central tower features stepped angle buttresses and two doorways with decorative jambs, overlights, and plank doors. Above the doorways is a 4-light stone mullioned window with simple Perpendicular tracery, topped by two octagonal caps to the corners. A similar triple sash window is visible in the left gable end. To the right is No. 10, the former schoolmaster’s house, although a triple window to the school is visible in the internal yard between the two ranges.

The rear of the school has single-storey wings with similar detailing and windows, although some alterations have taken place. Inside the school, the central entrance features fine doorways and doors with moulded stiles and rails and planked panels. A straight flight of stairs leads to the tower room. The open boarded roof has moulded collars and king-posts. The tower room has coloured glass in the upper lights of the window. Two large classrooms on either side of the entrance have lowered ceilings, but the original open roofs survive, with the lower parts of braces visible rising from moulded stone corbels.

No. 10 is constructed using similar materials, with simplified polychrome brick decoration on all sides. It is a two-storey building with a five-window range at the first floor. A projecting three-window canted bay is located on the left, with two windows to the centre and right, over a central moulded wooden porch (currently boarded) and a slightly projecting ground floor window. Windows are 1/1 sashes, visible from inside, although boarded externally. The gable end has a paired sash window with a blank paired window above it, and a blank narrow window in the attic. A wing to the rear has windows to the side and gable end, along with blank windows. Similar windows or blank windows are also found in the internal yard, alongside a small further single-storey and two-storey wings. The interior of No. 10 features a staircase with a stick balustrade and moulded newels, 4-panel doors, and fireplaces that have been removed, except for the kitchen fireplace which maintains its plain, high surround. Despite the loss of the upper part of the tower many years ago, the school and house remain largely unaltered. The buildings represent an early example of a school constructed by a School Board in a rural area following the Education Act of 1870, and are of significant architectural merit.