Dragons

This is a late Victorian house, dated 1883 on the south elevation. It has a complex plan, with a main range running roughly north to south, presenting a north-west front elevation. The house is constructed of red brick in English bond, with two storeys and attic space. The roofs are ridged and gabled, with a hipped end to the loggia, and are covered in clay tiles, featuring crested ridge-bonnets and various red clay gable finials, including dragons, dogs, decorative crosses. There are four chimney stacks, asymmetrically placed, each with bold treatment featuring oversailing coursing at their tops.

The north-west front elevation features a two-storey, hipped bay window of five lights, with a transom and studs and pargetted infill between the storeys. To the right (south-west) is a projecting gabled wing, with pierced and serpentine verge boards - its gable pargetted between studs. The first storey of this wing has a square and jettied bay window of five lights, followed by a semi-hexagonal bay of seven lights, both with transoms. The return of the wing incorporates a porch with a steeply gabled roof, serpentine pierced verge boards, a timber finial, two glazed and leaded Gothick doors, and close-boarded panels beneath leaded side-lights.

The south-west elevation shows a centrally projecting brick loggia, with a three-light oriel window on the first storey, over an open arcade of two, four-centred, and pointed arches. A gabled wing on the right is jettied at tiebeam and first floor level, with matching verge boards, a two-light semi-hexagonal oriel window on the first floor, and a six-light full-height semi-hexagonal bay on the ground storey. A single projection with matching verge boards and a three-light casement is located to the left of the loggia; from this aspect, the wing’s pronounced projection over the oriel is most noticeable.

Inside, the porch features a pictorial nativity in coloured ceramics. The entrance hall contains a carved wooden pilaster dated 1894, a Gothick timber arcade on the landing, and a carved fire surround with nine panels, pictorial relief overmantel, and Gothick recesses either side. The stairs have heavy stop-champered newels with acorn finials and very finely turned English-twist balusters. The Gothic arcade on the first floor landing is jettied on a bold timber coving with acorn pendants above the ground-storey entrance hall.