Copt Hall And Attached Walls, Pavilions And Conservatory

Copt Hall and attached walls, pavilions and conservatory

Country House. Built circa 1751–1758, probably by John Sanderson for John Conyers; internal remodelling by James Wyatt around 1775; extended and remodelled circa 1895 by C E Kempe for Edward James Wythes. Flemish bond brick with Portland stone dressings. Double-depth plan flanked by screen walls, extended to right circa 1895. Palladian style. Three storeys.

East and west fronts each have 2:3:2 fenestration with pedimented centre. The east front features a central porch with moulded cornice and semi-circular arched rusticated doorway, having paterae with festoons in spandrels. Rusticated quoining to ground floor, which has square-headed architraves to windows. Raised cill band beneath first-floor windows which have cornices and pulvinated friezes over architraves. Square-headed architraves to second-floor windows. Similar fenestration to the four-bay left (south) side wall, with eared architrave to the circa 1895 doorway.

The west (garden) front has similar fenestration and a tetrastyle Ionic pilastered portico built in stone by Kempe, circa 1895. A doubled staircase (balcony removed) rises on rusticated basement with three round-arched openings to first-floor piano mobile, which has pedimented full-height window openings. Sculptured figures flank a pedimented sundial in the tympanum. All elevations have modillioned stone cornices, balustraded parapets and chimneystacks with moulded stone caps by Kempe, circa 1895.

An addition to the right, of four by four bays, is also by Kempe and in matching style, with two bays to the left of the west front faced in stone ashlar with Ionic corner pilasters.

The east front is flanked by blind arcaded screen walls, of four bays to the right and five to the left, with stone parapet and impost band running to end pavilions, each with broken pediment over semi-circular arched niche. Paterae appear between arches on the right.

A conservatory is attached to the south (left), built circa 1895, of L-plan with wing extending to west. The six-bay rusticated west elevation has Ionic columns and balustraded parapet to central gateway. The rear wing has six-bay blind arcade with banded rustication articulated by Ionic half-columns rising to dentilled cornice.

Copt Hall has remained derelict since it was destroyed by fire in 1917.