Goldings Including Retaining Walls And Steps To Forecourt And Terrace

Goldings is a large country house built between 1871 and 1877 to designs by the architect George Devey. Originally a private residence, it subsequently became an orphanage and is now occupied by County Council offices. The building has undergone 20th-century alterations and extensions.

The house is constructed of red brick laid in English bond with diaper patterns formed by blue headers. It stands on a coursed rubble stone base and features ashlar dressings and stone mullioned windows. The roofs are clad in Welsh slate and punctuated by multiple stone-coped parapeted gables. Numerous chimneystacks of moulded brick with multiple shafts, moulded bands and oversailing caps rise from the building. The architectural style is free Elizabethan.

Planning and Setting

The plan is irregular, with projecting and receding bays arranged informally. On the north-west side, a central entrance hall gives access to the principal reception rooms, which open off an inner hall (the Saloon) and face the gardens to the south-west and south-east. The forecourt is approached through an archway, and raised terraces overlook the gardens. A long, irregular service wing extends northwards at an angle to the main house.

Exterior: Entrance Front

The entrance front rises three and four storeys with attics. It comprises six irregular bays, each marked by a gable at the roofline of varied widths and profiles. Bays one and four from the left have Dutch gables. Stone mullioned windows with dripmoulds above and iron casement sub-frames are distributed throughout. A large projecting stone mullion and transom bay window on a coursed rubble base lights the billiard room at ground-floor level in bays two and three. A large flush-set mullion and transom window illuminates the former dining room. In bay five, to the right of the entrance, a storey-height mullion and transom window occupies the first floor, with a narrow semicircular bay window to the right lighting the main staircase and landing. Bay six at the right features a broad entrance chimneybreast to the library, which rises with offsets on the left to a three-flue chimney. Diaper patterns enrich the brickwork across the entire elevation.

The entrance is located in bay four. The second floor has a four-light window above a canted three-light mullion and transom bay with an elaborate carved stone strapwork balustrade above and a carved stone panel in the spandrel below. The ground-floor porch contains twin-leaf hardwood panelled doors with moulded stiles and muntins and ogee traceried heads. These sit within a stone Tudor arch surround with moulded jambs and intrados, a projecting keyblock and carved spandrels bearing shields and fern leaves. An outer surround features attached Ionic columns raised on tall plinths with an entablature and pulvinated frieze. A panel above the door records that the William Baker Technical School (run by Dr Barnardo's Homes) was opened on 15 November 1922 by His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales.

South-East Garden Front

The south-east principal garden front has five bays. Projecting wings at left and right with Dutch gables frame three recessed bays with plain gables. Three- and four-light attic windows are present, along with projecting bay windows featuring multi-light mullion and transom windows over two storeys. The left-hand bay one is rectangular, bays three and four are canted, and bay five at the right is semicircular. A garden entrance in bay two consists of a recessed glazed hardwood traceried screen with twin-leaf half-glazed doors set within a broad stone Tudor arch with moulded jambs and intrados and carved spandrels below a projecting dripmould. Above this is a pierced strapwork carved stone balcony with a moulded cap, surmounted by a moulded and traceried oak arcade with a low copper roof.

South-West Elevation

The south-west elevation features large multi-light mullion and transom windows across most of the ground floor in projecting polygonal and rectangular bays. At the left, a link connects to a single-storey conservatory with continuous stone mullioned windows, a brick parapet and a Welsh slated roof. The gable end facing the entrance forecourt has an open semicircular pediment with curved swept links to flanking pinnacles and a large mullion and transom window.

Service Wing

The service wing extends northwards from the right-hand end of the south-east garden front and is treated as part of the overall composition. It connects via a three-storey polygonal bay window and a tall octagonal stair turret. A central projecting three-storey semicircular bay rises with an attic gable above and a three-flue chimney to the right. A second gable lies further right, followed by a projecting five-storey tower with a coursed rubble base and brick walls featuring full-height diaper patterns. A three-storey canted bay window with brick diaper-patterned spandrels is present, with two three-light mullioned windows above at the centre of the east face (the servants' hall was located on the ground floor). A moulded stone band and castellated parapet conceal a lead flat roof. An octagonal stair turret rises on the north face. A parapeted wall extends to the north, concealing the former kitchen yard, which was roofed over and converted to workshops in the 1940s with metal casement windows in the outer face.

Interior

The interior is elaborately designed and fitted. The main hall (Saloon) is panelled to dado height and features panelled doors with moulded architraves and broken pediments above pulvinated friezes. The fireplace has a bolection surround and a panelled outer surround with Jacobean pilasters with strapwork and a carved shelf, plus a panelled overmantel. The stair is set within an arcaded screen with Ionic columns on tall plinths with rusticated blocks. It has a close string with long bobbin balusters, moulded handrails and newels with square urn finials with ogee caps. The ceiling features ribs and circular panels with sunflowers and poppy heads in urns bearing the initials 'S' (for Smith).

The drawing room has bolection moulded panelling, Ionic pilasters and a modillion cornice. The fireplace sits in a recess with Ionic columns on plinths in antis and a marble bolection surround. A carved wood outer surround and geometrical ribbed plaster ceiling complete the room. The morning room has a half-octagonal bay, panelling with moulded stiles and muntins, a modillion cornice, an elaborate fitted Jacobean-style sideboard, and a fireplace with a white marble bolection surround, wooden Tuscan fluted pilasters, a moulded shelf and a panelled overmantel.

The dining room faces the forecourt and features Jacobean-style oak panelling with a triglyph frieze. The fireplace has an oak outer surround with coupled Tuscan attached columns, a strapwork frieze and a shelf carved with stylised oak leaves, plus an overmantel with coupled Ionic and a central single Ionic pilaster. The ceiling displays ribbed square and star patterns with Tudor rose motifs.

The billiard room has softwood panelling and a fireplace with a green marble bolection surround, squat Tuscan columns on the overmantel and a ceiling with a strapwork pattern. The principal bedrooms have white marble fireplaces, some with de Morgan tiles, low dados with moulded rails, and moulded ribbed ceilings. A newel stair rises to the second-floor schoolroom suite, with a closed string featuring heavy mouldings, panelled newels with ball-on-pedestal finials, pulvinated column balusters and a heavy moulded handrail. Many second-floor rooms have been subdivided.

The service wing has a stone-flagged lower corridor, a high kitchen and a servants' hall in the base of the tower. A closed-string newel back stair is also present. On the ground floor to the south is an attached linked orangery or conservatory with a cast-iron trussed roof.

Retaining Walls and Steps

Retaining walls and steps provide access to the forecourt and terrace, forming an integral part of the designed setting.

History

Robert Smith inherited the Goldings estate in 1861 and served as Sheriff of Hertfordshire in 1869. The old Goldings Hall, dating from around 1650 to 1660, was demolished around 1875, by which time the new Goldings commissioned from George Devey was nearing completion. The buildings were later adapted and extended, and a chapel was added in 1923. A new wing was constructed north of the arched entry to the forecourt in 1960. In 1967 the school closed, and Goldings was purchased by Hertfordshire County Council. The County Surveyor's Department has occupied it ever since.

George Devey (1820–1886) was one of the major Victorian country house architects. He designed in a picturesque style incorporating Elizabethan and Jacobean details, which merged with the evolution of the Arts and Crafts Movement in the late 19th century. A skilled watercolourist, Devey's picturesque massing was based on pictorial composition, but his plans were often rambling and haphazard, as exemplified at Goldings.