Keeper'S Cottage In Home Wood Along Track 260 Metrs From Road

Keeper's Cottage is a house located in Home Wood, 260 meters from the road. It was built in 1851, as indicated by a quatrefoil datestone on the west gable. The cottage was likely designed by P C Hardwick for John Hodgson Esq of Gilston Park. It features a picturesque, one and a half storey design made of red brick and slate in a Gothic style. The building is L-shaped and faces west, with a low plinth.

The west end of the west wing has a semi-octagonal single-storey stone bay window set on a brick base. This bay window includes 1- and 2-light transomed wooden casement windows and a steep polygonal roof covered with large slate slabs, accented by round-topped slate rolls at the angles. Above the bay window is a 2-light casement window with a flat gauged brick arch and a flush stone sill. The north side of the cottage features two tall projecting chimneys, each with two diagonal brick shafts topped with moulded caps.

The west gable has simple bargeboards with a finial, while the east elevation is simpler, with two casement windows on each floor and a four-panelled flush beaded door located under a gabled timber porch with a slate roof. The windows throughout the cottage have flat gauged brick arches and flush stone sills, with transomed windows on the ground floor. This cottage is one of the earliest built for John Hodgson Esq on the Gilston Park Estate and reflects the Gothic style that Hardwick was employing in the construction of Gilston Park at the same time.