Clifton House

KING'S LYNN

TF6119NE QUEEN STREET 610-1/9/177 (West side) 01/12/51 No.17 Clifton House (Formerly Listed as: QUEEN STREET (West side) No.17 (Clifton House) & Tower at rear of Clifton House)

GV I

House. C13, C14, rebuilt in parts C16 and C17, refronted 1708 (dated on lead rainwater hopper). Built originally as 2 hall houses. Brick. Plain tiled roofs. 1708 elevation to Queen Street of 2 storeys in 7 bays. Doorcase in second bay (from left) comprising 2 barley-twist columns in antis with modified Corinthian capitals. Flat hood with guttae carrying a segmental pediment. Panelled doors. Small cellar windows to right. Fenestration of sashes with glazing bars under gauged skewback arches. Timber eaves cornice below hipped roof. Stack right of centre and on south roof slope. North elevation to King's Staithe Lane with large stepped external stack. Cornice continues. Short wing projects west along Lane in 2 storeys. 3 sashes to ground floor, 6 to first floor, the 2 to east taller. Glazing bars. Gabled roof. South side of house forms north side of courtyard. Panelled door to right, 4 sashes to ground floor, 5 to first floor, all with glazing bars. Gabled roof. At west end is look-out tower, the last late C16 example surviving in Lynn and a fine example of C16 brick work with many similarities in its planning to late medieval solar towers in this region e.g. Caistor in Norfolk. Square plan, 5 storeys, with a 6-storey polygonal staircase tower against south side. One room each floor. One 3-light casement to each floor of east and west elevations, all with pediments. Panelled door under broken pediment to east. Newel of staircase formed of a single ship's mast. Wall paintings in third floor room. INTERIOR. Mid C14 four-bay undercroft beneath Queen Street/King's Staithe Lane return. 4 central octagonal stone piers with moulded capitals carry flat brick rib vaults. C13 door in south wall leads into a room with a tiled C13 floor, the tiles glazed with decorative patterns. Remains of central hearth. Staircase probably 1708: 3 twisted balusters per tread, carved tread-ends.

Listing NGR: TF6165319937