Old Rectory

Former rectory house at Great Moulton, built in 1831 from designs by architect W J Donthorn. The building was commissioned by the Reverend J S Wigget, the incumbent. Donthorn produced a series of drawings for the project, with the final version dated January 1831.

This is Donthorn's only surviving unaltered classical building and his sole executed Italianate design. It represents an extremely early example of the richly detailed Italianate style applied to a villa-scale building, drawing presumably on the research of his friend Charles Parker's Villa Rustica (1832-1841). The house is constructed of brick with slated roofs, and features sharply profiled and squared stucco on the south and east fronts. It comprises 2 storeys with a 3-storey tower.

The two facades are arranged in picturesque opposition, with the tower and stack of the south front acting as pivotal points. The asymmetrical south front contains 4 bays and three principal elements: the tower, an off-centre porch, and a stack. Two ground floor windows are round-headed arched sashes with glazing bars, moulded heads and flat aprons rising from the plinth. The porch features a round-headed moulded arch with a deep dentil eaves cornice and a solid parapet balcony above, incorporating a central open work panel of pierced superimposed arches based on Italianate ridge tile screen sources. A first floor platband contains 2 sashes with glazing bars and French doors opening onto the balcony. The tower's upper storey has a 3-arch loggia with moulded base and "X" frame balustrade. The hipped roof has 3 stacks rising through the eaves with characteristic Italianate angle brackets supporting a hipped coping. The tower is balanced to the east by a prominent external chimney breast and stack featuring a ground floor blank arched niche with apron base and moulded head, a first floor blank semi-circular opening, and a stack rising through the eaves. Two detached flues are linked above by an arched bridge with dentil cornice.

The east garden front has 2 outer 3-sided canted bays and a 3-bay centre section. These share with the south front the plinth, first floor platband, and a deep bracketed Tuscan eaves cornice. The outer bays contain 3 ground floor, plinth level silled sashes with margin light glazing bars and three first floor margin light glazing bar sashes. The centre section has 3 ground floor French windows with fixed semi-circular glazed fanlights and 3 first floor margin-light glazing bar sashes. There are 3 separate hipped roof sections to each 3-bay section, with a stack at the north side featuring a moulded cornice.

The interior contains a large 2-storey hall with an open well staircase featuring cast-iron anthemion panel balusters. The ceiling has a heightened rectangular compartment abstracted from the centre, forming a sort of square dome or lantern. A contemporary painted room at the south east features pilaster strip panels and roundels with classical figures and grotteschi. This room contains a massive grey marble fireplace with flattened anthemion paterae.