Former Sunday School at Pettwood is a Grade II listed building in the Babergh local planning authority area, England. First listed on 15 October 2001. School.

Former Sunday School at Pettwood

WRENN ID
roaming-quartz-rain
Grade
II
Local Planning Authority
Babergh
Constituency
South Suffolk MP: James Cartlidge (Con)
Country
England
Date first listed
15 October 2001
Type
School
Address
Former Sunday School at Pettwood, Ipswich Road, Holbrook
OS grid reference
TM 168 367
Coordinates
51.98652, 1.15671
Source
Historic England listing

Also on this page: flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

The Former Sunday School at Pettwood, built in 1884 for Rev. C.F. Childe, is a single-storey building with a rectangular plan, featuring two linked rooms and smaller service rooms. It is constructed with a timber frame covered in corrugated iron, and has a hipped slate roof with two brick side stacks. The walls are made of red brick, with gault brick flues and a smaller stack at the rear lower section. The entrance facing Pettwood is mostly blank, except for a doorway with double doors. The right side of the building has four 6/6 sash windows with fine glazing bars and finely moulded wooden architraves, while a lower section to the far right includes a 4-panel door. The left side is blank but shows the brick walling of the two stacks. The lower rear section is in a state of significant decay.

Inside, the two main rooms feature coved ceilings with small ventilation panels and deep elaborate plaster cornices. The projecting chimney-breasts are adorned with veined grey marble fireplaces and cast-iron grates. Between the main rooms is an opening screen made up of five 6-panel doors. The smaller rooms beyond also have 4-panel doors and a fireplace with a cast-iron grate, but they are much decayed, as is part of the rear wall of the larger room.

This building is a rare example of a construction method typically associated with 'tin tabernacles' and other religious and educational structures, which are usually designed in the Gothic style. Instead, this building employs a simple Classical style that complements the existing rectory, incorporating windows and fireplaces from a style that was popular 50 years earlier, along with interior details that are more commonly found in grand domestic reception rooms.

Local climate

Former Sunday School at Pettwood sits in a drier-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 730 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 80% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 66% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 14 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 87% of listed buildings. Of these, 7 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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  • Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
  • Flood risk assessment
  • Radon risk assessment
  • Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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