The Stable And Coach House Block At Felixstowe Tennis Club

The stable and coach house block at Felixstowe Tennis Club dates to 1892 and was designed by Thomas Cotman for John D. Cobbold. The building is constructed of red brick, with decorative headers of burnt brick. It has plain tile roofs, partly mansard style, with red brick stacks. The design is in the Arts and Crafts style, arranged over two sides of a triangular area.

The front, facing Bath Road, features a central range with a round-arched carriage entrance, double doors, and a half-hipped gable with a two-light sash window dormer above. Similar hipped dormers are located on either side of the mansard roof. To the far right is a hayloft door also with a hipped dormer roof. To the right is a lean-to structure behind patterned brickwork, and to the left is a single-storey range with a canted end, angled roof, and garage doors. The clerestory to the roof incorporates small-paned windows all around, covered by a hipped tile roof. A similar building extends to the rear and also has a matching clerestory.

Inside the yard, the buildings have a series of garage doors, some with projecting pentice roofs supported on open brackets. A door in the acute angle next to the carriage arch leads to a staircase with a stick balustrade, serving rooms for staff. One corner building features an exposed roof and some relocated stable partitioning to create additional garage space. Further along are more garages, an office with a door and window, and an open-fronted area supported on braced posts. Above this, are additional staff rooms, accessible by a staircase.

The building was constructed to provide stables and coach houses for the former Bath Hotel (a wing of which remains), during a period of development in Felixstowe spearheaded by the Cobbold and Tollemache families. Cotman also added to the hotel in the same year. The stable and coach house block remains largely unaltered and has group value with the former Felix Hotel (now Harvester House), also designed by Cotman between 1900 and 1903. This illustrates the growth of Felixstowe as a popular resort.