Entrance Gateway And Gates At No.44 (Abington Place Stables)

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TL66SW BURY ROAD 177-1/0/9 (Southeast side) 30-OCT-06 Entrance gateway and gates at No.44 (A bington Place Stables)

GV II Gateway and gates at entrance to driveway at Abington Place Stables and Trainer's House, Bury Road [qv]. 1895. By John Flatman in a Northern Renaissance style, possibly inspired by late C16 or early C17 designs for triumphal arches, for Martin Gurry, racehorse trainer. Red brick with red and yellow terra cotta dressings, stone dressings, and pair of elaborate wrought iron gates. PLAN: recessed archway flanked by quadrant walls stopped at the outer ends by square piers supporting lamps. ELEVATION: central archway on offset plinth with moulded terra cotta jambs and basket arch with stone voussoirs and raised and dropped keystone. The keystone is carved in relief to front and rear with monogram MG in a frame, and the archway is framed by pilasters on moulded bases, and with a panel of moulded foliage on the face of each pilaster. The entablature, which breaks forward over each pair of pilasters, has its frieze decorated with festoons over a dentil string course, and cornice with a dentil moulding. The parapet above the entablature has moulded capping and a pier block capped by a ball finial above each pilaster, with blind balustrading at either end; above the parapet between the finials a shallow, stone coped, Flemish gable with crowning finial set on a moulded base block. In each of the outer faces of the flanking quadrant walls recessed panels in moulded frames; the outer piers in banded rustication with stone pyramidal caps, and on each cap a glazed, metal-framed, gas lantern with ornamental cresting and finial. In the archway a pair of wrought iron gates of scroll pattern enriched with leaves. HISTORY: the gateway was built for Martin Gurry following the success of `La Sagesse', a horse he trained for Sir James Miller which won The Oaks at Epsom in 1895. REFERENCES: Forest Heath District Council: Newmarket Horse Racing Training Yards: 1992: 85. Brown, Haward and Kindred: Dictionary of Architects of Suffolk Buildings 1800-1914: Ipswich: 1991: 107. Flatman, J: Drawings: 1895: Forest Heath Drawings Archive H.60.