3 The Terrace

This is a significant early 18th-century house, built in 1767 for Christopher Blanchard, possibly to designs by Sir Robert Taylor. The house is constructed of Flemish bond brown brick with stone ashlar dressings, and has a slate roof. It is a three-storey and basement, two-bay range, designed in a Palladian style. The front is pedimented, with a rusticated ground floor featuring semi-circular arches above the windows, each with a triple keystone, and a panelled door with decorative wrought-ironwork to the fanlight. Later 20th-century sash windows are set into pedimented aedicules with Ionic half-columns on a stone podium on the first floor, and within cored stone architraves on the second floor. An open pediment sits above the cornice and richly carved frieze; the tympanum contains a blind lunette with carved stone palm fronts. Fine wrought-iron railings are situated at the front of the building. A three-storey canted bay window extends to the rear, with wrought-iron grilles to the ground-floor windows and a panelled door.

The interior features bolection moulded panels to the walls and a segmental vaulted ceiling in the narrow entrance corridor, which leads to a central stairhall lit by a glazed dome. A fine, open-well, cantilevered staircase has a ramped handrail and decorative wrought-iron balustrade. The walls are panelled, displaying profile heads within medallions, with wheatear swags beneath enriched egg and dart cornices, and floral swags to the dome. Enriched panelled doors are set within pedimented architraves to ground and first-floor rooms. Rococco plasterwork is present over a swan-necked pediment above an enriched plaster architrave framing a medallion on the first-floor landing. A front ground-floor room contains a reset marble fireplace with engaged Ionic columns, accompanied by enriched carving to the door and shutter panels, dado rail, and skirting, along with rococo plasterwork to the ceiling. A rear ground-floor room features a marble fireplace with a fluted frieze, panelled walls with alternating carved narrow and large panels, and fine panelled plasterwork to the ceiling, including a rococo centrepiece. A similar rococo plaster ceiling is found in a front first-floor room, which also has finely carved rococo friezes to the door architraves, and a coloured marble fireplace with fluted half-columns. A small closet with a panelled corner cupboard is located off a rear first-floor room, which contains a marble fireplace with a cast-iron grate and panelled plaster ceiling. A second-floor front room has a segmental arched alcove framed by Ionic brackets.