Orchard House Including Front Railings

Orchard House is a substantial town house created in 1904 through the conversion and extensive remodelling of two 18th-century houses at numbers 67 and 69 High Street. The conversion was designed by Alexander Ellis Anderson for Joseph William Mann, a boot and shoe manufacturer who was Olney's largest employer and most prominent citizen in the early 20th century.

Construction and Materials

The 18th-century core of the building is constructed of coursed local limestone rubble. Anderson's early 20th-century additions to the front—the canted bay and entrance porch—are built of local limestone ashlar, with columns and dressings in deep yellow limestone. At the rear, the gabled extensions are also of coursed limestone rubble, while other extensions are pebbledashed, all with red brick dressings to quoins and window surrounds. The roofs throughout are slate.

Plan and Form

The original 18th-century building is a long three-storey structure running north to south, with mansard roofs featuring dormers. It was substantially extended to the rear in the early 20th century, with smaller but highly distinctive additions to the front. The front additions comprise a flat-roofed bow window, an ornate entrance porch, and a two-storey canted bay.

The rear extensions are complex: from the south are two gable-ended extensions side by side, the southern one largely concealed behind a two-storey flat-roofed wing with a central canted bay. Between the north gable and the 18th-century house is a one-and-a-half storey lean-to, and from the north end projects a single-storey mainly flat-roofed wing with a tall central chimney.

Exterior

The main east elevation retains regular 18th-century fenestration, interrupted by Anderson's striking early 20th-century additions. The entrance porch is heavily ornamented with Ionic columns supporting a semi-circular open pediment flanked by scrolls. The tympanum is carved with a stylised fruit tree with spreading branches and the words "Orchard House". On either side of the entrance are sash windows with leaded panes and stained glass in Art Nouveau designs.

The two-storey canted bay to the south has four sash windows to each floor, with the upper sashes featuring glazing bars. The central mullion of each floor has a carved floral motif. The bow window to the north has seven lights divided by wooden mullions, with the upper portions containing stained glass in an Art Nouveau tree design. The original first and second floor windows have been replaced with large-paned Edwardian sashes with margin glazing. Next to the bow window is an impressive Neo-classical wooden doorcase with an open triangular pediment, framing a door that gives access to a stone-flagged service passage—this may also be an early 20th-century addition.

The west elevation is dominated by an irregular arrangement of early 20th-century extensions. The windows are all sashes of differing styles, some with margin glazing, some with stained glass. The two-storey canted bay has four windows to each floor with glazing bars in the upper sashes; the lower sashes of the upper four windows, which light the billiard room, have leaded lights and stained glass. The extensive single-storey addition projecting from the north end of this elevation accommodates the service areas.

Interior

The interior plan consists of living rooms arranged around a spacious entrance hall, with generous service accommodation to the rear. Entry is through substantial panelled doors into a relatively modest vestibule with a patterned tiled floor and green glazed bricks to dado height. A wooden screen, half-glazed with stained glass in an Art Nouveau design of leaves and flowers, separates the vestibule from the hall, from which point the house becomes an exuberance of decorative detail.

The hall and dining room are decorated in an eclectic 17th-century Jacobean style, both employing dark wood to create a formal, sombre effect. The hall is less ornamented than the dining room, with plain panelling and a tiled fireplace with wooden surround and overmantel featuring a pediment and central round mirror. The open-well staircase has splat balusters, a square newel post and moulded handrail in lighter wood, opening the hall to the first floor where a brass chandelier is suspended from a canopy with delicate Neo-classical plasterwork. The understairs cupboard has stained glass in a similar design to the entrance screen.

The dining room has raised chamfered dado-height panelling and elaborately carved foliated decoration of wreaths, festoons and pendants above its two doors. The fireplace has a wooden surround with glazed overmantel, the glass flanked by pairs of pillars supporting a cornice. There is also a wood-framed alcove with a decoratively carved arch. The ornate plasterwork ceilings reference the orchard theme with wreaths of fruit, flowers and leaves.

The two living rooms are lighter, employing an elegant Georgian Neo-classical style with delicate plasterwork decoration. Both have fireplaces with ornate overmantels with mirrors. The fireplace in the north living room (with the bow window) has fluted Ionic columns to either side and a wide oval mirror. Decorative detail is concentrated on the plasterwork of the ceiling above the picture rail, as well as the ceiling of the bow window. Delicate glass bell-shaped light shades are suspended from brass wall fittings.

In the south living room the plasterwork design of festoons and pendants is confined to the front extension, including the canted bay window, and is partly concealed behind a built-in corner seat. The ceiling is coffered, and a brass chandelier with mother-of-pearl effect shades hangs from the centre. Apart from some damage to the ceiling of the north room, all detail in the living rooms survives intact, including brass door furniture and light fittings and shades. At the base of the door to the south living room is an ingenious device that causes a draught excluder to drop when the door closes.

At the back of the hall, doors with stained glass upper panels and overlights lead to the cloakroom and service areas. The service passage has a geometric tiled floor and also connects the kitchen and dining room. The kitchen has glazed bricks in brown and turquoise to dado height, with brown glazed bricks in a dogtooth pattern framing doors with blind arches. The fireplace has been blocked, and there is a 1950s English Rose sink unit. Tiled pantry, scullery and other storage rooms survive intact, including a complex pumping system that originally separated hard and soft water. Roof lights allow daylight into areas with no windows.

The stairwell rises through the first floor with its canopy supported on columns that rest on the baluster. To the front of the house on either side of the landing are three bedrooms. At the back is a billiard room above the dining room in the bay-windowed extension. This room is fully panelled, with a handsome marble fireplace and hearth with carved panels above flanked by truncated Ionic columns supporting the mantelpiece. There is a raised upholstered window seat in the canted bay window. The plasterwork on the ceiling continues the orchard theme, with fruiting brambles in long rectangular panels which also depict symbols in roundels at the corners, some with a Masonic theme such as set squares. Above where the billiard table would be positioned is a pyramidal roof light inset above ceiling height, surrounded by pendant electric lights. The room is otherwise lit by small glass chandeliers suspended from brass wall fittings.

The bedrooms retain tiled fireplaces and light fittings. The fireplace in the main north bedroom has tiles with a floral pattern and a brass pendant ceiling light with two bell-shaped glass light shades. The south bedroom has an oval window with Art Nouveau stained glass in a leaf and flower design; this window looks north up the High Street. The bathroom is tiled from floor to ceiling in plain and decorative tiles and has a stained glass window with a boat design. It also contains a fireplace and built-in cupboards.

On the second floor the only early 20th-century ornamental features are the stained glass windows, but there are three early 19th-century fireplaces with reeded jambs and corner roundels in the bedrooms, and one on the landing. These are perhaps the only surviving feature from the original houses. There is a back staircase from the north corridor down to the kitchen and service area.

Subsidiary Features

The cast iron railings above a stone wall to the front of the house introduce the orchard theme with their tree design. In the garden are three structures. The oldest is the picturesque stone-built thatched cottage (listed separately), which predates the house and has been used as a feature in the landscaping. The garden path from the back door passes through the covered passage that divides this building in two; this passage appears on the 1882 Ordnance Survey map. It has lead-paned windows and there is a fireplace in the north end.

On the north side of the garden is a small red brick building of 1904 with cream brick dressings. It has a steeply pitched roof now covered in corrugated iron. Its gable end contains a half-glazed door above which is a pointed arched window with wooden tracery set under the gable. This building housed the electricity generator (listed separately).

The third building is the conservatory, again of 1904, built by the local firm of W.S. Revitt. This is built of wood and glass on a brick plinth. Placed against the garden wall, it consists of two lean-to sections with a taller central projecting canted bay with hipped roof.

History

Orchard House was converted from two 18th-century houses, numbers 67 and 69 High Street, in 1904 for Joseph William Mann; the architect was Alexander Ellis Anderson. J.W. Mann was at that time Olney's largest employer, having moved to Olney from Northamptonshire in 1880 and founded a shoe factory there in 1884 with his partner William Hinde. Mann was not only of some standing in the town as a local manufacturer and employer, but also appears to have been a generous local benefactor and was involved in bringing social and economic improvements to the town in the early 20th century.

It is not clear when Mann purchased numbers 67 and 69 High Street. Early Ordnance Survey maps show that they were two properties in 1882 but were already one by 1900, although very different in plan to the present. In the late 19th century the plan of the house extended some way to the rear. These were presumably extensions to the original building, swept away by Anderson's designs of 1904 which consisted of new extensions to the front and back and a complete remodelling of the interior. His extensions at the back are identified by red brick dressings to quoins and window surrounds; his striking additions to the front include the porch, the full-height canted bay, the bow window and the cast iron railings.

The garden of the new house took in all the land to the rear up to the boundary with West Street and was later landscaped by Perkin's Nurseries in Northampton. The conservatory was built by a local firm, W.S. Revitt, but the stone thatched cottage, used as an eye-catching feature, was already there in its present plan form in 1882. Orchard House was the first house in Olney to have electricity, powered by a generator housed in the small brick building in the garden, and still uses a 50-watt current for lighting.

Alexander Ellis Anderson LRIBA was born in Scotland. After his training and further experience there and in England he set up his own practice in Northampton. His listed works include City Buildings, a warehouse in Northampton, and extensions to Miller Street Last Works and to the Crocket and Jones Shoe Factory, also in Northampton, all listed at Grade II. He also designed houses, several of which are included in the Abington Park conservation area in Northampton, and was executant architect for Charles Rennie Mackintosh's remodelling of number 78 Derngate for W.J. Bassett-Lowke, the toy entrepreneur, in 1916.

Significance

Orchard House is designated at Grade II* for its striking and unusual Arts and Crafts exterior combined with an extensively decorated interior in a variety of styles, all employing an orchard theme throughout to high standards of design and craftsmanship. It was designed by a significant Northampton architect, Alexander Ellis Anderson, for an important local boot and shoe manufacturer, J.W. Mann, Olney's most prominent citizen in the early 20th century. Anderson is best known for his buildings for the shoe industry in Northampton, several of which are listed, and also for his association with Charles Rennie Mackintosh at number 78 Derngate. The house and its garden, with conservatory, thatched cottage and generator housing, have all been maintained in good condition and have survived almost completely unaltered for over a hundred years.