Clock Tower At Inglewood House

Clock Tower at Inglewood House, Kintbury

Built between 1844 and 1863, architect unknown, this is a Classical garden building of stucco-rendered brick with a slate roof and wooden clock tower. The structure stands as an octagonal tower of three storeys topped by a square wooden clock tower, positioned to the west (rear) of the main house within its former gardens.

The exterior is finished with stucco rendering incised to give the appearance of masonry and enhanced with blind arcading, pilasters, a cornice and parapet. The clock tower sits at the apex of the slate roof with clock faces set in diamond-shaped plaques above small louvre openings on all four elevations, and is surmounted by a weathervane. The main tower has limited windows to the north-west and south-east comprising multi-paned sashes without horns of varying sizes on different floors; the first and middle floor features the largest windows, creating a piano nobile effect. There is a modern door to the north-east in a historic opening and a further doorway to the east which formerly provided access to the now-demolished ancillary ranges that were attached to the tower since at least 1877.

The ground floor is plastered internally and has been subdivided by modern partition walls into two small bedrooms with radiators. A metal modern spiral staircase to the south-east provides access to the upper floors, which are presumably of similar form. The roof and clock mechanism are accessed via a hatch on the second floor landing ceiling. Late 20th-century internal partitioning has been inserted throughout.

The clock tower was built by Major William Dunn, who substantially enlarged and improved Inglewood House, the principal residence which had been purchased by his brother Thomas Dunn, a Judge of the King's Bench of Quebec and Senior Member of the Executive Committee of Lower Canada, in 1829. The expansion is evident on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1877, which shows additional ranges of buildings to the south-west, all linked to the house. In 1893 the estate was bought by the Walmsleys, a Catholic family of Lancastrian origin, who made various alterations. The De La Salle Brothers, a Catholic teaching order, purchased the estate in 1928 and converted it for use as a seminary and school, a use that continued until 1971. The estate was subsequently sold to Champneys, who converted it into Inglewood Health Hydro, operating from 1975 until 2004. During this period, the clock tower was converted to staff accommodation with six small bedrooms, two to each floor. As of 2009 the clock tower was unused.