West Downs School (Main Range)

West Downs School (Main Range) is a preparatory school built around 1880, designed by the local architect Thomas Stopher, who was also a three-time Mayor of Winchester. The building combines Gothic and Queen Anne architectural styles.

The school features a long range of red brick, with the front elevation faced in flints and accented with stone marble and red brick dressings. It has a tiled roof adorned with crested ridge tiles and five tall brick chimneystacks, while the end gables include lunette windows. The structure is two storeys high with an attic.

Prominent on the front elevation are two notable features: a tall water tower on the right and a curved Dutch gable on the left. The water tower rises above the roofline and is topped with a crenellated parapet, a modillion cornice, and a brick St Andrew's Cross. It has a louvred lancet window, and below it is a two-storey four-light stone oriel with trefoliated mullioned and transomed windows above blank shields and Caernarvon arched heads. A brick arched doorcase is located beneath this oriel.

The Dutch gable features one cambered sash window without glazing bars in the attic, two narrow cambered sashes on the first floor, and a wide four-centred arched doorcase with a hood moulding. This doorcase includes two half-glazed double doors with fanlights above. Between the water tower and the Dutch gable, there are three ranges, each with six hipped dormers featuring 16-pane windows, with the central dormer extended downwards for loading doors. The building has a brick modillion eaves cornice and a row of five small oculi below it. Each range contains three triple cambered sashes without glazing bars, framed with brick surrounds and some black brick headers, along with triangular-shaped brick window dressings and quoins. The left end bay has a large four-light bay window spanning both floors. There is a double brick band between the ground and first floors, and a plinth. The rear elevation includes some lancet windows on the first floor.