Stable Block And Carriage House Including Walls To The South East, North Of Mountains Lodge

This is a stable block and carriage house, likely dating from around 1865, built alongside Mountains Lodge and possibly designed by G. Somers Clarke. A later 19th or early 20th century carriage house block was added. The building is constructed of English bond brick with blue diapering, with the clock tower block featuring imitation timber framing.

The layout consists of two blocks set at right angles, creating two sides of a stable yard. Mountains Lodge and surrounding walls form the remaining boundaries. The stable block, running parallel to the road, is oriented east to west, while the clock tower block sits at a right angle to the south. Additional carriage houses project into the yard on the east side.

The five-bay stable block has a gabled section on the left (west) side, possibly originally a tack room. There are four stable doors, including access to the rack room, sheltered by a carriageway roof. Three gabled attic dormers feature ornamental pierced bargeboards and original four-pane casements. An unusual first-floor walkway platform connects the tack room loft door to the clock tower block. The east-facing elevation of the clock tower block is largely hidden by the adjacent carriage house. The hipped roof has timber finials and a projecting loft door within a decorative bellcote with a gabled, shingle-covered roof. Loft breathers are positioned either side of the loft door. To the north, a carriage entrance has a gabled roof. The carriage house, fronting the clock tower block, has a flat roof where it meets the block and a gabled end. It has three paired plank doors with large straphinges and a three-light casement window in the gable. A 19th century cast iron pump remains west of the clock tower block. The stables have been extended westward, outside the stable yard, in a sympathetic architectural style.

The interior of the stable block includes an arched braced roof, with decorative corbels and boarded, canted ceilings. One original stall partition with a cast iron post survives. A round-headed brick arch leads from the west end into the tack room.

This is an unusually complete example of a well-detailed, small-scale High Victorian stable yard.