Ightham Court

Ightham Court is a house dating from the mid-16th century. The original H-shaped plan was altered in the mid-16th century with the addition of a projecting, four-storey classical frontispiece in 1575. Later alterations occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries. The west front has a ragstone ashlar plinth, while the basement is ragstone ashlar on all other sides. The upper portions are red brick with stone dressings and a crenellated parapet concealing a slate roof. There are three groups of chimneys, which are 20th-century replicas of those shown in a Kip engraving. The west side features a three-bay central frontispiece flanked by single bays, each of three storeys, with 19th-century Tudor Gothic mullion and transom windows on the first and second floors. Tall, splayed bays with glazing-bar sashes are on the ground floor. The four-storey frontispiece becomes progressively shorter towards the top and incorporates thin columns, arranged by order, supporting a flattened pediment with raised panels. Each order has a full entablature and full columns in the centre, with half columns at the sides. Two outer windows on the first floor are round. The ground floor is ashlar-faced, with two rusticated arched windows, cut off by a projecting 19th-century porch with double ribbed doors. The north side has a central two-and-a-half-storey projection with canted corners, a symmetrical two-window first floor, and a four-window ground floor. A central entrance, accessed by four steps, is set within a recess and has a four-centred arched surround with moulded imposts and double Gothick-head glazed margin light doors. The east side features a central recess flanked by two one-bay wings, with a tower supporting a clock cupola to the right of the recess. The fenestration is irregular. The interior retains little of the original fabric, except for an early 17th-century wooden balustraded open-newel back staircase.