Limnerslease, The Great Studio And The West Wing

Limnerslease is a house, built in 1891 by Sir Ernest George for George Frederick Watts, the painter and sculptor. It is now divided. The construction consists of snecked Bargate stone at the lower level and half-timbering above, with pebbledashed infill. The roofs are tiled, with hipped sections and sweeping down to the ends. The building is roughly L-shaped, with a projecting studio wing to the right. It has two storeys and an attic, with hipped-roof dormers. A tall stack with a corbelled top is located to the front right, while arcaded rear ridge stacks are found to the left and right.

The windows are primarily casement style, with leaded glazing. There's one window to the first floor in the projecting half-hip and gable break of the re-entrant angle, three windows to the centre, one in a hipped break to the right, and one ground floor window in an extension to the left. A single-storey wing to the right features a large wood-framed mullioned and transomed window. A ribbed door is located in the re-entrant angle, sheltered by a flat-roofed porch on brackets. A half-glazed door is set into a recess in the porch on the left end of the wing.

Later 20th-century additions include a brick and weatherboarded gable end extension to the left end, and a weatherboarded porch to the left end. A further weatherboarded porch is on the right-hand return front, with two dormers and a door.

The house is listed for its historical significance as the home of George Frederick Watts and his wife, Mary Seton Watts, who lived there until their deaths in 1904 and 1938 respectively.