Kinnersley Manor South Bank The Manor House

Kinnersley Manor South Bank, The Manor House

This building comprises two wings of a mansion house, now in separate ownership, representing the surviving portions of a mansion originally built in 1579 by John More and called Kinnersley Manor. The building was partially refronted and refenestrated in the 18th century and underwent late 19th-century alterations and additions.

The original mansion was square in plan with a central courtyard. The Manor House forms the north wing and South Bank forms the east wing. The other two wings were demolished in the late 19th century and the courtyard was filled in. The replacement buildings erected on the site, which have separate postal addresses, are not of special architectural interest.

The structure is timber-framed with plaster infill. The framing features close-studded panels that are exposed on the north and east elevations, while the ground floor is underbuilt in painted brick. The north front is stuccoed. The front roof slope of The Manor House is covered in Horsham stone slabs, with the remainder tiled and featuring clustered brick chimneystacks. The building rises to two storeys with attics and a basement.

The Manor House's north front displays three projecting gables with moulded wooden bargeboards and finials. The windows feature original three-light wooden mullions on the gables, while the lower floors contain five bays of 12-pane sashes. A central doorcase with rectangular fanlight and half-glazed door is sheltered behind a 19th-century wooden porch. The west return has a similar tile-hung gable with a later projection comprising two lower floors with sash windows. The east front includes a gable at its north end (part of The Manor House) and the remainder belonging to South Bank, which has a gable with carved bargeboards to the south and a 19th-century gabled dormer. Most windows throughout are sashes, though two blocked original casements are visible on the first floor east elevation. The south front of South Bank is covered in late 19th-century stucco and features a projecting gable to the south-west with three casement windows.

Internally, The Manor House contains significant features from the 16th century. The cellar preserves late 16th-century cross beams with lamb's tongue stops and 18th-century wine bins. The ground floor west room displays a fine 16th-century Reigate stone fireplace with decorated spandrels and was originally panelled. The dining room features a cornice decorated with wheat and cornucopia motifs, an early 19th-century six-panelled door, and a late 19th-century black marble fireplace. The windows retain two surviving pieces of 16th-century stained glass bearing coats of arms of the More family. The first floor contains a further 16th-century Reigate stone fireplace of similar design. A corner room on this floor has a cross beam with lamb's tongue stops and a roll-moulded beam. A wooden panel with carved fleur de lys represents a rare survival of a 16th-century wooden window shutter. The second floor contains a room with exposed plaster bearing painted ermine decoration. The roof structure is a queenpost design with diagonal braces.

South Bank retains internally the original external wall of the courtyard, featuring weathered timber-framing with plaster infill. A first floor room contains moulded crossbeams. The roof is of butt purlin construction. A boarded-up late 18th-century service staircase survives, replaced functionally by a late 19th-century well staircase situated in the original courtyard space.

Kinnersley appeared on Speed's map of Surrey dated 1623 with lettering as large as the adjoining towns, indicating its historical significance. The whole building was described by Manning and Bray in 1809 as "Large, timber built and consists of a quadrangle enclosing a court. In the upper storey is a room which runs round the whole, on the outside walls of this room, all round, are small cabins sufficient to contain a bedstead, some of which remained until lately." The building was painted by the Hassell Brothers during the 1820s and 1830s.