Dial House And No. 1 (Dial Cottage) And No. 2 Dial House Gardens

This house, briefly used as a school, is currently divided into three residential properties. Dial House dates from around 1730, possibly built as a parlour wing to an earlier house to the east. It was refenestrated with a porch added in the early 19th century, and some later 19th-century bays were added on the south side. No. 1 Dial House Gardens (Dial Cottage) may have some 17th-century origins, altered in the 19th century. No. 2 Dial House Gardens is early 19th century with 20th-century extensions.

Materials and Construction

Dial House is built of buff brick with red brick dressings, painted on three sides. It has a wooden modillion eaves cornice and a hipped tiled roof with brick chimneystacks on the north-west end and east side. The other properties are of painted brick with slate roofs.

Layout

Dial House is three storeys with a cellar, and has three windows to the west and south fronts. Internally, the ground and first floors have two rooms either side of a central staircase, with four rooms on the second floor. No. 1 Dial House Gardens is two storeys with six windows. No. 2 Dial House Gardens is a two-storey three-bay pavilion.

Exterior

The west side of Dial House was originally the entrance front. It has three symmetrically placed early 19th-century sash windows with stone cills, with smaller six-pane windows to the second floor and 12-pane sashes to the other floors. The central second-floor window is blank and contains a sundial dated 1730 with the initials H W. This is a copy made in the 1990s of the original, thought to have been removed by a previous owner. The central ground-floor window was originally the main entrance but was converted into a window, probably in the early 19th century. There are projecting brick bands between the floors.

The south front has been painted and is wider than the west side, although also of three bays. The left side second-floor window is blank. In the mid-19th century, a single-storey canted bay window was added to the left and a two-storey canted bay added to the right. The projecting Tuscan porch is early 19th century and has a mid-19th-century half-glazed door with incised decoration. The north elevation never had windows but has a blocked doorcase. The east side has a projecting external chimneystack and is partially obscured by the two-storey former service range of painted brick with slate roof, which has 20th-century sash windows in earlier openings.

No. 1 Dial House Gardens (Dial Cottage) is a continuation of the service end of Dial House in painted brick and slate roof, with six 12-pane sash windows and 20th-century porches.

No. 2 Dial House Gardens is an early 19th-century two-storey three-window detached pavilion with a hipped tiled roof and sash windows. It was either built as a purpose-built pre-1839 schoolroom or adapted from an earlier carriage house.

Interior

Dial House has a ground-floor western drawing room, adjoining staircase hall, smaller dining room, and a kitchen to the extreme east. Entrance through the central door in the south elevation leads directly into the hall, which has dado-panelling and a deep moulded wooden cornice. A moulded plaster ceiling may survive under a later covering. The floor is multi-coloured Victorian tiles.

The early 18th-century dogleg staircase has moulded balusters, dado-panelling, a round-headed niche between the first and second flights, and a cupboard with butterfly hinges, known as the bible cupboard. The western room has painted pine panelling with dado rail, deep moulded cornice, a wooden fireplace with eared architraves, and a china cupboard with flat arch with keystone and serpentine wooden shelves, flanked by pilasters. The window shutters and window boxes survive. The dining room has a narrow moulded cornice, a wooden bolection-moulded fireplace, and wide floorboards.

A rear service corridor leads to the cellar, which has a ledged plank door, brick floor, coal chutes, and brick and slate wine bins. The first-floor landing retains panelling to the south wall with moulded cornice and dado panelling. The western parlour has similar panelling to the room underneath, a fireplace with eared architrave but late 19th-century tiled surround, flanked by two cupboards with L-hinges, one of which is panelled on the inside. There are shutters, windowseats, and a two-panelled door. The eastern bedroom retains an 18th-century two-panelled door on L-hinges but the cornice is 20th century.

The staircase between the first and second floor is separate and not integrated into the lower part of the staircase but identical in form. The dado-panelling was replaced in the 20th century. The central corridor of the second floor has a massive wooden beam and an early 19th-century school cupboard with shelves still retaining the names of the pupils. The north-western second-floor room has an early 19th-century wooden fireplace with cast-iron range, three 18th-century two-panelled doors survive, and one ledged plank door. The roof has original rafters and purlins and retains a fixed wooden ladder, originally leading to the belvedere on the roof.

History

The Dial House property formed part of the manor of Laleham, which was in the possession of the Reynell family between 1660 and 1745, when it passed to the Lowther family. The two-storey block to the east of Dial House (No. 1 Dial House Gardens) may have origins in the mid-17th century, but the main three-storey part of Dial House is dated 1730 with the initials on a sundial blocking the central window on the second floor of the west elevation. A brick near the corner on the west front is also inscribed H W. This possibly refers to the Walker family who are likely to have built the main part of Dial House in the early 18th century.

The Lowther family sold the property at auction in 1803 as Lot XVII, where it was described as:

"A Brick and Tiled Dwelling House in the Village of Laleham, containing on the Ground Floor, a Dining Room in front, a Kitchen, small Pantry and Wash House behind; in the latter is a pump of good water. On the First Floor, a Drawing Room in Front, and a good bed chamber behind, separated by a Passage or Landing to the Stair Case. In the Attics two bed chambers in front, a passage, and two Bedrooms behind. Good cellaring under the house. A Range of buildings adjoining the Wash House, containing a Stable for two horses, Chaise House, Knife House, Etc. part brick, part Boarded, and the whole Pantiled. Yard and Garden...."

The deeds of 1816 suggest that the property was owned between 1803 and 1810 by James Simmons of Canterbury and that in 1810 Charles Walker of Old Jewry bought the property from the estate of James Simmons. It was tenanted by Webster Gillman followed by Mrs. Roebuck. In 1816, Dial House, including the yard, garden, outhouses, and appurtenances, was sold to Thomas Hartley of Horsleydown for £330. In October 1824, Hartley sold the complete property to James Fenton of Farnham for £430.

Fenton converted part of the house and its attached building to the east into a private boys' school, which probably operated until his death in 1838. No. 2 Dial House Gardens is thought to have been used as a classroom. His widow Anne remained in occupation until 1867, and then the property remained in the joint ownership of the Fentons' two sons until 1878. In 1878, the property was sold to Dr. John Wyatt Barnard for the sum of £1,900.

A late 19th-century photograph shows roof railings to the former belvedere, which were no longer present by the 1930s. After Belfour's death in 1925, his widow Florence lived in the house until her death in 1953. In the 1950s, the property was divided into four separate properties, currently called Dial House, No. 1 (Dial Cottage), No. 2 Dial House Gardens, and No. 3 (Dial Croft). No. 2 was possibly originally a carriage house or purpose-built early 19th-century schoolroom. No. 1 was renovated in 1987 after the roof caught fire, and No. 2 was extended in the 1980s.