Keffolds

Large house. Built in 1905 by the local architect and builder Herbert Hutchinson for a Commander Henderson of the Royal Navy. The house has an L-shaped plan, with the principal rooms facing southwest and a service wing to the northeast. The architectural style is Jacobethan.

The southwest wing is two storeys high and constructed of red brick with black diaperwork detailing and a tiled roof. It has five windows. The windows are mullioned or mullioned and transomed casements. The southwest or entrance front features a large gabled dormer, a buttress, and a round-headed plank door set in a semi-circular recess with a lamp, a keystone, and a blank plaque with a triangle above. Gable ends have kneelers which return. The garden front has a two-storey, seven-light canted bay and a gable to the southeast with fretted bargeboards and a two-storey canted bay.

The northeast wing is two storeys high with attics and has five windows. It is built of red brick, but the northwest front, facing a courtyard, has a recessed centre with eclectic timber framing. The second floor has a roof in three hips with tile hanging. The windows are mainly casement windows with leaded lights. A tall staircase window of three by three bays is located to the right. The rear elevation has a timber-framed second floor with two gables.

Interior features include a ground floor room with a copper fireplace in a recess, and an adjoining Great Hall with an arched fireplace in a recess, incorporating a settle, and an oak staircase with arched balusters and elaborate finials. To the south is a room with a bracketed eaves cornice, a fireplace with ovolo moulding, and a marquetry floor.

Attached to the west is a low red brick terrace wall and two stone and brick gatepiers with tiled gabled heads.

A second description indicates that the right wing, containing the entrance, appears to be the original house, dating from the late 19th century. It is two storeys and five bays, with a very irregular appearance. The fairly high-pitched tiled roof has one tall canted gabled dormer in the centre. The construction is red brick with a large diaper of blue heartens and freestone dressings. The windows are leaded casements of varying sizes, reflecting the function of the rooms within. Gabled buttresses flank the large window on the right. Continuous drip moulds are present at varying levels. The round arched entrance has a splayed reveal and architrave, a keystone with a pedimented plaque above, and a studded door with elaborate iron hinges. The other wing appears to be later, from the early 20th century. It is two storeys and an attic, with three bays. The central bay is wider and recessed, holding three close-set windows on an overhanging half-timbered first floor. A continuous pentice above creates a distant Wealden echo, and three tile-hung gable ends are above this pentice. Other walls are red brick. The right bay has a rounded inner angle and a round-arched door, which may be part of the earlier house or a sensitive transition between the two wings.