Bolnore House

Bolnore House

Former mansion, now divided into apartments, located on Isaacs Lane in Haywards Heath.

The house was developed over several building phases. The south west wing and possibly the north west wing were built between 1852 and 1855 by Decimus Burton for Miss Dealty in Classical style. The south east wing and attached north west stable block were added around 1878 for owners with the initials HW. The north west wing was refronted in 1930, and a west garden room was added at the same time for Alexander Drake Kleinwort, a banker. The building was converted into eleven apartments in the 1940s.

The north west entrance block dates from 1930 as a refurbishment of a 19th-century wing. It is faced in ashlar in Classical style with a slate mansard roof topped with two tall chimneystacks with round-headed arches. The block is two storeys with attics and nine windows. The attic storey features seven pedimented dormers with 9-pane sashes. The centre three bays project forward under an elaborate pediment bearing a shield and the motto "NIL SINE LABORE". A deep modillion cornice runs across the facade. The first floor windows are 15-pane sashes in surrounds with keystones, ears and feet. The ground floor has alternate curved and triangular pediments, the curved ones bearing fasces, with mullioned and transomed windows containing leaded lights. The central doorcase has a projecting curved pediment inscribed with the initials ADK, decorated with olive wreaths, and flanked by half-Tuscan columns and sidelights. The elaborate door features a rectangular fanlight and wrought iron grille. Four elaborate rainwaterheads are dated 1930.

Attached to the north west is a mid-19th-century block modified around 1930. Its front is rendered with a slate mansard roof from around 1930 and four tall stone chimneystacks. The block has pedimented dormer windows with 12-pane sashes and sash windows with cornices and brackets to the lower floors. The rear elevation is of three storeys in red brick with cambered 12-pane sash windows to the upper floors and larger sashes with vertical glazing bars only to the ground floor. A late 19th-century timber-framed, gabled square bell turret rises at the rear.

Attached to the west is a one-storey early 20th-century Classical style garden room in ashlar with a hipped slate roof, glazed at the centre, and a tall chimneystack. It features a cornice with paired obelisk finials, rusticated pilasters, twenty-four pane sashes in elaborate surrounds, and an oculus facing north east.

The south west wing dates from 1852 to 1855 in Classical style, stuccoed with a slate roof. It is two storeys with seven windows. A moulded cornice with later 19th-century balustrading has been superimposed above. First floor windows have pediments and brackets; three contain 12-pane sashes. The tall ground floor windows are set behind balconies with cast iron balustrading supported on stone columns. Two bays of the entrance block featuring a Venetian window may also date from this building phase. The rendered octagonal corner tower to the extreme south west and one bay along the south east are probably also from this phase, as they share identical pediments and brackets to the first floor windows. Round-headed arches occur to the ground floor of the tower. Old photographs show that the tower formerly had an ogee-headed dome with metal finial, now replaced with a pyramidal roof and a metal weathervane dated 1900. The rear elevation of this wing, facing an internal courtyard, is red brick with mainly cambered 12-pane sash windows, though a large three-tier 6-light staircase window was inserted in 1930, along with a ground floor addition.

The south east wing is dated 1878 with the initials HW. It is two storeys of red brick with seven windows, mainly cambered, and a dated oriel window on the right hand side. Cemented balustrading runs along the facade.

The former stable block, attached to the north west of the entrance block, is late 19th-century, arranged on three sides of a courtyard with a former coach house in the centre flanked by gabled stable wings. The blocks have red brick ground floors, timber-framed and plastered first floors, and tiled roofs with brick chimneystacks. Windows are mullioned or mullioned and transomed casements with six-panelled doors with pivoting fanlights above.

The interior of the public rooms in the north western wing was refurbished around 1930 in Jacobean style. The entrance hall features an elaborate strapwork ceiling and oak panelling, a stone fireplace with carved overmantel and blue Turkish tiles. Double doors lead off and there is an oak well staircase with flat balusters and an elaborate carved newel post bearing the Kleinwort shield. A gallery with round-headed arches and tapering balusters overlooks the staircase. The stained glass staircase window displays eight shields of the Kleinwort family. A further carved stone fireplace with Turkish tiles stands opposite the staircase. The remainder of the interior was not inspected.