Lower Lodge, With Walls, Railings And Piers

Lower Lodge, with walls, railings, and piers, dates to around 1740 and was designed by John Wood the Elder as an entrance lodge to Prior Park. It is constructed of fine limestone ashlar with a stone slate roof. The building consists of a small, single-depth gabled block, with a lower, single-bay addition.

The main elevation has three storeys. A fine Palladian window with radial bars to the centre light dominates the front, set above a plain architrave and keystone to plain pilasters, with a plain apron below. The ground floor is treated as a ‘Rustick’ or basement with small arched six-pane windows, a central elliptical archway for a six-panel door, and rusticated quoins. Channelled pilasters run up the facade, incorporating a first-floor band and a moulded cornice that returns to the pilasters. Copings are present to the kneelers, and ashlar stacks flank the ends. An east-facing elevation to Church Street features a small arched window, partly obscured by a later extension. The rear elevation has two oval windows to the first floor. A single-bay block to the left has an arched four-pane window above an elliptical arched two-light casement, culminating in an acute angle at the rear. The front to Ralph Allen Drive contains eight-pane arched lights to the first and second floors, with a larger version to the second and smaller to the ground floor.

The rear wall is of coursed rubble, with two oculi above a ground-floor lean-to range, and a stone eaves band concealing a gutter. A rear wing has twelve-pane windows on each level, with a corner stack. The interior remains uninspected.

The lodge is accompanied by a semicircular, ashlar wall with stepped saddle-back coping topped with short spikes, positioned across the front of the lodge. Opposite the entrance are a pair of square piers with flat pyramidal cappings, supporting a cast iron gate with dog-bars. The facade wall terminates at the north end and at a large pier with a pyramidal capping to the south, beyond which a length of railing extends to a higher return wall. This lodge was originally located at the north end of the main carriage drive to Prior Park, and is depicted on the Thorp Map of 1742.