Bishopsworth Manor And Attached Walls And Piers

Bishopsworth Manor is a house dating to circa 1720, located on Church Road in Bishopsworth, Bristol. It is a building of group value, reflecting its significant architectural and historical importance.

The manor is constructed from squared, coursed Lias rubble with freestone dressings, with rendered sides. An ashlar stack design replicates the style of Kings Weston, with a slate roof and hipped mansard. The rear of the building features pantile tiling. The house follows a double-depth plan, centered around a stairhall. The design is strongly influenced by Vanbrugh's Baroque King's Weston.

The front façade is symmetrical and comprises five bays. The central bay projects slightly and features a pediment with pilaster quoins. A keyed, elliptical-arched, bolection-moulded doorway contains an 8-panel door and an interlace fanlight. Above the door is a broken segmental pediment supporting an urn, flanked by acanthus leaf scroll brackets. The window above is similarly framed with fluted pilasters and a keyed elliptical head. A string course separates plate-glass sash windows in flush bolection-moulded frames, with flat arches featuring carved grotesques on the ground floor. A dentilled cornice and a steep pediment top the façade, enclosing a square plaque with a sunken round panel. Two wide, hipped dormers, each with an 8/8 sash window and a pineapple finial, are present. The hipped mansard roof is cut by a rectangular indent at the rear and is crowned by a four-sided chimney arcade, mirroring Kings Weston's design. Twelve chimneys are linked by keyed, elliptical arches on imposts, with the two central stacks at the front and back being dummies.

The interior features a good open-well staircase with triple column-on-vase balusters and fluted newels. A 9/9 sash window illuminates the stairwell, and a corniced ceiling incorporates an oval moulding. A semicircular-arched, two-leaf glazed door leads from the upper landing. Plain, fielded panelling and shutters are found in the downstairs and main first-floor rooms, alongside internal sliding sashes between attic rooms. The cellar includes a vaulted basement and a freshwater cistern with a hand pump.

Attached to the manor are rubble garden walls, a coped front wall to the street, and two pairs of gate piers linked by ramped quadrant walls. The piers are topped with moulded caps; Grecian urns adorn the inner piers and pineapples the outer ones. A range of converted farm buildings is incorporated at the rear. Much of the joinery was renewed in the 1970s under architect Peter Ware. The manor represents a fine early Georgian house with a noticeable architectural connection to King's Weston.