St Ervan House

St Ervan House

A rectory, now a private house and restaurant, built in 1853 as a gift to and held by the Reverend Henry N. Barton, the rector. The building is constructed of slate rubble with a Delabole rag slate roof featuring gable ends and red clay ridge-tiles. Large gable-end stacks with dripcourses and tapered caps are prominent features.

The house is designed in a domestic revival or survival style that combines Georgian and Gothic elements, while maintaining a plan typical of the mid-19th century. The building comprises two parallel ranges separated by an entrance hall, with an entrance porch located at the right end in the angle with the rear range, which projects to the right. The two principal rooms occupy the front range facing south onto the garden. The back range contains the study at its right end, adjacent to the entrance, with the stairwell to its left. A rear service wing extends at right angles to the left, containing the kitchen and an unheated single-storey wing at its end. A single-storey wing was added to the left end of the front range in the late 20th century.

The exterior presents two storeys with an attic. The symmetrical south garden front displays windows in a 2:1:2 arrangement on the first floor and 2:2 on the ground floor, all fitted with cambered slate arches, slate sills and 19th-century 4-pane sashes. Three 19th-century gabled dormers pierce the roof, each containing a pair of 4-pane sashes with shaped slates in the slate-hung gables and slate-hung cheeks. The east elevation shows the gable ends of the two parallel ranges, with the rear right-hand range projecting. A single-storey gabled porch sits in the angle between the ranges, featuring a pointed-arch doorway with an integral weathered buttress to its left and a 2-centred arch inner doorway with a fanlight and 19th-century panelled door. The projecting range's gable end contains 4-pane sashes on each floor and a lancet window in the gable above. The rear elevation of this range has a large stair sash in a cambered arch opening with a lateral stack above. The rear elevation shows a gable-ended service wing to the right and a single-storey hipped roof wing at the end of the main wing. The west side features a large 19th-century tripartite sash serving the kitchen and a 2-light sash above, both with cambered arches and slate sills. A single-storey addition with rendered walls and a low-pitched asbestos slate roof is attached to the left end of the front range.

The interior was not accessible at the time of survey but is likely to retain 19th-century features including the staircase, chimney-pieces and joinery.

The rectory is referenced in John Betjeman's blank verse autobiography "Summoned by Bells" (1960), which describes the building and its contents, particularly noting the pitch-pine doors and window frames. The bell at the Church of St Hermes, also at St Ervan, is likewise mentioned in the same work. The rectory was probably designed by the architect responsible for the School House at St Ervan, which was built in 1856.