Pengreep House

Pengreep House is a country house, originally a farmhouse, built in the early 18th century and subsequently enlarged. It was extended in the early to mid-18th century for the Beauchamp family and further extended around 1865 for the Williams family.

The building is constructed of elvan ashlar with some rubble to the rear. The roofs are hipped, mostly scantle slate with parapets to the south-east and north. Tall brick chimneys define the original side walls of the house, now a partition wall, with further chimneys to the rear of the wings and over the cross wall to the mid-18th-century range to the north.

The original house had a two-room plan, probably with a rear stair turret and service wing. The mid-18th-century extension added one room to the right (north) and a kitchen to the rear, forming a further garden front and possibly incorporating an earlier service wing, now containing a mid-18th-century stair. The circa 1865 extension to the left (south) comprises two rooms deep with a stair and integral service room filling the space between the 18th-century wing and the 19th-century rear south-west room. It is possible that the 19th-century part to the rear left replaces an early to mid-18th-century extension on the same site, with the ashlar facing and parapet cornice reused from this earlier work.

The building is two storeys with basement and attics. The original house and part of the early to mid-18th-century extension have hipped roof dormers to all the early to mid-18th-century parts. The south-east front displays a taller regular 19th-century two-window section projecting to the left and a regular five to three-window range to the middle and right. The early 18th-century five-window part was originally symmetrical with a wider first-floor middle window of sixteen panes. The doorway was originally directly under this wide window but was moved around the early to mid-18th century to the fourth ground-floor opening when a three-window section was added to the right of the front. The basement acts as a plinth with a mid-floor string and moulded cornice under a plain parapet. Flat arches are employed throughout. The original mid-18th-century sashes are twelve-pane oak with much crown glass and wide, internally ovolo-moulded glazing bars. The basement is blind to the 19th-century part and the last bay of the mid-18th-century part to the right. The doorway is approached by a wide flight of steps with a ramped iron railing and finials. A 18th-century six-panel door with blind overlight is protected by a hood on brackets.

The north-east front has five windows of the early to mid-18th century, originally symmetrical and possibly originally with a central doorway, now a window, and a window to the left, now a doorway, with a pair of two-panel doors between wooden pilasters. It shares similar detail with the main front but has no basement. Original sashes survive, with a further 18th-century sash to the gable end right. The remaining 19th-century sashes are hornless.

The interior of the entrance hall is a virtually complete survival of one of the two original early 18th-century reception rooms, featuring a moulded plaster ceiling cornice, fielded dado panelling, and an eight-panel door with HL hinges to a semi-circular-on-plan niche to the left of the fireplace. A mid-18th-century fireplace surround and late 18th-century oval over-arch grate are also present. The original basement kitchen below retains original rough-hewn oak cross beams and a cambered chamfered and stopped oak fireplace lintel. Early to mid-18th-century shutters survive. A secret panel to the right of the front door uses the space vacated by a window jamb splay. The rear passage beyond the axial passage has a dado with fielded panelling and a further early 18th-century seven-panel resited door with fielded panes between the axial passage and the room to the right of the entrance hall.

Other rooms in the early to mid-18th-century parts of the house are almost completely intact from their period and feature moulded plaster ceiling cornices, doors, architraves, and window shutters. The rooms to the main front, at ground level, have oak panelling and fluted pilasters and entablature of the Doric order including triglyphs. The right-hand room also has oak panelling with key-pattern detail. The first-floor rooms over are fully panelled with original early 18th-century panelling and cornices to the left and middle rooms, and with a dentilled cornice and eared fireplace in the early to mid-18th-century right-hand room. The steep service stair to the inner part of the rear wing is circa mid-18th century with an open well and chinoiserie balustrade. The kitchen of the wing and passages not overlying basement areas have granite flagged floors. An original mid-18th-century kitchen dresser with entablature survives, resited in the axial passage, with a further similar dresser in the kitchen.

The Victorian parts of the house are also very intact and of good quality for their period, including fireplaces, ceilings with cornices and bands, doors, window shutters, and an open-well open-string stair with mahogany handrail.

Although comprising three main periods, this is predominantly a mid-18th-century house and represents a fine and complete example, retaining three virtually complete rooms of its earlier phase and incorporating good quality circa 1865 additions.