Moditonham House

Moditonham House is a substantial house of early 18th-century date, incorporating fabric from an earlier house, with alterations made in the later 18th and 19th centuries, and some 20th-century changes. It is located in Botus Fleming.

The exterior presents a carefully composed design. The front elevation is constructed in Devon limestone ashlar with granite dressings, while the sides are rendered and lined out, and the rear is built in slatestone rubble. The roof is hipped and covered in slate, with the rear slope in asbestos slate. Chimney stacks to the sides have rendered shafts and cornices.

The building is three storeys tall, raised on a plinth. The front elevation is symmetrical, arranged in 2:3:2 bays, with the outer bays slightly advanced. Long and short rusticated quoins frame the composition, with granite band courses running over the lintels and a granite moulded cornice supporting a parapet with moulded coping and urns at the right and left ends.

The ground floor features a central Roman Doric portico with fluted columns, frieze and entablature including triglyphs, guttae and mutules. The portico contains double half-glazed doors. All windows are 12-pane sashes in exposed boxes with flat stone arches featuring voussoirs and projecting keystones; these sashes were replaced later in the 18th century. The left side of the front range has a 12-pane sash at ground and first floor levels, with an external stack. The rear range contains a 2-light casement and two 20th-century French windows at ground floor; three 12-pane sashes at first floor; and three oval lights at attic level with radial glazing bars. The parapet ramps up to meet the front range.

The right side of the front range has rusticated quoins, with two 12-pane sashes at ground floor and 12-pane sashes to the left at first and second floors, balanced by a blind window to the right. String courses and parapet with coping continue across this elevation. The parapet ramps down to the rear range. At ground floor there is a deep 15-pane sash and a 12-pane sash. The first floor has a 19th-century mullion and transom window and two 4-pane sashes in raised architraves, also of the 19th century. The second floor has three similar 4-pane sashes with segmental heads.

The rear elevation of the main range contains a large 30-pane sash serving as a stair light, with a cellar door below, and 20th-century doors to the ground floor at right and left. The first floor has a 2-light casement to the left and a 12-pane light to the right, both of 20th-century date. The wing to the left has a rear door and a large 80-pane sash of 19th-century date at ground floor on the inner side, with a 20th-century 2-light casement at first floor. The wing to the right has a blind gable end and a 6-panelled door with brick segmental head to the inner side.

The plan is of double-depth arrangement with a central entrance hall and principal rooms to the front left and right. The stair hall occupies the rear centre, with smaller rooms to the rear right and left. Rear wings of single-room plan extend to the rear right and left, forming a rear courtyard. The earlier house appears to have extended further to the rear.

Interior features are notable. The entrance hall contains a plaster ceiling, cornice and central roundel decorated with plasterwork of rustic objects including a rake, billhooks, wheatsheaf and barrel, dating to the early 18th century. A round arch opens to the rear stair hall. The stair is a fine imperial example, probably of the later 18th century, with turned balusters, swept and wreathed handrail, open string and fluted columnar newels. Later 18th-century plasterwork appears at the first-floor landing ceiling.

The front left room was remodelled as a library in the early 19th century. Bolection moulded panelling from the early 18th century remains, as does a bolection moulded chimneypiece at the left end. Regency-style glazed bookcases with Gothic glazing and fluted friezes line the walls. At the left end, a window features trompe l'oeil painting resembling bookcases, and panelled shutters close the front windows. The front right room has a fine late 18th-century plaster ceiling with a central roundel depicting Grecian maidens, a dado rail, and panelled shutters to the windows. A wooden chimneypiece at the rear has paired Ionic columns, frieze and entablature. Both front rooms have 6-panelled doors. The rear right room has a similar chimneypiece with single fluted Ionic columns positioned back to back with the front fireplace.

In the rear right wing is a kitchen, heated from a gable-end stack, with a slate floor. The rear left room contains plasterwork frieze of vine leaves and a plain reeded chimneypiece. A segmental-headed alcove with pilasters is set into the inner wall.

The house retains fine internal features from both the early and late 18th century. The side stacks create a symmetrical exterior effect, though the stack to the right does not heat the ground-floor room, serving only the first and second floors.