Argal Manor House

Argal Manor House is a manor house, dating from the 18th century, with extensions from the early 19th century and rebuilding of much of the front wall of the 18th-century house and the adjoining wall of the 19th-century garden front around the 1930s. The house was built for the Reverend Edward Hodge. It is constructed of granite ashlar to the 19th-century front, with granite rubble and granite dressings or roughly dressed quarried granite elsewhere. The roofs are covered with dry Delabole slate, with a hipped roof, projecting eaves, and a 20th-century granite chimney over the right-hand side of the 19th-century garden front range. Similar chimneys are over the gable ends of the 18th-century range and its 19th-century extension. The single-storey rear wing has a scantle slate roof with a hipped end.

The house has an irregular U-shaped plan. The original 18th-century house contains a kitchen on the left and a parlour (now a sitting room) on the right. A service room is located in an outshut to the left, and a large 19th-century entrance hall and staircase are situated behind the right-hand side. A two-room-deep 19th-century garden front range extends to the right, and a one-room plan circa early 19th-century servant’s cottage addition is on the left, with a later 19th-century lean-to behind. A single-storey service wing, dating to the early 20th century, adjoins the rear entrance hall on the left.

The south front, with an overall five-window arrangement, originally had a nearly symmetrical three-window front to the 18th-century house, which has been largely rebuilt in the 20th century. A one-window front from the early 19th-century cottage is on the left, and a one-window end of the early 19th-century garden front is on the right, both also rebuilt in the 20th century. The original house’s doorway is slightly right of the middle, with an early 19th-century 20-pane sash window above and a similar sash to its right. The remaining windows on this front are 20th-century horned copy sashes, along with a 20th-century door. The symmetrical three-window east garden front is unaltered and retains its original hornless 16-pane sashes, some with crown glass, set within shallow segmental arches with projecting keystones. A principal rear doorway has an old six-panel door with panelled reveals and a 20th-century classical-style distyle porch. There is evidence of a former conservatory.

The ground floor was the only area inspected. The 18th-century house features a large 18th-century granite fireplace on the left and a 20th-century granite fireplace on the right. Round-headed wooden-fronted niches are on either side. There are circa early 19th-century panelled doors and moulded architraves with roundels to the corner blocks, and possibly later 19th-century moulded ceiling cornices in the reception rooms. A staircase, dating from circa 1936, is in an 18th-century style. A circa late 18th or early 19th-century marble chimney-piece in the far right-hand room is from another house.