Killigarth Manor

Killigarth Manor, Lansallos

Manor house, now converted to holiday accommodation. The building dates to 1872, as indicated by a datestone, though it incorporates substantial reused dressed stone from an earlier manor house. The core of the earlier building may have been remodelled rather than entirely rebuilt. Construction is in stuccoed stone rubble with granite dressings and rusticated quoins. The roof is of slate with gabled ends to each of the three ranges, and a pyramid slate roof surmounts the original entrance tower.

The house is planned as two parallel ranges forming a double depth plan, with a third range across the left-hand end and a tower (originally the entrance porch) at the opposite right-hand end. It is now subdivided into holiday flats.

The asymmetrical west front presents two storeys across five windows. The composition comprises the gable end of a cross wing on the left and the west front of the double depth range on the right. On the ground floor, a reused three-light granite window with hollow-chamfered jambs and hoodmould appears on the left, flanked by reused pilasters with ionic volutes at their bases. A datestone reading '1662' is positioned to the right.

A porch of stone rubble with a gabled slate roof is situated to the left of centre, featuring a reused two-light mullion window with hollow-chamfered jambs on its front and a single-light window in the right-hand side wall. A reused three-centred arch with chamfered jambs ornamented with ball stops and run-out stops below is set in the left-hand side wall. The inner door has a three-centred granite arch with heavy rollmould.

At the centre and to the right are four-light and three-light granite mullion windows with hollow-chamfered jambs and segmental arched openings, each with hoodmoulds and flanking reused pilasters with volutes below. Between these openings, 20th-century garage doors occupy a wide opening, which itself features a hoodmould.

The first floor contains three six-pane sashes with hoodmoulds and flanking pilasters. A four-pane sash is positioned to the left of centre, with a tall stair window featuring a segmental arched opening to the right of centre.

On the south elevation, a square tower of three stages projects slightly off centre from the double gable end of the main range. The tower displays rusticated quoins, chamfered on the ground floor and alternating above. The entrance, though now blocked, retains its reused three-centred chamfered arch with unusual stops, which appears to have been heightened. Above this is a panel comprising an arcade of blind trefoiled arches with a datestone reading 1872 above.

Segmental arched sashes punctuate the side walls and first stage of the tower. Roundels are positioned in the second stage. A dentilled string course and modillion cornice surmount the pyramid roof, which features shaped slates and a slender wooden cupola. The cupola is topped with an ogee hexagonal dome bearing a ball finial and a wrought iron weather vane.

The rear garden elevation to the east presents a symmetrical two-window front with canted bay windows at ground floor level and sashes on the first floor.

The interior was not accessible at the time of listing inspection.

The site was formerly the property of John de Kylgat, Bearers, Bevills and Grenvilles (see also Talland Church). The original manor house is reputed to have been demolished after 1820; a possible earlier site lies to the west. The present house was erected in 1872. However, J. Couch, in his History of Polperro (published in 1871 after his death), describes Killigarth Manor in detail, including a fine room used as a sleeping compartment with a vaulted ceiling featuring longitudinal and transverse mouldings, decorated with paintings of the History of Paradise. Seventeenth-century records also document the existence of a bell tower.