Penrice

SX 04 NW ST AUSTELL HIGHER PORTHPEAN

868-0/12/462 Penrice (Formerly Listed as: ST AUSTELL 11/03/74 Penrice)

GV II*

Large country house, now used as care home. Mid C18. MATERIALS: Pentewan stone ashlar with granite dressings; dry slate and rag slate hipped roofs: the front roof over a moulded and bracketed wooden eaves cornice, the left-hand return behind a moulded stone parapet, and the right-hand return with a moulded wooden cornice; ashlar axial stacks with moulded cornices. PLAN: large overall deep rectangular plan built around a small courtyard; service ranges at rear. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys; symmetrical 2:1:3:1:2-bay U-shaped principal entrance front has hipped outer wings and 3-window centre broken forward with triangular pediment. Mostly original or early C19 12-pane hornless sashes (to all elevations) and some horned copies. Central pedimented porch with square Tuscan columns and 4-panel door within. Pediment has crest with the Latin inscription: PER SINUM SODARUM. Left-hand return is a symmetrical 5-window parapeted front with central round-arched doorway, plus a lower 4-window service range on the left. The sashes to the 2 right-hand bays are glazed but blind. Right-hand return is a symmetrical 4:3:4-bay front with central bays bowed and with bowed sashes. The left-hand bay has glazed but blind sashes. INTERIOR: very fine quality features where inspected including moulded and carved ceiling cornices, the inner hall with a central oval and the stair hall with an open-well cantilevered open-string staircase with turned balusters. A fine mid C18 house. (The Buildings of England: Pevsner N: Cornwall: London: 1990-: 135).

Listing NGR: SX0219649884