Former Riding School And Banqueting House At Oldway Mansion

The former riding school and banqueting house at Oldway Mansion, located on Torquay Road in Paignton, was built in 1874 by GS Bridgman for Isaac Singer. It is a building of group value. The complex originally comprised a riding school and exercise pavilion, now used as offices, alongside a banqueting hall, currently workshops.

The riding school has a round plan, with remnants of a former glasshouse to the west. It was designed with an open central area surrounded by stabling and harness rooms and originally featured a movable wooden floor intended for entertaining. The building is constructed of Flemish bond red brick with local grey limestone footings, topped with a slate roof featuring stacks with grouped red brick shafts, stone banding and corbelled caps with stone pots. The lantern has a peaked slate roof with lucarnes, and a weathervane. A prominent, massive gabled porch on the south side, facing Oldway Mansion, features a full-height round-headed doorway with triple keyblocks, incised decoration, and left and right semi-circular cheeks. A substantial two-leaf door with studs, chamfered stopped rails and a wicket door are present. A barleysugar iron column remains on the left-hand cheek, a remnant of a former palm house that once stood between the mansion and the pavilion. The building’s ground-floor windows are two-light, high-transomed, with decorative tile panels above the sills. First-floor windows mostly comprise two-lights. Dormers with kneelers and a semi-circular fanlight are positioned above a first-floor window on either side of the porch. Surviving barley-sugar columns and cast-iron arches with foliage decoration indicate the remains of the adjacent glasshouses. The banqueting hall is also brick-built, with a pair of vertical boarded doors on the south side and a roof ventilator. At each end of the yard, north of the banqueting hall, square three-storey towers face into the yard; the right-hand tower has a curved conical slate roof. The towers have three-bay fronts with tall two-light windows.

The interior remains uninspected, but may contain features of interest. Isaac Singer, who developed the sewing machine, was known for his hospitality and hosted children's parties within the riding school. Photographic records, Bridgman’s plans, and elevations, which were published in The Architect in 1874, are displayed within Oldway Mansion.