Churston Court Farmhouse Including Courtyard Of Service Buildings And Garden Walls

Churston Court Farmhouse, built in the mid-19th century, is constructed from squared stone rubble with quoins and details in dressed Devonian limestone and red sandstone, and has a slate roof. The farmhouse is a double-fronted main range with a central entrance leading to a staircase, and a rear wing to the right, which forms one side of an enclosed service courtyard to the left, containing a former wash house and ash house. It is two storeys high with a garret. The design is intended to evoke a 16th and 17th century Cotswold farmhouse style, although without the stone-mullioned windows and hoodmoulds, with one exception. The front has three windows, the central window in a gabled projection with kneelers. The quoins are of red sandstone, contrasting with the limestone elsewhere. The central doorway features a four-centred chamfered arch of voussoirs, with red sandstone jambs and hoodmould. Either side of the doorway are slit windows. The windows have flat arches with limestone voussoirs and wood mullioned-and-transomed window frames with horizontal glazing bars. Gable ends are similar, with parapet copings and kneelers. Inside, the wooden staircase has thin square balusters and turned newels. The service buildings within the courtyard are single-storied; the ash house has a flight of stone steps leading to a loading point, with the waste emptied through a small brick-framed hole at ground level. The garden walls are constructed from stone rubble, tall on the north-east and north-west sides and lower on the others. One wall has a chamfered coping of stones on edge and curves inwards towards recessed square gate piers with pyramidal caps. Churston Court Farmhouse is a well-preserved mid-19th century layout of uniform architectural character, and has consistently been part of the Churston Court Estate. The farm buildings, which are separately listed, combine with the farmhouse to form a complete and fine group from the same period.