Seend Green House

SEEND HIGH STREET ST 9461 (south side) 12/301 Seend Green House 19.3.62 GV II

House, late C17 altered and extended 1760 for Mary Duchess of Somerset, ashlar with slate low-pitched hipped roofs. Square plan 3-storey main house with L-plan east end 3-storey service range. Main north front has moulded plinth, dripcourse stepped over ground floor windows, plain string over first floor, moulded cornice and parapet. Windows all recessed chamfered 2-light mullion windows with traces of removed transom. Early C19 small-paned sashes with Gothic pointed glazing bars to top panes. Six-panel door in moulded architrave set in early C19 Tudor-arched ashlar porch with carved arms. West end wall is rubble stone with string, cornice and parapet carried round and 5-window range of blocked openings to two upper floors. Ground floor has c1900 projecting room, rendered with parapet and 3-window range to south front matching windows of main range adjoining. South front is apparently c1760 but uneven spacing of 6-window range suggests that it incorporates part of C17 house. String courses, moulded cornice and parapet, sash windows in plain raised surrounds, 12-pane to second floor, 15-pane to first floor and French windows to ground floor. Openings of fourth bay are false. Half glazed door in third bay in moulded architrave with segmental pediment on consoles, obscured by early C19 Roman Doric porch. All windows have Gothic heads to top panes. From north-east angle projects L-plan service wing with various c1900 lower additions to south. Rendered with ashlar cornice and parapet and 2-light windows in plain architraves, 4 windows visible on second floor of south front, ground floor and part of first floor obscured. Blank rubble stone east wall has plaque under cornice 'Built by the Dfs of Somerset 1760' and fine lead rainwater head. North front, rendered, has one-window range of 2-light windows to projecting left side and similar one-window range to right side, in line with main north front, from which the string courses are continued in cement. Windows have sashes with Gothic heads to top panes. Interior: early C19 Gothic cornices to main rooms on south front and early C19 staircase. House was the principal house of Seend from the C17, said to date from 1620. In the 1660s the house was owned by John Somner (1622-70), friend of John Aubrey and in 1716 passed to Edward Seymour, who became 8th Duke of Somerset 1750 and died 1757. The house was rebuilt for his widow (d.1768) in 1760, and remained in possession of the Dukes of Somerset into the C19. The early C19 alterations were probably for C. Tylee, banker who leased the house c1820-5. (J. Aubrey, Natural History of Wiltshire, ed. J. Britton, 1847, 21; E. Bradby, Seend A Wiltshire Village, 1981, 36, 185-91)

Listing NGR: ST9490361186