Priory Cottage

Priory Cottage, Barnstaple

Priory Cottage is an early 19th-century house with a double range of earlier building on its right-hand side. It stands on Coronation Street, formerly known as No.10 Boutport Street, with priory remains incorporated at the rear.

The main house has solid rendered walls, probably of stone, with a semi-basement of exposed stone rubble at its base. The earlier range to the right is rendered only at the front; the remainder consists mostly of exposed stone rubble, except for red brick in the upper storey of the rear wall and in the apexes of the gables. The roofs are slated, except for pantiles on the rear slope of the earlier building and red tiles on a lean-to in front. The main house has hipped roofs to front and back. Red brick chimneys on the right-hand and rear walls of the main house have caps composed of projecting brick courses, one course with bricks set at an angle.

The main house is two rooms deep with the staircase at the front, rising directly from the front door. To the right is one room, and at the rear are two rooms, the left-hand one narrower to match the width of the staircase. The house is two storeys tall, with much loftier storeys to the main house, set on a high semi-basement. The main house presents a two-window range to the front.

The semi-basement has an eight-paned sash window with a later four-paned casement window to its right. The front door, set between the semi-basement and ground floor, is four-panelled with a flat moulded hood on brackets, approached by four stone steps with a late 19th or early 20th-century red brick wall on the right-hand side. Above the door is a tall 24-paned stair window. At ground-floor level to the right, a window has double sashes with 9 panes in the lower sashes and 6 panes above. A similar window on the second storey has 6 panes in the lower sashes and 3 panes above.

The earlier building to the right has at its left-hand end an old plank door with a window cut into it, and a small two-paned window above. Against both storeys to the right is an open-fronted lean-to with brick side walls and a central wooden post. The right-hand side wall of the building behind is without openings except for a ventilator cut into the left-hand gable and a slit window in the right-hand gable. The latter has two stone buttresses, with two more (one now reduced in height) on the rear (north) wall.

The rear wall of the main house, visible from Rackfield, has at ground-storey level a pair of six-paned sash windows to the left and a single 20th-century replica six-paned sash window to the right. Paired sash windows on the second storey have eight-paned lower sashes and four-panes above. The earlier building to the left has in its upper storey two casement windows, each with two lights of four panes. The ground storey has a door with a three-pane fanlight to the right.

Interior

The main house has a dogleg wooden stair with shaped step ends, thin square-section balusters with square newel posts having flat moulded caps. The ground-floor front room has a moulded cornice and a wooden chimneypiece with moulded architrave, plain frieze and moulded cornice. The rear room, entered through a wide opening with moulded architrave, has a chimneypiece with moulded wood architrave and shelf. A similar chimneypiece is found on the floor above.

The first-floor front room has a painted stone chimneypiece with flanking pilasters and frieze with round moulded panels at each end. Two six-panel doors are found on the ground-floor landing and three two-panel doors on the first-floor landing. The earlier building contains old roof trusses, plastered in.

History

The house was originally listed together with No.10 Boutport Street but is now in separate ownership, apart from a section of the semi-basement. The earlier part of the house is believed to be a remnant of the medieval priory of St Mary Magdalene, dissolved in 1536.