Mothecombe House

SX 64 NW HOLBETON MOTHECOMBE 10/82 29/3/60 Mothecombe House

GV I

Country house on or near the site of an earlier manor house. Circa 1710 built for John Pollexfen. Restored and dining room wing added in 1922-25 by Sir Edwin Lutyens. Coursed and dressed slate with granite dressings. Steeply pitched hipped slate roof with heavy coved eaves cornice, breaking forward over corner pilasters. Square on plan. Two storeys, attic and basement. Five bays. Tall narrow sash windows in exposed boxing with thick glazing bars restored by Lutyens, set in segmentally arched openings. Centre first floor window is rusticated granite architrave. Central doorway with heavy rusticated granite pilasters and voussoirs, attached slender Tuscan columns, on large bases, supporting moulded hood on carved scroll brackets. Approached by a flight of steps with C20 wrought iron balustrade. Three hipped dormers with moulded cornices and casement windows. Large chimney stacks with dentilled cornices. South side five bays, but without rusticated centrepiece, built over basement across which a segmentally arcaded terrace was built in 1873, and improved by Lutyens by the addition of steps and slate-on-edge paving. Dining room wing at right angles on south west corner by Lutyens. Built of green slate ashlar, with hipped slate roof with coved eaves breaking forward over corner pilasters. Single storey, with three tall windows, facing garden, in deep reveals with shutters. The link to main house has tall doorway in plain architrave with keyblock and roundel in square recess. Very large sundial on south side. The wing is built over wide segmental arches to open lower ground level. Interior: largely intact including bolection moulded panelling and cornices. Apart from the bolection chimneypiece in the hall the chimneypieces are later. Staircase with three twisted balusters per tread with moulded hand rail ramped up to newels. Pilaster cornice of staircase landing is enriched with acanthus leaves. The Lutyens dining room has a moulded cornice and chimneypiece, a pair of giant non-structural columns at the entrance end and a vaulted corridor connecting it to the main house. Reference: Country Life Volume 120 pages 190-193 and 238-241.

Listing NGR: SX6086047813