Bitton House

Bitton House is a large house dating to the late 18th century, with significant remodelling circa 1835 by George Basevi for Matthew Praed, a poet. Later 19th-century alterations were also made to the interior. The house sits within its own grounds and is now used as district council premises.

It is constructed of painted stucco with a slate roof, featuring late 19th-century moulded stucco stacks. The building has a U-plan with a long south garden front. A cornice, parapet with moulded coping, and a platband run around the building, while the rear and returns have banded rustication.

The symmetrical north entrance front, with six windows, features banded pilasters and moulded semicircular arches above 6/6-pane sash windows on the first floor. A projecting, probably 19th-century, semi-octagonal porch is centrally positioned, with a cornice, moulded coping to a parapet, moulded pilasters to the angles, panelled sides (blind), and a segmental-arched doorcase with overlight above double doors. Projecting side wings have stacks behind pediments and moulded roundels to their apexes. The ground-floor windows are 4/4-pane tripartite sashes set in segmental-arched recesses. The west front has two full-height canted bays. The first floor features shouldered architraves and consoles rising from the platband to the sills of 6/6-pane sash windows. French windows on the ground floor are sheltered by a deep, swept, tented verandah supported by cast iron columns.

The 11-window range south garden front was embellished in the mid-19th century. The first floor features 6/6-pane sash windows in similar architraves to the west front. Fluted pilasters rise from consoles below the platband and extend through the cornice, articulating the left and central windows. Shallow curved bays flank the centre, and the parapet is panelled with guttae motifs. Raised panels are above the parapet, with antefixae and anthemion motifs. The ground-floor windows are 6/9-pane sashes below ornamental panels and keystones to segmental-arched moulded architraves.

The interior has undergone alterations, but retains features such as 6-panel doors, joinery, fireplaces, enriched cornicing to the ground-floor rooms, an elegant curved staircase with stick balusters, and a stained-glass panel to the inner door depicting Admiral Pellew, who owned the property from 1812 to 1833.