Church Stile House

Church Stile House is a house dating to around the late 18th century. It is built of rendered stone, with a slate roof hipped at the ends, and has brick chimney shafts at the ends.

The house comprises two adjoining blocks, each with its own roof. The front block is single-depth and contains the main heated rooms, arranged on either side of a shallow entrance hall with a stair hall behind. A half-basement contains service rooms. The narrower rear block has a lower roofline and contains a central service stair and further service rooms.

The front of the house is symmetrical, with three bays. It features two-storey bows with peaked roofs on either side of a central bay, which has steps with curved iron railings leading up to a central two-leaf front door. The door is topped by a large semi-circular fanlight with small panes and margin glazing. The windows to the left and right in the bows are fine tripartite sashes with small panes and margin glazing. The first-floor windows in the bows are 20th-century replacement plastic pivot-hung sashes set within the original window openings. Two sandstone platbands are visible on the front elevation, with the lower one being narrower.

The interior retains good late 18th-century details. The open well staircase has turned newels, stick balusters, and a steeply ramped handrail. The principal room on the right has an Adam-style plaster wall frieze and a round-headed recess on the rear wall. A 20th-century chimneypiece has been installed. The service stair to the rear is contemporary with turned newels and a ramped handrail, and other original joinery details remain.

Church Stile House is an attractive example of a late 18th-century gentleman's house, situated to take advantage of a view across the Exe estuary towards Topsham. Historical records indicate that the house once had extensive grounds, now reduced in size, with symmetrical blocks to the right and left, likely used for a coach house and stabling. The presence of Diocletian windows in the houses that now flank the front garden suggests the former positions of these service blocks. After 1869, the building was used as the Devon and Exeter Boys Industrial School, founded in 1863.