Manor Farmhouse

Manor Farm House is an estate manager's farmhouse built in 1910 in the Cotswold vernacular style. It was constructed for Captain Robert Brassey by the builders Alfred Groves and Sons of Milton-under-Wychwood, with architectural advice from Mr M Gray, a London architect who was agent to the nearby Sherborne estate.

The house is built from coursed rubble with ashlar quoins and dressings, under Cotswold stone roofs with large rubble stacks on the ridges. It is arranged on a T-plan with principal rooms in the main south-east range, a former service wing running to the rear, a further range at right angles, and a former dairy projecting to the north of the service range.

The exterior is of two storeys. The main south-east elevation features two large two-storey gables flanking a single-storey central entrance porch with a Tudor arched doorway below a plaque inscribed B / 1910. The gables were extended forward in 1959 and 1961. To the right is a single-storey gabled extension added in 1975. Windows are stone-mullioned with hood moulds throughout. The single-storey former dairy has a hipped roof with louvred gablets. The service range terminates in an extension added in 1948, to which a further two-storey range was added in 1997. The south-west side has a single-storey canted bay window. The inner courtyard contains a gabled porch added in 1948 and a gabled addition housing the stair with a tall stair light.

Internally, principal rooms flank the entrance hall, each with stone fireplaces with Tudor-arched openings, moulded skirting-boards, picture rails and shallow cornices. Doors throughout are four-panelled with moulded edges, set within narrow moulded door surrounds. The dog-leg stair has turned newel posts and plain stick balusters with a moulded, wreathed mahogany handrail. It has been moved to a narrow extension just behind its original position but appears to be the original staircase. The room added in 1975 matches the original detailing. The rear service range has been opened up to create a single large kitchen, with an enclosed service stair rising to the first floor immediately behind. The former dairy retains its original opposing entrance doors and has been converted to domestic use. The service range terminates in the former staff flat, now open to the large room in the 1997 extension. The ground floor of the staff flat retains its original fireplace and modest decorative scheme of cornice and skirting boards. The first floor has a wide landing above the hall flanked by principal bedrooms, with various later partitions for bathrooms. Bedrooms and bathrooms are ranged along the north side of a corridor running the length of the service range, and beyond the service stair there is a bedroom and bathroom formerly part of the staff flat. The most recent extension contains a further bedroom.

The farmstead known as Manor Farm was built on a previously undeveloped site in 1910, replacing an earlier Manor Farm situated within the village of Upper Slaughter. A substantial estate in Upper Slaughter, including the large house Copse Hill, was purchased in 1873 by Henry Arthur Brassey, son of the celebrated international railway and civil engineer Thomas Brassey. The estate included the Old Manor House, used as a farmhouse since the late 18th century. After H A Brassey's death in 1891, Captain Robert Brassey took over the estate and built the new farmstead on the site of the current Manor Farm in 1910. The earlier farm buildings at the Old Manor House were demolished and the house sold off in 1913. In the same year, the estate passed to Robert Brassey's cousin, Major E P Brassey.

Manor Farm House was built as an estate manager's house, situated to the south-east of the new model farm buildings. Two pairs of cottages in similar style were constructed to the east and north-west of the farmstead, completing a planned group. A porch was added to the rear of the main range in 1948, and at the same time the hall was extended to the rear, into which the stair was moved. A staff flat was added in a two-storey extension to the rear of the service wing in 1948. The house was extended to the front of the main range by full-height, slightly projecting bays to either side of the porch in 1959 and 1961 respectively. A further single-storey extension was added to the right of the main range in 1975, and at the same time the service range to the rear was opened up to create a large kitchen. A two-storey extension adjoining the staff flat was added in 1997.