Old School And School House

HIGHNAM HIGHNAM VILLAGE SO 7819-7919 9/51 Old School and School House GV II Now doctor's surgery and community hall, formerly school and school mistress's house. 1851 by H. Woodyer for T. Gambier-Parry; later extended. Squared, roughly coursed lias, ashlar dressings, tiled roof. Originally 'T plan, school room single storey, house in stem 1 1/2 storey, one room deep: later single-storey schoolroom added to infill rear angle. Entrance front faces away from road: gable to schoolroom on right, boarded door up 3 stone steps, arched head with hoodmould and floriate stops; angled corner buttress on right. Two-light plate tracery window above, ovolo surround. Chimney rises off bottom of left slope. House set back on left: 3-light mullioned window, trefoil heads in line. Open timber porch to left, heavy timber corner posts on stone plinth, cambered tie beam, 'V' struts over, plain barge boards. Sides open with curved braces to wallplate, above weatherboarding within main frame, stone plinth. Internally wooden benches each side, boarded door at rear. Above 2-light window rising into stone dormer on right, single- light window below eaves off-centre to right over porch, both leaded lights, iron opening lights. Stone lean-to on left gable not of special interest. Right return moulded string course at window sill level: three 2-light mullion and transom windows, circle over heads, rising into stone gables, plain barge boards. Angled buttress each end: rendered projection in centre not of special interest. Internally, schoolrooms form 'L', boarded panelling to dado, painted brickwork above. Fireplace across inside angle, corbelled arched stone head, moulded corbel restores angle above. Trusses hidden by inserted ceilings: rise from plain corbels. Forms group with church, village hall, old rectory and Church Lodge, (q.v.). School said to be 1851, not 1850 as rain- water head. (D. Verey, Gloucestershire, the Vale and the Forest of Dean, 1970; T.J. Fenton, A History and Guide to the Church of the Holy Innocents, Highnam, 1985)

Listing NGR: SO7972119652