The Towers at Ss 7942 4978 is a Grade II listed building in the Exmoor National Park local planning authority area, England. First listed on 24 November 1988. Gateway.
The Towers at Ss 7942 4978
- WRENN ID
- over-pier-nettle
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Exmoor National Park
- Constituency
- North Devon MP: Ian Roome (LD)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 24 November 1988
- Type
- Gateway
- Address
- The Towers at Ss 7942 4978, Brendon and Countisbury, North Devon
- OS grid reference
- SS 794 497
- Coordinates
- 51.23439, -3.72862
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Towers is a gateway built around 1832, constructed from uncoursed stone rubble. It features a pair of hexagonal turrets with a depressed archway between them, designed in a free Gothic revival style. Each turret has a plinth and corbelled eaves, with Gothic arches that spring from projecting round stones. They also have a chamfered cornice and a domed stone cap topped with a carved stone bird finial.
On the outer front face of each turret, there is a tall blind lancet window, complete with a cill and a hoodmould that has projecting stones as stops. The right-hand pier includes an open lancet window on the rear side. The inner face of the turrets features stone-arched doorways, with the left-hand doorway being blind.
The depressed archway between the turrets is made of stone voussoirs and has a brick hoodmould with projecting stones as stops. Above the archway is a coped parapet that rises to the center, adorned with a carved lion. The gateway is located alongside the long steep drive to Glenthorne and marks the start of a cliff-top pathway to the west.
Local climate
The Towers at Ss 7942 4978 sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,180 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 90% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 97% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 9 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 92% of listed buildings. Of these, 4 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- No related consent applications matched
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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