Eller How

Eller How is a house built in the cottage orné style, enlarged from an existing cottage in about 1818 by Francis Webster and extended between 1827 and 1850 by George Webster. It occupies an elevated site above the Kent Estuary at the western foot of Newton Fell, situated at the north-west corner of a 12-acre contemporary landscape that rises up to the fell and crags at the rear.

The house is constructed from local slate stone, rendered, with yellow and grey stone dressings, timber barge boards, and Westmorland slate roof coverings. The plan is asymmetric and irregular with an angled west end, reflecting the irregular and slightly sloping nature of the site. The structure is a mixture of single and two-storey elements, some projecting and some set back, with pitched roofs, multiple tall chimney stacks to the rear ranges, and multiple gables with various Tudor chimney stacks. It is characterised by extensive ornate timber barge boards with perforated, curvilinear edging and ornate finials and drops to the gables. Window frames are largely small-paned and timber, set within large stone, chamfered openings.

The main south elevation has six bays. From right to left, these comprise a two-storey, three-bay rear range with segmental-headed dormer windows to either side of a central, two-storey, projecting, gabled cross wing. The cross wing has a six-light bay window and a first floor four-light window with a label mould. To the left is a single-storey gabled bay with a six-light window and to the right is a single-storey entrance bay with a segmental-headed stone surround fitted with a multi-panelled door with fanlight. To the front is a rustic porch with a vaulted ceiling and a low, solid stone base; Venetian openings on the south and east sides have alternate rusticated voussoirs and turned columns. The elevation continues with three two-storey bays comprising a gabled bay with a first floor cross window and a pair of ground floor openings (now blocked) with rusticated stone piers; a set-back bay with a ground floor entrance and a large cross window above; and at the apex, a stone bearing the initials G E W and 1827, which probably marks the marriage of George and Eleanor Webster. The west end bay is set at an angle to the rest of the house and has a ground floor window opening within a recessed segmental arch and an ornate oriel window above. Attached to its south-west face is a rustic, first floor, timber-built, open-sided, scissor-trussed verandah. The left return has double doors to a store beneath the verandah, plain fenestration, and the left end bay has a chamfered corner and an 1827 date-stone. The right return is plain with scattered fenestration and a passage opening at the rear; a round-headed ground floor window has fine glazing bars incorporating circles. The single and two-storey rear north elevation is relatively plain with simple window openings, multiple chimneys and the same ornate barge boards as to the south elevation; the slightly projecting east end has a lean-to roof and over-sails a ground floor passage.

Internally, the eastern part of the house contains an entrance vestibule with a geometric tiled floor. An opening leads to a reception room with an ornate classical architrave fitted with an eight-panel door, and a round-headed opening leads into an inner vestibule with an identical tiled floor, a heraldic ceiling rose and two round-headed openings with fluted architraves, each fitted with an eight-panel door. The stair hall has an opening with a similar ornate classical architrave leading to a rear reception room; the original cellar door remains, and other doors are replacements. The quarter-turn stone and timber staircase with winder has simple newel posts with timber finials and drops, a moulded handrail and turned balusters. The staircase is lit by a skylight and a small splayed stair window with margin lights.

The rear reception room, entered through the classical door case, has a simple plaster cornice and a small 18th-century Dent marble chimneypiece. A similar classical entrance opens into the main reception room (formerly two separate rooms), which retains both original geometric plaster ceilings, each with a narrow plaster frieze below with floral motifs in relief. The ceiling of the former east room has ribs and a central heraldic rose, and that of the former west room is similar, with rectangular panels. An original grey marble chimneypiece with an early 21st-century mirrored overmantel has circular corner motifs and classical relief panels in buff marble with white marble foliate panels to the jambs. The bay window is panelled, and its small-pane fenestration has unusual grooves to the underside of the glazing bars. The kitchen has a simple, blocked timber chimneypiece. First floor doors are mostly six-panel and one bedroom has a marble chimneypiece with a hob grate.

The western part of the house has exposed ceiling beams, supported in one room by a substantial, chamfered and tooled stone column. Rooms at the extreme west end are irregularly shaped, one with a rusticated stone fireplace. An inserted 20th-century staircase leads to the first floor, where a large L-shaped room has a similar plaster ceiling to those of the ground floor, with central and corner heraldic roses and other intricate floral and foliate motifs with an ornate, modillioned cornice below. There is also a contemporary white marble classical chimneypiece. A segmental-headed opening in the upper stair hall opens into a pair of irregularly-shaped rooms with exposed triangular roof trusses and purlins. Both rooms have a number of plaster figures and heads mostly in the form of roof corbels, and one room has a large chamfered recess to the north wall, a square plastered floriated recessed panel to the ceiling, and vertical sliding sash doors to the west verandah.

A bridge with weir below over an ornamental lake is located to the south-east. It is of rusticated stone construction with three tall, segmental arches with cut waters. It has a low flat stone parapet set with a series of shaped pyramidal stone posts carrying metal rails. Dry stone abutments stand to either side; that on the north side has attached, flanking stone steps with stone piers and balustrades with flat coping and attached low, stepped stone wall.