Boathouse With Attached Quays And Enclosed Dock With Slipway Approximately 300 Metres To North Of Wray Castle

Boathouse with attached quays and enclosed dock with slipway, mid-19th century, situated on the western shore of Lake Windermere approximately 300 metres north of Wray Castle near Claife.

The boathouse is constructed in roughly coursed slate rubble with a corrugated iron sheeted roof. It adopts a castellated Gothic style and comprises two storeys and two bays arranged in an L-shaped plan, with the more northerly bay recessed. The structure is surmounted by a crenellated parapet, the upper parts of which are partially lost, with corbelling carrying turrets at the corners. Two large boat entrances of unequal size and length occupy the ground floor of each bay, both featuring segmental-pointed heads. Similar windows, partially blocked, are positioned above these entrances. The south bay also features a tall narrow window to the right. Both return elevations have five battered and staged buttresses with some windows and an entrance on the south side. The rear elevation contains a porch with a crow-stepped gable and a segmental-headed entrance reached by stone steps, giving access to the first floor.

On the west side of the boathouse is a stone quay projecting into the lake. On the east side is a second quay and an enclosed dock with a slipway.

The ground floor interior comprises an essentially undivided wet dock for boats, with two parallel docks entered through a doorway near the south corner. Stone steps lead down to slate-paved stone-built walkways along the south-east and south-west sides of the larger eastern dock. A central wooden walkway is a later insertion on the site of a former floating stage. The rear wall of the dock contains two wall cupboards, wooden shutters to the openings in the north-west side, and a row of square socket holes of uncertain function. Timber posts and a cast iron column support the first floor, which is divided by lightweight modern partitions into two spaces. A small workshop at the south corner, enclosed by timber partitions, contains a fireplace and storage cupboards.

This boathouse was one of five constructed on the Wray Estate during the second half of the 19th century. Its size and position indicate it served as the principal boathouse for the occupants of nearby Wray Castle. The building does not appear on the Ordnance Survey map of 1847-8 but is present on the 1888 edition, indicating construction shortly after 1847 as part of owner James Dawson's (1779-1875) building project at Wray. A small room on the first floor, referred to as a 'workshop' in 1920s sales documentation, survives from this period.