Quaker Meeting House Alston

Quaker Meeting House, 1732, with C18 and C19 alterations.

MATERIALS: Alston sandstone walls, stone flagged gable roof with copings, and a slate clad gabled porch roof.

PLAN: rectangular plan, aligned roughly east-west.

EXTERIOR: the meeting house is set within the north-east corner of a burial ground enclosed by a stone boundary wall. It is a tall three-bay, single-storey structure, built of coursed squared rubble stone, laid on a foundation course of rounded boulders that are exposed at the base of the north and east walls. All elevations display two phases of masonry construction, with the earliest at the base dating to 1732 and the finer upper courses belonging to 1764. The main elevation faces south over the burial ground and has a central gabled porch built after 1848; it is entered by a narrow double-door flanked by quoined stone jambs, beneath a re-set flat chamfered stone lintel, dated 1732. To the left and right of the porch is a pair of 12-light timber sash windows, with exposed sash boxes. Two low blocked square windows, with finely tooled surrounds are situated to either side of the left-hand window, and to the upper right of the elevation, there is a blocked two-light stone mullion window that formerly lit the loft. The east gable end is built directly onto Front Street; the outline of the original roof is clearly delineated in the fabric of the wall, and rounded stones mark the flue rising up to a short gable-end stack that has a projecting drip mould. The west gable is un-fenestrated and lime-rendered. The north elevation is also blind and is predominantly obscured by an abutting two-storey stone building. The graduated stone-flagged gable roof is drained by cast-iron guttering and down pipes.

INTERIOR: the building is divided into two principal spaces: the larger meeting room to the west and the smaller former women’s business room to the east, now an ancillary area equipped with cupboards. The meeting room is entered from the porch; the room is rectangular in plan and lit by a single window in the south wall. The walls have been plastered and painted and the south and west walls have tongue and groove panelling to dado level. The east wall is formed of vertical sliding timber panels, with a central door to the ancillary space. The raised ministers’ stand is located on the west wall, with access steps to the left and right. The stand is fronted with horizontal panelling and the fitted bench has turned front legs.