Brandsby Hall

Brandsby Hall is a substantial country house, a rebuilding of an older house undertaken around 1742 to 1748, with alterations made around 1785, possibly by Thomas Atkinson. The main house was built by and for Francis Cholmeley. It is constructed of sandstone, with hammer-finished ashlar facing and dressed and rubble stone, beneath a Westmorland slate roof.

The house follows a U-shaped plan and rises to three storeys. The south front is finished in ashlar across seven bays. It features a plinth, rusticated quoins, and first- and second-floor bands. The original windows sit in keyed architraves with sashes glazed with bars, except for the central three windows on the ground floor, which were altered around 1785 to become 15-pane sashes extending down into the plinth and equipped with cornices. The second-floor windows are 4-pane sashes. A cyma reversa cornice tops the front, with a parapet above, and a hipped roof. Rendered brick stacks rise between the 2nd and 3rd bays and between the 5th and 6th bays.

The rear elevation is of rubble stone and bears a lead rainwater head inscribed with the date "F M 1746". The left return is of coursed stone across five bays, with bands and keyed architraves matching the front elevation. On the ground floor from left to right are leaved French doors below a 4-pane overlight in an extended architrave, an 8-pane window, a part-glazed door in a window opening with wooden steps, and two sash windows with glazing bars. The first floor contains, from left, two 10-pane windows in altered architraves lighting the back staircase, and three 8-pane sashes. The second-floor windows, cornice and parapet match those of the front. A corniced stack and hipped roof appear at the left end, possibly incorporating some work from the older house on the site.

The right return is of rubble stone, five bays wide, with windows featuring thick glazing bars and keyed ashlar surrounds; the first bay is blind. In the third bay is a door of six fielded panels below a 3-pane overlight in an eared architrave with a pediment supported on consoles. The first floor has two 18-pane sash windows lighting the main staircase and two 8-pane sashes. The second-floor windows contain four panes each.

The interior is of considerable sophistication. An east door opens onto a staircase hall containing an oak cantilevered open-well staircase with turned balusters of fluted columns on gadroons and vases, and a wreathed mahogany handrail. The walls display Vitruvian scrollwork at first-floor level, above which are egg-and-dart plasterwork edgings to panels, a rich modillion cornice, four medallions in the cove, and a central cluster for a chandelier. This plasterwork was created by Cortese. The staircase hall has doorways with egg-and-dart architraves and edging to six fielded panels.

Behind the staircase hall lies the kitchen, containing two chamfered ashlar fireplaces, one with a segmental arch and the other tripartite with outer round arches flanking a larger central segmental arch, all chamfered.

In front of the staircase hall, facing south, is the drawing room, now used as a library, featuring a Cortese ceiling with ribbon and grape motifs, augmented around 1830 with a Greek-key frieze with an almost detached roll wrapped with acanthus leaves, and a yellow and white marble fireplace of around 1783. Adjacent is the original entrance hall, now the drawing room, containing a chimneypiece in white marble dating from around 1785, a cornice featuring guilloche in its hollow core, and a ceiling with delicate decorative painting of around 1845 by Crace. The dining room at the west end has a later cornice and fireplace. A dogleg back staircase features column-on-vase balusters.

On the first floor to the rear left is the chapel, now used as a billiard room, with Cortese ribbon work on the ceiling and large wall panels with a shell niche. The reredos, now serving as a chimneypiece, features a broken pediment on Corinthian columns, with doors in eared architraves with pulvinated friezes of acanthus leaves and cornices.

All second-floor rooms feature simple classical cornices. The plasterwork throughout the house, from cellars to attics, was provided by Cortese, whose bills survive for the work.

The first-floor landing is raised over a cavity containing fragments of the older house that once occupied the site. When Francis Cholmeley married in 1745, he was forced to live temporarily at Warren House because his workmen had demolished more of Brandsby Hall than he had intended, leaving only two rooms habitable.