Amen House, Walls, Fives Court, Store, And Yard To West Of Bedale Hall

Amen House is a complex of buildings west of Bedale Hall, dating to around 1735 with later additions and alterations. The group comprises a house, walls, a former Fives Court, a store building and a yard. The structures are built of handmade brick and shaped coursed rubble limestone, with roofs of stone slate, pantile and concrete tile.

Amen House

The main house stands west of Bedale Hall, aligned approximately north-south with a wing extending eastwards at the southern end and a shorter section extending westwards at the northern end. The building is two storeys with hipped slate and concrete tile roofs, constructed in a mixture of red and grey handmade brick laid in garden-wall bond and coursed stone rubble.

The south elevation is built of stone. The western part has a higher two-bay section with two altered multi-paned sash windows on each floor. The lower eastern section also has two windows per floor. The east end of this wing is gabled and cement rendered in brick, with an entrance to the left and a window above. The north elevation of this wing is in brick with three blind recessed archways, the rightmost having a semi-circular window inserted at the top.

The east elevation facing Bedale Hall has five bays, the central three projecting beneath a pediment with stepped and dentilled cornice. The half-glazed door occupies the centre and has an eared stone architrave with frieze, cornice and pediment, set within a round-arched recess containing a small four-light window at the top. The flanking bays have windows in stone architraves with 20th-century glazing and an impost band at first floor level. The first floor windows also have stone architraves and are six-pane sashes. The outer bays feature lower round-arched recesses with impost bands and six-pane casement windows.

The north-facing return of the main range has two ground floor six-over-six sashes in stone architraves and three first floor three-over-three sashes, also in stone architraves. The rear elevation has a projecting wing to the north with a hipped roof and a blocked semi-circular opening at first floor with stone keystone and impost. The south side of this wing is in coursed rubble with brick infill around inserted windows. The west elevation of the main range is in coursed rubble with three eight-over-eight sashes and one 12-over-16 sash at first floor level, all later insertions with concrete cills and lintels. At ground level is a door to the right and two windows in the same style. To the left is a Tudor-arched timber door in a square stone architrave with strap hinges. Single-storey outbuildings extend westwards.

The interior of the south wing has two exposed beams on the second floor, possibly late insertions, but has otherwise been entirely remodelled as offices in the 21st century. The main part of the building was adapted to a domestic dwelling in the late 20th century and contains some architraves, a staircase and a late 19th-century fireplace probably dating from this conversion. The roof structure, approached from an inserted staircase in the main house, is original. The main range has heavy purlins and two main trusses with tie beams. At the north end a partition wall with a plank door leads into the hipped roof of the north wing with pegged timbers in queen-strut trusses.

Walls and Fives Court

A brick wall runs from the south-west corner of the north wing of Amen House to the south-east corner of a small brick building known as the Fives Court. This building has a blind façade on its north elevation with a central round-arched door flanked by flat-arched doorways, each with a square opening above. It is topped by machicolations and an embattled parapet with stone copings which continue on the east elevation. The south elevation, which has a single inserted window, has been rebuilt with a lower section to the west. The interior has been infilled in the 21st century with a roof sloping westwards. This adjoins a small single-storey brick office building of the 21st century to the west.

The brick wall with stone coping continues westwards from the north-west corner of the Fives Court to join the north-east corner of a large store building. Another wall runs from south-west of Amen House to join the south-east corner of the store building, built in stone rubble with brick patching and stone coping. West of the opening to the Fives Court this wall rises in a series of sloping steps to the height of the store building, the upper levels being in brick. West of the store it continues in brick with later patching and an entrance to the yard.

Store Building

The store is a two-storey brick and stone structure with a stone-slate roof, aligned north-south across the eastern side of a small yard. A large timber louvre sits above the hipped south end of the roof. The south wall is in stone rubble with two lower windows having stone cills and lintels and a larger upper round-arched window with stone impost and keystone and brick voussoirs. The north end is in brick with a brick pediment and a central archway with impost band and stone voussoirs, blocked with brick below and breeze blocks above. To either side are blind square openings, one above and one below the impost band.

On the northern half of the east side is a brick pent-roof outshut with a single window on its north side and a low blocked opening below a band. It has a pantile roof with a louvre and blocked openings on its east side. The southern half of the east side is blank. The west side facing the yard is in brick with an off-centre round-arched cart entrance having timber doors below and timber-framed glazing above, partly blocked. Partly blocked square windows sit high on either side, with a further partly blocked window to the north and additional blocked openings partly obscured by a lower range extending west from the store.

The interior's northern end is open to the roof structure, which has been renewed though main trusses with hand-cut timbers survive. The southern end is separated from the main space by an internal wall and is also open to the roof, with the louvre adjacent to the hipped apex at this end. The central section is divided from the north end by a wall at upper level with a blocked round-arch opening at first floor level having voussoirs and keystone. An earlier, more steeply pitched roof line is visible on this wall. The concrete floor has slots for machinery formerly used to process timber. A door accesses the lean-to extension.

Yard

A row of single-storey outbuildings in a mixture of brick, stone, breeze block and timber with pent pantile roofs stands against the high wall to the north, filling the north side of the yard. Ruinous remains of other buildings stand against the brick west wall of the yard, which steps down from north to south.

The buildings are designated for their architectural embellishment involving classical and Gothic styles, particularly on elevations facing Bedale Hall and the adjoining parkland, their early to mid 18th-century date contemporary with Bedale Hall, and their group value as significant elements of the former manorial complex associated with the Grade I listed Bedale Hall.