Main building at Chard School

Main Building at Chard School

This building began as a house in 1583 and was converted to a grammar school in 1671, becoming independent in 1971. It has undergone various later additions and alterations, with programmes of repair and renovation throughout its history.

The main structure is constructed of squared, knapped chert stone rubble, partly rendered to the rear, with some red brick and Hamstone dressings. The roofs are laid with Delabole slate and asbestos tiles, with brick stacks rising to the ridge and gable ends and stone coping to the gable ends. The 19th and 20th century extensions to the rear have painted and rendered walls (probably brick) with roofs of Welsh slate and asbestos tiles. A link building connecting to Monmouth House is built of painted and rendered brick with flat and monopitched roofs.

The late-16th-century house is roughly L-shaped, consisting of a five-bay main range with an off-centre projecting entrance porch and a two-bay rear service wing. Later extensions have been added to the rear wing, with the northernmost addition skewed to the north-east. A single-storey block and small 20th-century lean-to stand at the north-west corner between the main and rear ranges. The building is linked to the adjacent Monmouth House (Grade II*) by a narrow, single-bay link dating probably to the mid- or late 19th century, built over the passageway providing rear access.

The building rises to two storeys with attics. The principal elevation facing Fore Street consists of five windows with an off-centre, full-height porch. A chamfered plinth, stepped towards the right-hand end, runs beneath sill bands to the ground and first-floor windows (the lower one also stepping right). The restored windows feature cavetto-moulded stone mullions with labelled hoodmoulds and 20th-century leaded lights. The three-storey porch projects forward and is gabled to front and sides. Its entrance has a stone door surround with a four-centred arched head, roll mouldings and spandrels, much weathered, topped by a square-headed hoodmould and fitted with a modern metal barred gate. The lobby is lit by two small lancets and contains an inner doorway with a similar surround (less weathered) and a plank door with applied fillets. The first floor displays a four-light window to the front and two-light windows to the sides, with a continuous sill band and hoodmould. The second floor has three-light windows and a sill band. At attic level, decorative lead guttering and two rainwater hoppers are visible; one bears the initials of William Symes, the other the date 1583.

The principal elevation's ground and first-floor windows are four-light in the outer bays and six-light flanking the porch. Two gabled dormers light the attics with three-light windows each. To the left, above the passageway accessing the rear, a two-storey link to Monmouth House contains horned six-over-six timber sash windows on each floor.

The rear elevation of the main range is mostly fenestrated with timber casements, with French doors and a doorway in the eastern bay. At the western end, a projecting narrow gabled bay is partly obscured at ground level by a square stone and brick addition. The east elevation of the rear wing displays cavetto-moulded mullioned windows on ground and first floors (both with 20th-century leaded lights and hoodmoulds), a two-light dormer window and a small rooflight. The 19th and mid-20th-century rear extensions have metal-framed windows and some timber sashes. The gabled north elevation is symmetrical, with a central entrance flanked by flanking windows, three first-floor windows and a small two-light attic window. A metal fire escape has been added to the west elevation.

Internally, the eastern end room features a mid-19th-century Gothic-style decorative scheme with a marble fireplace, enriched cornice and ceiling rose, and carved architrave and shutters to the front window. The adjacent former parlour retains steep-chamfered and moulded transverse beams. Beyond lies a lateral passage with reset late-16th-century panelling and a straight-flight lateral staircase; box framing is visible in the staircase's outer wall. The passage continues westward through a stone four-centred arched doorway with plain sunk spandrels onto the principal room (now subdivided), which retains a 17th-century cornice and stone fireplace. The rear wing contains a timber winder staircase and, in an adjacent room, a fireplace with a late-16th-century four-centred arched stone surround with hollow-moulded jambs and sunk spandrels, into which a mid-19th-century cast-iron range has been inserted. A separate entrance from the passageway between this building and Monmouth House leads into the rear wing through a timber Tudor-arched surround and plank door with a small leaded window.

A newel staircase leads to the first-floor landing. A pair of Tudor-arched doorways (one with a late-16th-century plank door) occupy the timber-framed partition to the front (west) room. A repaired late-16th-century pointed-arched plank door within the plank and muntin screen opens onto the eastern half of the range, rear lateral stairs and a doorway to later extensions. First-floor stone fireplaces resemble those below, though not all have sunk spandrels. A narrow round-headed opening and steps lead to the link building, which contains a 19th-century staircase and small rooms on each floor, providing access to Monmouth House. Few other historic fittings survive in the main building or attached extensions. The attic rooms are reached by a straight-flight staircase. The roof timbers comprise principal trusses with cambered collars and threaded purlins, reinforced with iron ties; some tie beams have been cut.