The Ball Place at Downside School is a Grade II listed building in the Somerset local planning authority area, England. First listed on 18 July 2024. Sports facility.
The Ball Place at Downside School
- WRENN ID
- grim-hearth-violet
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Somerset
- Constituency
- Frome and East Somerset MP: Anna Sabine (LD)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 18 July 2024
- Type
- Sports facility
- Address
- The Ball Place at Downside School, Stratton-On-The-Fosse, Radstock, Stratton on the Fosse, BA3 4RJ
- OS grid reference
- ST 654 507
- Coordinates
- 51.2548, -2.49652
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Ball Place at Downside School is a pair of ball courts built in 1854 and designed by Charles Hansom. Constructed from ashlar, likely white lias, and stone rubble, this monumental stone structure measures approximately 30 meters wide and 12 meters high.
The main elevation, facing south-east, features two tall playing walls with short angled wings, all topped by stepped crenellation. In the center, there is a lower, open-fronted section that contains a blind niche or shelter with a sloping timber boarded ceiling beneath a pointed-arched head. Above the arch, the masonry is made of coursed, cut, and squared rubble with a relieving arch, also topped with stepped crenellation. The rear elevation, facing north-west, is built from random stone rubble with ashlar quoins. Each court has a stepped buttress, and the central section protrudes forward under a pentice slate roof.
The playing surface of the courts, which is now covered with tarmac, extends south-eastwards.
Local climate
The Ball Place at Downside School receives an average of 880 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 64% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 72% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 35 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 59% of listed buildings. Of these, 15 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- No related consent applications matched
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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