Middle Lodge and detached outbuilding

A gate lodge to Hestercombe Park with detached outbuilding, built in around 1895 for Hon. E.W.B. Portman.

MATERIALS: of sandstone construction with limestone dressings and timber sashes. The roof is tiled and the rainwater goods are cast iron.

PLAN: built on a T-plan the lodge is of two storeys with a central stair.

EXTERIOR: built in the Domestic Revival style the main elevations have gables with coped verges and kneelers, quoins and mullioned openings with eared architraves and fitted with horned sashes. The steeply-pitched roof has two chimneystacks and decorative ridge tiles. To the west front is a canted stone bay with a tiled roof. Set back to its right is the timber front door with overlight set in a projecting porch with the canopy supported on a low wall and short column. Facing the park gate, the iron operating mechanism formerly used for opening the gate is in the porch wall and fixed to the ground to its south. The rear elevation has a mullioned opening to the left of a central timber kitchen door. Cast-iron pipes to either side of the door serve the first-floor bathroom above.

INTERIOR: the ground floor principal rooms have cast-iron fireplaces with decorative tiling (and one has a stone chimneypiece). There are wood block floors and across the building are late-C19 doors. The stair has stick balusters and turned newels and at half-landing level the wall and bulkhead is timber-lined where it extends into a first-floor room (currently a bathroom). The three first-floor rooms have cast-iron fireplaces. Some of the pine floorboards are modern replacements.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: the outbuilding to the east includes a wash house. It is rectangular on plan and constructed of sandstone with dressings to match the lodge, although the interior is brick-lined and has brick floors. To the façade, a wide central opening has a timber plank wall and a timber plank door to the left, which leads into the main wash house with a partitioned privy to the left. The south end of the building is a workshop and has a separate plank door to the end bay with a sash window to its left. The rear elevation has an opening to the right.