Bunkle Manse

Bunkle Manse

William J Gray, architect of Coldingham, designed this building in 1846. It is a grade B listed property comprising a former manse, service quarters, and associated stable and coach house.

The main house is an asymmetrical two-storey structure of three bays with Tudor-detailed styling and a gabled projection to the front. Behind the front range stands a two-storey addition, with single-storey service quarters forming an L-plan kitchen courtyard at the rear. The front elevation is built in coursed and tooled cream sandstone, while the sides and rear employ squared and snecked, tooled cream sandstone rubble. Sandstone ashlar dressings are used throughout. The base course is raised, with stugged quoins and stugged long and short surrounds to the chamfered openings. Windows feature painted, chamfered mullions and transoms with chamfered cills. Glazing consists of 4-, 5- and 6-pane narrow timber sash and case windows.

The south-east (entrance) elevation has a timber panelled door at ground level with a border-glazed fanlight and chamfered surround beneath a stepped hoodmould. Above this is a bipartite window on the first floor. To the left is a tripartite window at ground with an aligned bipartite window above and a ball-finialled gablehead surmounting the eaves. The outer right features a full-height gabled wing containing a tripartite window at ground and a bipartite window at first floor, both with stepped hoodmoulds. A shield dated 1846 is centred in the ball-finialled gablehead above.

The north-east elevation has a full-height, ball-finialled gabled bay recessed to the outer left. A two-storey piended projection with bipartite windows at both floors occupies the next bay. To the outer right, single-storey service quarters with attic contain a bipartite window at ground offset left of centre, with a gabled bipartite window breaking the eaves above.

The north-west (rear) elevation shows a single-storey range with attic projecting to the left, featuring a bipartite window at ground in a bay to the outer left and a modern garage door to the right. An M-gabled house section sits behind with a large stair window at the centre.

The south-west elevation is predominantly a blind full-height gabled bay projecting to the outer right. Recessed to the left is a two-storey bay with a two-leaf glazed door at ground and a two-pane fanlight, above which sits an aligned bipartite window at first floor. A kitchen courtyard wall adjoins the outer left, obscuring the former service quarters behind.

The roof is covered in grey slate with gablet-coped skews and bracketed skewputts. Rainwater goods are cast iron. A corniced sandstone apex stack with octagonal can stands at the south-west; a brick-built wallhead stack at the rear has circular cans; a coped sandstone ridge stack serves the service block with cans now missing.

Tall, heavily-pointed coped rubble walls enclose the garden to the south-west, featuring tooled cream sandstone rubble dressings. Rubble boundary walls partially enclose the site. Coursed sandstone gatepiers with pyramidal caps flank the main entrance, with a timber vehicular gate between them.

The former stable and coach house sits to the north-west. This single-storey building with attic is constructed of harl-pointed rubble with cream sandstone dressings, tooled quoins, and tooled long and short surrounds to openings with projecting cills. The south-east elevation contains a three-bay stable section with a boarded timber stable door centred at ground, flanked by single windows. A gabled dormer breaks the eaves above, surmounting a wind vane. To the left stands a former coach house with two-leaf boarded timber cart doors. A roofless lean-to addition is recessed to the outer right. Windows are part-boarded. The roof is grey slate with stone-coped skews and iron rainwater goods. The interior retains boarded timber stalls, hayracks, iron columns, and an open timber ceiling.