Old Rectory

Old Rectory

An elegant and compact Stuart country house of double-pile plan, arranged on two floors with a dormer storey and basement. The building is constructed in red brick, laid in English garden-wall bond, with a distinctive hipped slate roof swept out in bell-cast manner over a dentilated cornice. Large brick chimney stacks with dog-tooth cornices are 19th-century replacements of brown brick.

The symmetrical five-bay front elevation features small-pane, timber-framed cross windows with iron opening casements, square-headed to the first floor and camber-headed below. A central gabled dormer breaks the roofline. The two right-hand first floor windows are dummy, fitted with very small fictive panes. The central entrance has a cambered head, with a six-panel door and two-pane overlight.

The left side elevation contains two dormers overlooking a small service courtyard, with one window to each floor and a side door beside a blocked opening. The original two-panel door has a moulded wooden architrave and exposed timber lintel. The right-hand side elevation has two windows to each floor: sixteen-pane flush-set sashes to the first floor and camber-headed cross-frame windows to the ground floor, with two further similarly shaped windows, blocked to the right.

The four-window rear elevation incorporates an early 19th-century polygonal bay to the left with stone plinth and tall twenty-pane unhorned sashes flanking a half-glazed garden door, with reeded colonnettes and outside steps. A further doorway to the right of centre was inserted below a former window opening, evident from the cambered voussoirs. The windows are unevenly spaced and of cross-frame type, except the window over the bay, which is a slightly recessed sixteen-pane sash. The central of the three first-floor cross-windows has been lowered by four courses, and the right-hand ground floor window retains fine original iron window fittings, including curved brackets for casement opening. Modern paired dormers occupy the centre.

At the front, attached high red brick screen walls create formal boundaries. The left wall steps down and curves around to the service courtyard entrance, beyond which stands the dovecote, which the wall originally joined; a modern arched opening has been introduced at the house end. The right wall borders the garden and runs south-west toward the stable courtyard, featuring slate copings and a boarded door.

The interior is centrally planned with a raised ground floor. The entrance hall received late Georgian remodelling, including a cornice and segmental archway; the ceiling joists were exposed when the ceiling was removed. A mid-19th-century decorative tiled floor, reportedly reused from the medieval church when it was superseded by St Peter's in 1863, occupies this space.

The right-hand front room, originally the parlour and later the dining-room, is a fine example of a late Stuart interior. It retains full-height oak wall-panelling, a moulded cornice, a stop-chamfered cross beam with moulded-plaster ceiling borders, and a bolection-moulded stone fireplace surround. Beside the chimney are panelled cupboards, one with shaped shelves and the other known as the "wig-cupboard".

Behind this room lies the drawing-room, which underwent 19th-century remodelling but retains its cornice and some original panelling, though of pine rather than oak. It has another bolection-moulded fireplace, and the shutters to the bay are crudely dated 1915, suggesting further alterations to this room.

A similar fireplace appears in the rear left room, now with a modern ceiling. The fine open-well staircase is full-height, with bolection-moulded string, turned balusters, square newels and broad handrail. Although its original positioning is probable, there is an uncomfortable relationship between the staircase and the rear elevation windows, partly resolved by lowering one window. An oddly-positioned dog-gate fastening on the lower newel suggests the lower balustrade may have been moved. On balance, the staircase is likely in situ, but its insertion necessitated compromises during the building's construction. Below the stairs, steps descend to a two-chambered cellar containing some chamfered beams.

The main first-floor bedroom is panelled as below, with a bolection-moulded fireplace and 19th-century cast-iron grate. Above the first floor, the rear wall narrows. Mostly original pegged roof trusses survive. Many original leaded windows throughout the house, including in the attic, retain unusually decorative original fittings of particular interest. Original floorboards survive largely intact: oak to the first floor and on the stair treads and risers, and pine to the attic floor. The majority of doors are primary, of two-panel type.