Rheola House

Rheola House is a substantial country house of white-painted rubble stone, probably formerly roughcast, with squared stonework to the canted-bay features on the left side of the entrance front and right side of the garden front. The additions to the northeast front and outbuildings are also in rubble stone. The house has slate hipped roofs with deep bracketed flat eaves and two brick chimneys, though many fewer chimneys remain than are shown in early views.

The house is two storeys with a U-plan arrangement and three main facades. The southwest entrance front contains the hall with the housekeeper's room and servants' hall to the left. The southeast garden front contains an interlinked suite comprising the morning room, ante-room and drawing room. The northeast range contains the library and dining room, which are interlinked, with an ante-room and billiard room beyond. At the centre of the house are the stair hall, butler's pantry, pantry and kitchen. To the left of the entrance front is a lofted hipped range of sculleries and outbuildings. The upper floor was said to have been added in the 1920s, though the altered windows suggest it was more probably remodelled at that date. A rear courtyard, entered through the scullery range, has a game larder at the north corner. Both the southwest and southeast fronts have verandas, originally separated by a conservatory at the southeast corner but now linked. The southwest veranda has stone columns while the southeast veranda has iron columns.

The southwest entrance front has a canted three-window section to the left in whitewashed squared stone and a long four-bay section to the right in whitewashed render. The canted bay has a red brick stack on its left side, twelve-pane sashes on each floor in the canted sides and sixteen-pane sashes to the centre. The main range has sixteen-pane square sashes with cambered heads to the first floor and flat-headed sashes to the ground floor: a sixteen-pane window to the left and a twelve-pane window to the right, presumably 20th century as a conservatory was formerly in this position. The two centre bays of the ground floor have narrow twelve-pane sashes flanking the doorway, which has sidelights, reeded piers and a tall nine-panel door. The veranda, re-roofed around 2000, has fishscale slates and a hipped centre projection in front of the door, carried on two cast-iron columns possibly stamped Baker of Newport. The veranda is carried on eight fine sandstone Roman Doric columns with block rustication.

The southeast side has three bays to the left in whitewashed rubble stone and a canted bay to the right in whitewashed squared stone. The left section has three square six-pane sashes at first floor level over a large triple sash to the left at ground floor with a timber lintel and two single sashes with brick sides and concrete lintels at ground floor, none aligned with the windows above. All ground floor windows are twelve-pane and are within a renewed tent-roofed veranda with thin fluted cast-iron Corinthian columns. The canted bay is interesting in plan, with the diagonal sides rebated slightly back to create more defined corners. It has similar six-pane sashes over twelve-pane sashes. An unpainted plinth in tooled grey stone runs along the whole facade. The northeast return has a chimneybreast with a red brick stack and two diagonal shafts. There are added 20th-century garages at ground floor right and a large 20th-century window above.

The added northeast front to the right has a large canted bay to the left, similarly treated at the angles but with a 1-2-1 window arrangement. The ground floor windows are arched and the bay is of coursed stone to sill level then red brick to window level, with long arched windows of eight panes. The first floor similarly has bands of coursed stone each side of red brick at the level of the windows, which are six-pane sashes with cambered brick heads. This was presumably all roughcast originally. The next section to the right is a hipped-roofed four-window range, arched below and six-pane above, fronted in squared stone, possibly renewed. The window bays are spaced 3-1, reflecting the division between the dining room and ante-room. A single-storey rubble stone billiard room projects slightly to the right, with a hipped roof and a northeast French window with stone voussoirs. The northwest end has a broad gabled projection in red brick with a tall thin brick chimney flanked by lozenge-glazed single lights.

The long service range to the left of the southwest front is a two-storey rubble stone seven-bay range with a hipped roof. The first floor has windows with brick surrounds: the left one is a sixteen-pane sash, perhaps earlier than the five four-pane sashes that follow as the bricks look older. There are two blocked windows to the left of the third and fifth bays, and the seventh bay has a broad six-pane sash. At ground floor level there is a brick-framed twelve-pane sash to the right, to the saddle room, with older bricks to the surround, then a large window with a brick cambered head and louvred shutters, to the pantries, then a through-arch to the service yard with stone voussoirs to the cambered head, then a cambered-headed sixteen-pane sash with a brick head, and finally a cambered-headed broad triple window in a brick frame. All have stone sills. The archway leads into a cobbled rear court. The rear of the service range has a projecting section to the left of the arch with paired hipped gables and a similar hipped gable to the right, with a lean-to beyond. A flat-roofed kitchen stands on the southeast side of the yard. The northwest end wall has a cambered-headed ground floor triple window and a four-pane sash under the eaves. On the bank at the rear north corner of the service yard is a red brick small octagonal game larder with renewed louvred two-light windows on three sides and a door on the fourth, a slate octagonal roof with a glazed lantern and leaded top.

The interior is under repair after long neglect and damage. The plasterwork has been largely restored but not exactly to the original design. Some original doors remain but nearly all the fireplaces have been removed. The entrance hall has a lozenge panel to the ceiling with an acanthus rose and scroll cornice. Two elliptical arched openings on the back wall, one plain, the other to the inner hall with delicate metal tracery to the fanlight. The right wall has an affixed collection of carved wood fragments, part of a collection left in the house presumably made in the late 19th century, 17th to 18th century and some Dutch. The inner hall is a small square space with a door into the corner morning room and an elliptical arch to the stair hall. The morning room has a 19th-century four-panel door, a dado rail, and a ceiling border with rosettes in circles. The fireplace has been lost. There are shutters to the triple window, with bordered panels. Double doors lead into the ante-room, which has double doors into the corner drawing room and a ceiling border with rosettes in scrolls.

The stair hall is square with renewed plasterwork to the ceiling. There is a deep cove around and a circular glazed lantern in a square border of vine and rose trail. The stair is open-well with two scrolled iron balusters and one square stick baluster to each step, the scrolls in a reversed S shape. The thin rail is scrolled at the end, as are the tread ends. The panelled dado has been renewed. There is a rosette border under the landing. An arched opening leads to a passage running northwest on each floor.

The corner drawing room is elongated octagon in form. The fireplace is missing and there is a ceiling border of rosettes in scrolls. There are panelled shutters and reveals to the double doors. Double doors lead to the library on the northeast front, a very large room with a broad bay window. The ceiling has a deep cove with a leaf-moulded cornice and roundels in the cove at the corners and centres of each side, with roses. The library opens into the dining room, which has a similar cornice. The arched windows have shutters and panelled reveals, the panels with borders with quadrant rebates at the corners. A tall door leads to the ante-room, Colonel Vaughan's study, which had a door back to the kitchen, now blocked. The end billiard room is now a swimming pool with a deep coved ceiling and new plasterwork. The roof light was renewed in the late 20th century. The kitchen has blocked fireplaces on the northeast wall and a built-in dresser, with a triple sash into the rear court. In the service range the southeast end contains a saddle room and a stair to the upper servants' rooms. The servants' hall with its large bay has a flush-panelled six-panel door, no cornices and an original fireplace in grey marble with reeded pilasters and roundels at the angles and a fine reeded iron grate. In the centre of the house the butler's pantry shows a very broad red brick arch under the plaster, which may be a relic of the old farmhouse.