Allerford House, Allerford, Holnicote Estate

Summary

Probable cross-passage house altered to send it up the social scale in the 18th and 19th centuries. Two stories, with basement and attic. Rendered stone rubble walls under shallow pitch slate roof. Grade II listed.

Identification Images (0)

Monument Types

Description

Allerford House is two storey on the front and west faces, with an attic in the roof space, and three storey on the rear and east elevations, with attic rooms in the roof space. The garden has been banked up to the south front, with slate steps up to a central porch with hipped roof over the entrance. Fenestration is regular. The roof is fully hipped, with dormer gabled. The west elevation roof has a full hip to the south and is gabled to the north, with a lean-to roof on the north wall. The south ground floor window is a rectangular bay with a single pitch roof. The windows under the rear lean-to are set lower. A second small lean-to is set against the first ( it is over the larder), the kitchen has a flat roof. Small raked dormer in main roof. The garden slopes down from the southwest corner of the house, so that near the north end of the west elevation a basement window is two-thirds visible, with the ground cut out immediately in front of it. The other light to the cellar is obscured by the bay window. The rear elevation is very disjointed. The rear pitch of the main roof is visible, with gables of wing ( to east) and rear of house ( west) visible. The wing is three storey, with small lean- to roof on west side over stairs giving access from main house bedroom floor to attics. The flat-roofed kitchen is set against the north wall of the house. A lean-to on the west side of the wing butts onto the north wall of the kitchen, and is partly supported by the two storey hipped extension on the wing north wall. Raked dormer in west pitch of wing roof. External open tread wooden steps give access from the rear yard to the wing and kitchen. The east elevation is, with the south, meant to be seen. It is three storey with cental entrance door ( now leading to basement) and large round-topped sash window with thick glazing bars above it. The right-hand ground floor window is mullioned and transomed, 17c in appearance. The roof has two raked dormers in it, and has moulded eaves boards. Lower roof over rear extension. Two metre retaining wall from southeast corner to road wall supporting the bank. Flagged path to entrance door from gateway ( now blocked) to road. The roof of the house and wing is of slate with crested red ridge tiles, hips leaded. South dormer same with slated sides, red fishscale tiles in gable and leaded valleys and apron. The walls are of rubble stone, rendered and painted. Built in the 16c/17c as a cross-passage three room house, from which possibly only the basement entry, east wall which batters in lavatory/ landing, and the ovolo moulded and stopped door frame in lower entrance hall remaining of the original house. During the late 17c/ early 18c the house was largely rebuilt with basement and two stories above, the present stairs' window and the mullion and transom windows on the basement floor ( flat kitchen), complete on the east face, frame only on the west side ( store) would perhaps go with this, giving two storeys on the south face ( as now) and an L-shaped roof. The rear elevation would have been much clearer. In the late 18c/ early 19c the house seems to have had another renovation, most of the sash windows were inserted, probably in the earlier mullion and transom openings without altering their size. The six panel doors arched opening in entrance hall with fanlight tracery above it, go with this phase. The main staircase with the cornice work are also probably contemporary with these alterations, the plasterwork does not look as battered and encrusted with paint as earlier 18c work would probably be. The 1840 Tithe map shows the building as T-shaped, this presents problems if it is correct. It means that room A did not exist until the mid 19c, with the doors, plasterwork, window sashes etc. being very late. The 1876 Holnicote Estate map shows the house the same shape, but the 1889 OS map shows an L-shape with a front porch ( the basic shape as now, but without the rear additions). It seems that - unless further documentary work shows otherwise, the plan shape on the Tithe map is not quite correct. Mostly good state of repair, the attics need ceiling and wall plaster mending in places. Rainwater gutter on front elevation slipped on left hand end. Slipped slate on north dormer, east elevation. Outbuildings: Stables and Coach House, now Workroom/ Store: East facing single storey gable-ended building set north-south at rear of house. Ground floor kitchen seems to be dependant on the south wall. Rear wall backs onto garden, which is at a much higher level, only 0.6m of wall being visible above ground on the exterior. Garage butts onto the north end. Rendered rubble stone walls under roman tile roof. Built between 1876 and 1889.

Garage, now Store: Single storey lean-to between north wall of coach house and south wall of 33 Allerford's wash-house, east facing. Rubble stone walls under corrugated iron roof. Shown on 1889 OS 1st edition Somerset sheet XXXIV.2. Probably erected to hold a small gig or trap. [1]

Allerford House was recorded in 2001 as part of the Holnicote Estate Survey: A lovely property with a Georgian exterior, based on a 17c cross-passage house. The present symmetrical front faces south, the cross-passage house faced east onto Cross Lane House. There are four floors on the front range – cellar, ground, first and attic; and three in the wing, where the ground floor is the same as the cellars. The Gould family owned the property in the early 19c, Sir Thomas rented it when he brought his rapidly increasing family up to Holnicote. The Aclands bought the property in 1851. The late 17c/ early 18c saw the front added, with the mullion and transome windows in the wing and the round leaded window lighting the stairs, with its old glass and ovolo moulded heavy glazing bars. Later, perhaps early 19c, the sash windows were inserted, the six panel doors and plasterwork are also probably this phase. The present stabling and coach-house were added in the late 19c. [2]

References

Designations

Other Statuses and References

Associated Events

Associated Finds

None Recorded

Related Records