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Summary

Description

William Burn, 1859-60. Tall, 2-storey, full basement and attic Baronial mansion. Relatively plain elevations, compact, almost square plan, picturesquely massed, lively roofline, with crowstepped gables, Early French Renaissance scrolled dormerheads, fishscale slated conical roofs to angle turrets with iron ball finials at apices, grouped square-shafted Jacobean stacks. Stugged and squared red sandtsone in courses, polished ashlar dressings. Plinth, string courses between floors, stepped strings at upper level to SW and SE turrets; gargoyles. Moulded window surrounds, 4-pane sash and case glazing. Principal rooms arranged to S and E around central 2-storey saloon, entered off gallery passage at 1st floor; service in basement including brick groin-vaulted servants hall below saloon; female servant's bedroom over saloon at attic. Iron beam construction. Single storey L-plan kitchen offices wing attached at N. Prominent picturesque site.

W (ENTRANCE) ELEVATION: asymmetrical, square, 3-storey entrance tower to left, with elaborate Jacobean doorpiece, with ringed shafts, cable moulded cornice, elaborate strapworked sopra-porte panel surmounted by small pediment, heraldic panel lost (see NOTES) and originally flanked by die-blocks with urn finials; 2-leaf, 8-panel oak door; gable flanked by corbelled angle turrets, full-height angle turret at NE. 2nd bay recessed between towers, recess infilled at basement and ground floor levels by stair with arrow slit detail, and parapet stepped with rake of the stair within; 4-storey and basement square advanced stair tower to right, buttressed at ground, with 3-storey angle turret corbelled from 2nd stage at NE, spired bartizans at upper stages only to other angles, telescoping from slim to fuller circumferences above at W angles, parapet balustered. Single end bay and full-height angle tower containing stair clasping to right.

S ELEVATION: symmetrical, 3-bays, with slim full-height circular angle towers (stair in left turret only). Centre bay with full-height projecting canted bay window, 3-light, corbelled to square on vigorous corbel brackets at attic. Plain outer bays with scrolled dormerheaded windows.

E ELEVATION: 4-bay with angle towers. Symmetrcial except for distinctive 3-light canted window projecting at 1st to left, corbelled from emormous wall buttress, and with masonry roof rising through 2nd floor (addition of circa 1870).

N ELEVATION: masked at ground by KITCHEN WING: L-plan, surrounding kitchen court to N of house, and originally enclosed at W by screen wall, now lost (see NOTES); crowstepped gables, square-plan gazebo/turret with steply-pitched and bell-cast pyramidal roof and fishscale slates originally terminating screen wall at NW.

INTERIOR: compartmentalised Jacobean plaster ceilings to principal rooms and saloon, oak panelling and gallery screens at saloon, 4-panel shuttering, and some simple marble chimneypieces survive (1991, see NOTES).

Statement of Special Interest

Variously spelt (also Balentore).

Interior largely lost (1991);

NMRS photographs of 1968 show principal staircase, diningroom, drawingroom chimneypiece and saloon.

Heraldic panel over entrance and kitchen court screen wall also lost; see NMRS photograph 1862.

References

Bibliography

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