Description

LOFTHOUSE MIDDLETON LANE SE32NW WF3 (east side, off) Thorpe on the Hill 5/64 Thorpe Hall 5th June 1964 - II*

Large house, now store. Dated 1735 on rainwater heads, but incorporating some earlier fabric. Red brick with sandstone dressings (rendered at ground floor), slate roof. L-shaped double-pile plan with rear service wing. Three storeys (externally) and 5 bays, in Classical style, symmetrical; rusticated long-and-short quoins, lst-floor band; central doorway in moulded architrave with scrolled consoles to a pediment on the band; vertical rectangular windows at ground and 1st floors, square at 2nd floor, all with moulded architraves, those at ground floor altered and the heads blocked, those at 1st floor 12-pane sashes, and those at 2nd floor blocked; moulded gutter brackets, hipped roof with chimneys behind the ridge. Left return wall of 5 bays (including 2 bays of service wing continuation under carried down roof) has a doorway in the 3rd bay, with moulded architrave and pediment, windows with plain surrounds (mostly blocked). Right return wall of 3 bays has similar windows except 1st floor of 3rd bay, which has a Venetian stairlight, and some of these windows have thick glazing bars. Near the front of each side wall, and in the angle to the rear, are lead downspouts with decorated rainwater heads lettered:

"1 7 (letters in monogram) MPMP 3 5"

Side wall of service wing has sashed windows with original glazing bars (4 at ground floor, 3 above).

Interior: in rear wall of service wing part of a timber wall-post, wall-plate and brace of an earlier building; axial passage between front range and service part, leading to a very fine dog-leg staircase with open string, scrolled brackets, 2 balusters per tread, ramped handrail, and wreathed curtail; in kitchen to rear of this passage, a wide stone-arched inglenook fireplace (blocked and altered for insertion of cooking range); principal rooms of house at 1st floor, with exceptionally fine decoration; right-hand front room (saloon) in Classical style with shouldered architraves to doors, moulded fireplace with cornice on 2 consoles and shouldered overmantel panel with broken pediment, other wall panels with egg-and-dart surrounds, modillioned plaster cornice; two panelled rooms in rear part, partitioned by double-layer panelling, on the left with square bolection-moulded panels and fluted pilasters, and on the right in Renaissance style of late C16 or early C17 with fluted pilasters, richly-moulded frieze, and dentilled cornice (both perhaps relocated); panelling formerly in 2 other rooms removed for storage or exhibition elsewhere. History: seat of the Gascoigne and Proctor families. References: RCHM pp. 90, 98, 99, 218. G. Roberts. Topography and Natural History of Lofthouse 1882.

Listing NGR: SE3161027009

External Links

• Wikidata Q17533184

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Recommended Books

• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Department for Communities Listed Historic Buildings of Northern Ireland: Information Guide for the 2nd Survey of Historic Buildings
• 
  Cambridgeshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Old House Eco Handbook: A Practical Guide to Retrofitting for Energy-Efficiency & Sustainability
• 
  Cumbria: Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)