Description

WESTON WESTON PARK SE 14 NE 10/98 Banqueting House approximately 50 metres east of Weston Hall 22.11.66 (formerly listed as Banqueting House at Weston Hall) GV I

Banqueting House. Late C16 - early C17. For Sir Mauger Vavasour and his wife Joan Savile. Ashlar and gritstone rubble with alternate quoins. Graduated stone slate roofs. A 3-storey, l-bay tower built on sloping ground with canted bay on south side and a rear projecting stair turret surmounted by a gazebo. Plinth. Recessed and ovolo-moulded windows throughout. South face: a 6-panel iron-studded door in a shallow triangular-headed surround with cornice. First floor: 5-light mullion and transom bay window with moulded sill and cornice terminated by shallow consoles decorated with 3 balls, square sundial over. Second floor: similar window with continuous dripmould flanked by roundels containing reliefs of the Vavasour cock (left) and the Savile owl. Left return: set back to left - flight of stone steps up to the studded 3-board door to the stair turret with moulded triangular-headed doorway; right, at ground-floor level: 2 round-arched recesses with projecting moulded sills and deeply fluted heads containing C18 gadrooned urns with leaf and swag motifs, stems and bases missing. First floor: 4-light mullion-and-transom window, with cornice, projecting over consoles decorated as front. Second floor: a similar window with paired plaques below the sill containing coats of arms, and flanking roundels as front. Right return, ground floor: two 2-light windows; first floor: a 4-light mullion and transom with details as left return over and a similar window above. A lead down-pipe with brackets having cockerels in relief to right. Set back to right: the stair turret has a narrow single-light window to ground floor. Rear: the projecting staircase tower has a single-light recessed ovolo-moulded window lighting the lowest stage which is at first-floor level. To left - rear entrance to ground floor has a board door in quoined surround. Front and sides have parapets pierced to centre with paired double-vase balusters flanked by shields, central panels to sides blocked by stone infill of later pitched roof; moulded coping stones over surmounted by cresting composed of central lozenge and C-scrolls to centre flanked by open semicircles with ball finials. Corner chimneys with plinth and cornices to south side. Board door with shallow triangular-headed lintel to south side of staircase tower gives access to roof. Similar door to east side of gazebo reached by flight of cantilevered steps from roof of front bay. Gazebo has 5-light mullion- and transom window filling full width of each side, above eaves cornice and shallow pyramidal roof with elaborate weather-vane. Interior: the stair turret, gazebo and first and second floors of the the building are plastered, whitewashed and painted in imitation of ashlar. The ground floor of the main front is unheated; a plain opening gives access to the base of the stair turret. An arched cavity on the west wall is blocked by rubble. First and second floors: entered from the door to the stair turret (west side), a spiral stone stair gives access to the 2 principal rooms, each with Tudor-arched corner fireplace with decorated spandrels; the upper floor is plastered and the roof is supported by queen-strut trusses. The banqueting house is linked to the Hall by a sloping lawn with a garden to the north; no certain link with the house is known, but the rubble-filled alcove in the base of the stair turret suggests a tunnel below the embankment leading towards the Hall. A copy of a drawing made c1720 in the possession of the owner shows the banqueting house in the north-east corner of a walled enclosure to the east of the Hall. The original glazing, possibly by Barnard Dinninghof and decorated with coats of arms, was removed in the early C19. Country Life, Nov 13 1958, p 1115; David Hey, Buildings of Britain 1550-1750, Yorkshire, 1981, p33.

Listing NGR: SE1786246737

External Links

• Wikidata Q17538199

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