Description

WARE TOWN

TL3514SE CHURCH STREET
829-1/9/50 (North side)
08/05/50 No.9
The Manor House

GV II*

House. C17, incorporating earlier fabric, altered C18 and C19.
Timber-framed, stuccoed, old tiled roofs, with hip at junction
with north wing. Central brick chimneystack with corbelled
oversailing courses on ridge, and 2 large shafted brick
chimneystacks on east face of north wing.
EXTERIOR: 2 storeys, with attics in north wing. 8 bay north
wing at obtuse angle to street to short south-west range along
street frontages, originally with lobby entry from gardens,
replaced by C19 vestibule in re-entrant between wings.
South elevation to street has first floor 1 mullion and
transom 6 light casement with lattice leaded glazing, ground
floor 4 paired cast-iron casement windows with glazing bars
set in continuous run. Principal west elevation of north wing
faces west into garden. First floor has 4 sash windows, with
central bars dividing 2 large panes. Ground floor has 3 sash
windows, with glazing bars, and at left 2 French casement
windows, with glazing divided into four panes. Stucco
architrave surrounds to windows, with keystones above those on
ground floor. Projecting stucco cills carried on brackets.
Wood profiled blind box covers to all sash windows. Central
main entrance through mid C19 conservatory, incorporating
glazed door with glazing bars forming 4 large panes, set in
surround with Tuscan pilasters, plain frieze and moulded
cornice. Hipped lead roof to central porch, glazed roof to
conservatory wings. Single storey red brick extension with
Welsh slate roof to left, behind screen wall to street (qv).
INTERIOR: has mid C19 plasterwork, and fireplaces to principal
ground floor rooms, left and right of central hall. Heavy
binder exposed in centre of right hand ground floor room
(Dining Room). Substantial posts and beams exposed elsewhere,
but refinished in mid C19, removing traces of jowls and any
mouldings. Hall has mid C19 open well stair with cut string
and brackets, turned balusters and wreathed moulded hardwood
handrail. Mid C19 service stair at junction of wings. Reset
C17 panelling in staircase hall, and in first floor study in
south-west wing, which also has reset mid C17 carved
overmantel with tapered pilasters, Ionic capitals, fascia and
scrollwork frieze. Twin recessed panels with egg and dart
outer surrounds, and scrollwork inner surrounds to inner
fielded panels. Roof of south-west wing has reset halved and
pegged smoke-blackened rafters of C15 origin, with notches for
missing collars, from a crown-post roof, others with collars
in-situ, but no trace of a collar purlin. 2 rafters of finely
moulded timber, without smoke-blackening. The south-west wing
partly overlays the roof of the long north wing, which has
halved and pegged rafters, clean without smoke-blackening.
Largely concealed except near eaves due to C19 insertion of
attics. Roof over the 2 north bays rebuilt mid C19 has trussed
construction with 2 purlins.
HISTORICAL NOTE: the site of the Manor House is associated
with the alien Benedictine Priory of Ware, suppressed by Henry
V in 1414, and ownership transferred to the Carthusian Priory
at Sheen, and subsequently to Trinity College, Cambridge, as
part of Henry VIII's endowment in 1546. Probably the Steward's
house of the Rectory Manor. The Manor House, with its mid C19
landscaped forecourt, and gateway (qv) leading from Church
Street forms a group with No.8 Church Street to the west (qv).
(Heath C: The Book of Ware. A Portrait of the Town: Chesham:
1977-: 41-3, 45; Hunt EM: The History of Ware: Hertford:
1986-1946: 83; The Buildings of England: Pevsner N (rev.
Cherry B): Hertfordshire: Harmondsworth: 1977-: 381; Royal
Commission on Historical Monuments (England): An Inventory of
the Historical Monuments in Hertfordshire: London: 1910-: 229;
Smith JT: English Houses 1200-1800. The Hertfordshire
Evidence: London: 1992-: 28; Smith JT: Hertfordshire Houses.
Selective Inventory: London: 1993-: 198; Perman D: Ware UD.
List of buildings of special arch or historic interest: 1993-:
15; Ware Tithe Map: 1845-; Ware 25" to 1 Mile. Surveyed by
the Ordnance Survey Department: 1851-; Forrester H: Timber
Framed Buildings in Hertford and Ware: Hitchin: 1964-: 30,
32-34).

Listing NGR: TL3571014485

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17554026

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

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