Description

TAWSTOCK
SS 52 NE
4/93 St Michael's School, Tawstock
- Court
25.2.65
GV II

Country house, used as school since 1940. 1787, remodelled at rear in 1885.
Stuccoed stone rubble. Hipped slate roofs concealed by parapet.
Overall 4-sided rear courtyard plan. The garden (east front) has 2 principal rooms
to each side of wide entrance hall with rear passage which has staircases and
entrances at each end. Left-hand (south) rear wing contains library, right hand
(north) rear wing the service rooms. Gatehouse to rear (west) wing. Principally
Gothick style, the 1885 additions to rear in late medieval gothic style.
South front: 2 storeys. 9 bays, symmetrical with polygonal corner turrets.
Embattled parapet. Plat-band. 3 centre bays break forward slightly with pediment.
In each face of the towers and in the pediment is a blind quatrefoil panel. Central
single storey gabled porch with embattled parapet and diagonal buttresses. Tall
lancet window to each side wall, and large 2 centred arched doorway to front with a
4-centred sub-arch and cartouche to the tympanum. All Gothick fenestration with
pointed arched windows and sashes with intersecting glazing bars. Decorative
rainwater heads to each side of porch and pediment with ornamental cresting and
armorial shields.
Left (south) side: 8 bays including tower-like rectangular wing to right hand end
which is a westward continuation of the polygonal corner turret and a rectangular
tower-projection at left end, both rising above the 5 central bays, the middle bay
of which has a 2 storey canted bay window. Embattled parapet and plat-band. Except
for the bay windows, the windows are 2 light Gothick casements with Y bars above
sashes, those at left end with intersecting glazing bars. The tower wing at the
right-hand end has a large mullioned window of 5 depressed headed lights with 5
transomes above a battlemented 2-centred arched doorway with trefoil-headed sub-arch
and diagonal buttresses.
Right (north) side has similar tower to those on east side with Gothick fenestration
at right hand end of 3 bay range, the left hand bay with added late C19 canted bay
entrance front rising to 2 storeys with 3 light transomed mullion window with rubbed
brick surround, some of the panes with armorial glass above ogee-headed doorway (now
blocked) with rubbed brick panelling above. The remainder of the north wing
extending westwards beyond the tower concealed by C20 extension.
West side has rear late C19 courtyard entrance resembling fortified brick gatehouse
with diagonal buttresses and multiple moulded semi-circular arched gateway with mock
portcullis surmounted by rubbed brick cartouche bearing date 1885. Reset stone
cartouche on inner face with achievement. Inner courtyard walls entirely rebuilt in
1885 with rubbed brick surrounds to the 3-light mullioned transomed windows.
Interior Interior largely altered in late C19 and again in mid C20. Late C19
panelled entrance hall with massive chimneypiece reusing some C17 panelling.
Anthemion frieze to partitioned principal room to left. Staircase at left end of
rear passage with moulded handrail and barley sugar balusters and newels with acorn
finials. Staircase at right end, believed to be designed by Sir John Soane, lit by
elliptical dome with Greek key motif around the drum and Ionic-style pillars to the
balustrade at head of stairs. Library fittings principally intact with geometrical
patterned ceiling, fluted Ionic columns dividing the bookcases, and false book
spines to rear of doorway. Octagonal ground floor room to north-east tower has some
replaced earlier panelling on walls and chimneypiece with some reused Renaissance
panels.
Tawstock Court was the seat of the Bourchier Wrey family. The Elizabethan house, of
which only the gatehouse now survives (q.v.) was destroyed by fire in 1787.

Listing NGR: SS5580329910

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26545493

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.

Recommended Books

• 
  Staffordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Listed Buildings and Other Heritage Assets
• 
  Renovating Old Houses: Bringing New Life to Vintage Homes (For Pros By Pros)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)