Description

ULVERSTON

SD37NW PRIORY ROAD
626-1/2/102 (East side (off))
02/03/50 Conishead Priory

II*

Country house, now Buddhist monastery, on site of Augustinian
Priory. 1821-36, extended 1853. To design by Philip Wyatt and
completed by George Webster. For Colonel Braddyll. Rendered
brick, limestone, and sandstone, with slate roofs.
Built on a vast scale in a hybrid Gothic style with an
irregular plan, with many pointed arches and traceried
windows, pierced battlemented parapets, steep gables, and
panelled octagonal chimneys.
The entrance front is very asymmetrical, but has a centre
3-storeyed gatehouse-type porch with gable and spired turrets,
an ogee-headed doorway with flanking niches, a large 4-light
traceried window on the 1st floor and a rose window above. To
the left are 2 (unequal) gabled wings, one with a large
pointed arched window, the other with a 2-storeyed bay window
and a pointed light on the 3rd storey. To the right of the
entrance (west) is a long single-storey wing with 4 large
2-light pointed arched windows, and clerestorey lights behind
a parapet.
A large wing at the west end projecting northwards ends in a
gatehouse tower dated 1853, in the same style, of 4 storeys,
and contains service quarters, stables, etc. The south front
is symmetrical, with 3 gables.
INTERIOR: a plaster-vaulted corridor runs from the east
entrance towards the west. On the north side a screen of 3
arches opens into a stair hall with an imperial staircase with
alternate turned and barleysugar balusters, lit by a stained
glass window by Wailes. Also opening off the north side of the
corridor is the double-height entrance hall (under repair at
time of survey in November 1991), entered from the north
doorway. It is said to have a west window by Willement, and,
on the 1st floor, a wooden screen with Perpendicular tracery,
taken from the chapel at Samlesbury Hall. The corridor
continues towards the west, where it has cloister windows on
the north side with Perpendicular tracery.
To the south of the corridor the dining room is lined with
panelling and has a Gothic fireplace in brown marble with a
carved oak overmantel. A room at the north-east end of the
corridor also has an elaborate marble Gothic fireplace and has
an oak overmantel. On the 1st floor the Oak Room is lined with
woodwork taken from Samlesbury Hall (near Preston) in 1834,

including a chimneypiece dated 1623.
A previous house on this site was demolished in 1821.

Listing NGR: SD3040375826

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Conishead Priory at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q5161107

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

• 
  Northumberland (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Listed Buildings and Other Heritage Assets
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  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990: Updated version