Description

PAIGNTON

SX8860 FISHER STREET
1947-1/5/35 (South West side)
Tower House School

GV II

Villa, extended and reused as a school. 1890 (datestone),
1930s extension. Free Beaux Arts style.
MATERIALS: Yellow Flemish bond brick with local grey limestone
dressings; roof concealed behind parapet; brick stacks with
corbelled caps and old chimney pots.
PLAN: Set back from the road with a large garden in front.
Deep rectangular plan: entrance from Mabel Place.
EXTERIOR: 3 and 4 storeys. Asymmetrical 3-bay front with left
and right clasping pilasters with chanelled rustication;
moulded eaves cornice above frieze of alternating brackets and
stamped tiles; balustraded parapet with terracotta urn
finials. Left-hand bay bow-fronted, central bay breaks forward
and rises as a 4-storey tower with polished granite pilasters
to left and right. Moulded string course with chevron frieze
at 2nd floor level.
Windows glazed with 2-pane plate glass sashes, some with
smaller panes in the head. Ground-floor windows with stone
lintels; pilastered first-floor windows, those to the bow with
chanelled rustication, glazed with plate-glass sashes with
smaller panes in the upper light. The right-hand block has 2
high-transomed French windows onto a 2-bay balcony on stone
corbels. Balcony has pretty cast-iron balustrade and cast- and
wrought-iron vertical panels and is covered with a glazed
roof. Second-floor windows have pilastered architraves,
shallow balconies and sill blocks. Upper stage of tower has
triple round-headed window with moulded architraves and
pilasters.
Projecting porch on right return has moulded cornice below
balustraded parapet. Pilasters with sunk panels and carved
capitals. Round-headed pilastered stone doorway with recessed
panelled door, upper panels glazed, and plain fanlight.
The right return of the porch has a pilastered round-headed
window with sill blocks, filled with stained glass. The left
end of the building is a 1930s extension, purpose-built as a
gymnasium.
INTERIOR: The main block retains much of Bailey's interior,
which is lavish. Hallway with tiled floor. Doors to principal
ground floor rooms are panelled with elaborate moulded and
pilastered doorcases with pediment overdoors, richly-modelled
plaster ceiling friezes. Main stair has turned newels and
cast-iron balustrades. Second stair down to ballroom at rear -
this room was divided by the Marist sisters. First floor
retains good doors and plasterwork friezes. Quantities of
stained glass, both internal screens and in external windows,
including the stair window.
HISTORY: Built by Henry John Bailey, responsible for Bailey's
Emporium (qv No.44 Totnes Road) and Coniston in Sands Road
(qv). The house was sold to the Marist Sisters in 1908 and
became a convent school which closed in 1982 (Tully). Tully's
book reproduces a c1920 photograph of the building before the
left end additions.
(Tully P: Peter Tully's Pictures of Paignton, Part II: 1992-:
22).

Listing NGR: SX8858660269

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26568808

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

• 
  Somerset: South and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 6: Westminster (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England): Westminster v. 6
• 
  Specifications for Building Conservation: Volume 1: External Structure: Practical Examples v. 2
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)