Details
BRISTOL
ST5768 CHURCH ROAD, Bishopsworth
901-1/50/411 (East side)
08/01/59 Bishopsworth Manor and attached
walls and piers
(Formerly Listed as:
CHURCH ROAD, Bishopswith
Manor House)
(Formerly Listed as:
CHURCH ROAD, Bishopswith
Walls and piers at the Manor House)
II*
House. c1720. Squared, coursed Lias rubble front with
freestone dressings and rendered sides, ashlar stacks linked
to form a square in the manner of Kings Weston, slate dormers
and hipped mansard roof, inset to the rear with pantiles.
Double-depth plan with central stairhall. Style strongly
influenced by Vanbrugh's Baroque King's Weston, King's Weston
Lane (qv). 2 storeys and attic; 5-window range.
A symmetrical front has a pedimented central bay with pilaster
quoins set forward, with a keyed elliptical-arched
bolection-moulded doorway, and 8-panel door with interlace
fanlight; over the door is a broken segmental pediment
enclosing an urn, supported by acanthus leaf folded-scroll
brackets; the window above has a keyed elliptical-arched head
flanked by fluted pilasters; a first-floor string separates
plate-glass sashes in flush bolection-moulded frames, under
flat arches with keys, carved with grotesques on the ground
floor; dentilled cornice and steep pediment, containing a
square plaque with a round sunken panel.
2 wide, hipped dormers with 8/8 sashes, one pane high, with
pineapple finials to dormers and pediment. Hipped mansard roof
cut by rectangular indent at the back, below the central
4-sided chimney arcade which crowns the house in the manner of
Kings Weston; the 2 middle stacks front and back are dummies,
all 12 being linked by keyed, elliptical arches on imposts.
INTERIOR: good open-well stair with triple column-on-vase
balusters, fluted newels, the well lit by a 9/9 sash set in
the indented rear bay, and a corniced ceiling with an oval
moulding, a semicircular-arched 2-leaf glazed door from the
top landing, plain, fielded panelling and shutters to the
downstairs and main first-floor rooms, and internal sliding
sashes between attic rooms. The cellar has a vaulted basement
and freshwater cistern with a hand pump.
SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached rubble garden walls, coped front
wall to street, with 2 pairs of gate piers linked by ramped
quadrant walls, the piers with moulded caps, Grecian urns to
inner piers, pineapples to outer ones. A range of farm
buildings (not included) has been converted and incorporated
to the rear. Much of the joinery was renewed in the 1970s
restoration under architect Peter Ware. A fine early Georgian
house showing an interesting stylistic connection with King's
Weston.
(Gomme A, Jenner M and Little B: Bristol, An Architectural
History: Bristol: 1979-: 115; The Buildings of England:
Pevsner N: North Somerset and Bristol: London: 1958-: 463).
Listing NGR: ST5711568926
