Listed Building: Beaulieu Hall (9/90)

Country house, now house. Probably late C16 for Montagu family, restored C20. Squared coursed limestone with Colleyweston slate roof. Originally probably U-shaped plan, in Jacobean style, of which one wing remains. 2 storeys with attic. Entrance front is a one-window range with 4-light stone mullion windows to ground and first floor. Ground floor window has transom. Doorway to left has 4-centred arch-head and chamfered stone surround. C20 door. Moulded string course between floors. Ashlar gable parapets and kneelers. Right gable has 2 moulded finials remaining, with diamond panel decoration to finial block at eaves. Large stone stack, with brick coping, projecting from left gable. C20 two-bay extension, attached to left, has reconstructed stone mullion windows. Right gable has 4-light stone mullion windows, with transoms, to ground and first floor and 2-light stone mullion attic window. Moulded string courses between floors. Rear elevation has large lateral stone stack, with brick coping, to centre. Square-head doorway, to far right, has moulded stone surround with moulded cornice and 2 rectangular panels above. C20 polygonal bay attached to right. Interior: entrance hall has open fireplace with bressumer to left of entrance, fragment of reset medieval masonry to right. Drawing room, to right of hall, has C20 fireplace access to old lateral stack. Exposed ceiling beams are mainly original. First floor room, above drawing room, has C17 fireplace with 4-centred arch-head and moulded stone surround. Remains of 5 roof trusses with queen posts and clasped purlins. Said to have formed part of a moated site enclosing 8 acres. Dean Swift, writing in 1713, records that the house had been pulled down; it was recorded as two houses in early C19. A large fireplace was removed in 1913. (V.C.H.: Northamptonshire, Vol.3: p.80; RCHM: An Inventory of Architectural Monuments in North Northamptonshire: p.89).

Record last edited

Jul 5 2021 1:51PM