Building record 3676/2/1 - Cransley Hall

Small country house built for Henry Robinson in 1677. The south and east fronts date to 1708 and a bay window to the south front is c 1800. C19 additions. Squared ironstone with limestone dressings and Collyweston and Welsh slate hipped roof.

{1} Small country house. Built for Henry Robinson 1677. South and east fronts, 1708. Bay window to south front c 1800. C19 additions. Squared ironstone with limestone dressings and Collyweston and Welsh slate hipped roof. Plinth, moulded first floor band, deeply moulded modillioned eaves cornice. Grouped coped stone ridge and side wall stacks. Square plan with central light well. 2 storeys plus attics. 7 x 5 bays. Principal east front has 7-window range of 12/12 sashes with projecting bolection-moulded ashlar surrounds, and above, 4 slate hung pedimented dormers each with a 2-light glazing bar casement. Off-centre 2-storey ashlar projecting bay has chamfered quoins. Moulded ashlar doorcase has segmental pediment containing a crest and a 2-panel fielded door with overlight. To the right, a late C19 billiard room with a canted end with 3 sashes. South garden front is a similar 5-window range with 2-storey bay window with 3 glazing bar sashes. Windows have moulded surrounds with keystones. Central gabled dormer. West front is a similar 4-window range with an off-centre ashlar doorcase with Doric piers and a segmental pediment. Above it a tablet with a crest. Windows have moulded surrounds with keystones. 4 pedimented dormers, each with an asymmetrical sliding sash. Beyond, to the left, C19 2-storey 3 window range in matching style, with half-glazed door. To the far left, a lean to outbuilding and a flat roofed stone addition with casements. North side has a projecting 2-bay service range with a half-glazed C19 door and overlight, flanked to right by a glazing bar sash, both with keystones. 2 casements above. To the left, billiard room with 2 sashes. To the right, a setback kitchen range with 3 sashes and a 2-light casement. Casements above. To right again, an ironstone and brick kitchen yard wall with slab coping, containing a gateway and 2 casements. Interior: entrance hall has an early C19 moulded wood cantilevered staircase with matching shaped landing balustrade, turned balusters and scrolled ramped handrail. Dining room has good quality mid-C18 plasterwork with shaped festooned wall panels, deep modillioned frieze and overmantel with acanthus scrolls and open segmental pediment containing a basket of fruit. The south wall has central moulded bracketed and pedimented doorcase with a 2-panel door. Central corridor has a large semicircular recess containing a moulded doorcase leading to the drawing room. This has reeded Ionic corner pilasters, festooned reeded wall panels, foliate moulded cornice, and a pair of Ionic pilaster piers to the bay window. Classical marble fireplace with a wreathed wooden frieze and cornice, flanked by single fitted cupboards with moulded architraves. North wall has a central C18 doorcase with eared architrave, scroll brackets and oakleaf frieze. Plaster panelled music room has fireplace with flanking Ionic pilasters. To its left, a moulded round headed archway, now blocked, and beyond, a moulded round headed doorway. Billiard room has half-height oak panelling c 1890 and a wide tapestry frieze. Coffered ceiling. Breakfast room has full height oak panelling c 1890, with late C18 basket grate in bracketed reeded oak surround with ornamental panel. Cransley Hall was built for Henry Robinson of Cransley, and passed to the Rose family in 1791, remaining in their hands till 1904. Sources: Pevsner, J Gotch, NMR

{3}{4} RCHME survey was not published in main volume, only listed. Unpublished survey is held in NMR.

{5} Cransley Hall was built in 1677 but the south and east fronts date to 1708-9. The house is five by five bays, except for the west front, where there are four irregularly spaced bays, two storeyed, with quoins and a hipped roof with pedimented dormers. On the east side quoins also to the middle bay. The doorway here has a segmental pediment. On the south side there is a canted bay in the middle, a Georgian addition. On the west side the segmental pediment of the door way rests on columns. Dining room with excellent decoration dating to c.1740-50. Overmantel with openwork basket set in an openly scroll pediment. Thick acanthus scrolls left and right of the mirror.

{6} The medieval manor seems to have been located on the same site as Cransley Hall to judge from Treswell’s map. The present hall was apparently built in 1677, with additions in the first decade of the C18th, though the VCH indicates that it incorporates fabric from the earlier building.

{11} [Former list description] II Cransley Hall
Late 17th century and later. Sandstone and ironstone with limestone dressing - 2 storey and dormer Colleyweston roof, limestone chimney stacks. There is a continuous dentilled eaves cornice and a platband between the storeys. Limestone quoins and wide architraves to windows and doorways. The entrance front (east) has 4 gabled dormers, seven windows 2:1:4 a shallow breakforward which is entirely of limestone. Above the simple doorcase is a broken segmental pediment with coat-of-arms. There is a fine panelled door. The garden or south front early and mid 18th century, has a large central bay of 3 windows and 2 windows on both sides of it and one gabled dormer in the centre. Fine interior.

<1> Clews Architects, 1980s, Database for Listing of Historic Buildings of Special Architectural Interest: Northamptonshire, 5/18 (checked) (Digital archive). SNN102353.

<2> 1976, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest ("Greenback"), K1/3 p.12-13 (checked) (Catalogue). SNN100754.

<3> Heward J.; Taylor R., 1996, The Country Houses of Northamptonshire, p.xv (checked) (Book). SNN41757.

<4> Heward J.; Taylor R., 1996 (circa), The Country Houses of Northamptonshire, (unchecked) (Unpublished Report). SNN103918.

<5> Pevsner N.; Cherry B., 1973, The Buildings of England: Northamptonshire, p.169 (checked) (Series). SNN1320.

<6> Slatcher D., 1999, A Desk-Based Archaeological Assessment On The Line Of The Requisitioned Sewer At Mawsley New Village, Cransley, Northamptonshire, p.8 (checked) (Report). SNN100008.

<7> Salzman L.F.(ed), 1937, The Victoria History of the Counties of England: Northamptonshire, p.162 (unchecked) (Series). SNN100371.

<8> Treswell R., 1598, Cransley Parish Map, (unchecked) (Map). SNN103920.

<9> Sale Plan, (unchecked) (Map). SNN106045.

<10> Rose C., 2006, Dame Alice Owen and Her Heirs at Cransley, p.23-31 (unchecked) (Article). SNN109285.

<11> List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, DOE(HHR) Distrisct of Kettering R.D. Northants, Feb. 19507 (Report). SNN112993.

<12> Historic England, Undated, CRANSLEY HALL, CRANSLEY, BF061906 (Archive). SNN115750.

Record last edited

Oct 24 2024 11:43AM