Listed Building: QUEEN ANNE HOUSE WITH BOUNDARY WALL AND GATE PIERS (381942)

PORTLAND SY6873 FORTUNESWELL, Fortuneswell 969-1/3/94 (North East side) 16/01/51 No.4 Queen Anne House with boundary wall and gate piers II* Detached house. Early C18, probably for one of the Gilbert family, quarry owners; Thomas Gilbert designer of St. George Reforne Church (qv), but incorporating some fragments of earlier work at rear. Portland ashlar, some squared and coursed, slate front slope, tile rear roof slope. Two storeys, basement and attic, 5-windowed. 3 flat-roofed dormers with slate cheeks and 2-light 4-paned casements above 12-pane sashes. First-floor sashes in plat band surrounds on stooled cills and with small aprons; at ground floor to Gibbsian surrounds and bold projecting voussoirs on moulded cills to brackets. To basement are 2-light casements under a string, rougher stone wall, one smaller light to left of bridge over to main 3-panelled part-glazed C19 door with rosette in Gibbsian surround to bold voussoirs under cornice hood. Stone stack with plain band capping to each gable with raised verge to kneelers. Gable ends plain, one small light right end; long single- storey extension to right not of special interest. Back includes a 16-pane early C19 sash and two blind windows. Interior has entrance hall with panelled coffered ceiling and dog-leg stair with shaped open string to heavy moulded handrail on turned balusters; stair to basement has some open fret balustrading, and a section of swept handrail. Main ground-floor room to left fully panelled, with window shutters and two cupboard niches to back wall, moulded cornice, plain fire surround in simplified rococo form. Corresponding room below has wide ingle fireplace with large stone bressumer, cracked at centre, and remains of bread oven. Thick-walled section at back probably from earlier structure, has stone cheeks to inner lobby flanking door at basement level, and deep embrasured openings. Subsidiary features: low boundary wall with plain weathered coping stepped across full width of frontage, pair of square gate piers to low pyramid cappings and stone balls at bridge for front door - bridge parapets in concrete block; smaller square pier at left end. The finest and most complete house of this period on the island, built from the much increased profits of the Portland stone industry. (Royal Commission on Historical Monuments: Dorset: London: 1970-: 254). Listing NGR: SY6892073298

Record last edited

Aug 18 2014 4:18PM