Listed Building record MDO37273 - The Old Rectory, Pulham

A house formerly the rectory. The main part of the building dates to the late 18th century and was built in the 'Gothic' style. The south-eastern part was added in the early 19th century and the room to the south was probably added around the middle of the 19th Century.

The Rectory, Pulham is two-storeyed with attics and has rendered walls. The north west part of the main block is late 18th century with a north west front in the 'Gothic' style. The south-east part of the main block was added in the early 19th century and the large room to the south is probably of the mid 19th century. <2-3>

<1> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey Map 6in, 1962 (Map). SWX1540.

(ST 71200845) Rectory

<2> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume III (Central) Part 2, 233-234 (Monograph). SDO136.

‘(4) THE RECTORY (71200845), 100 yards S.E. of the church, is two-storied with attics and has rendered walls and slated roofs. It was probably built at three periods. The N.W. part of the main block is of the late 18th century; its N.W. front (Plate 55), in the 'Gothic' style, may have been inspired by Chambers's work at Milton Abbey. The S.E. part of the main block was added early in the 19th century. The large room to the S. is probably of the mid 19th century.
The N.W. front is symmetrical and of three bays, the middle bay slightly recessed. At the centre is the front doorway, in a projecting three-sided porch; it has a pointed head with a label and is flanked by narrow lancet lights. On either side the ground floor has a three-light sashed window in which each light has a four-centred head and label; on the first floor are three sashed windows with four-centred heads under square labels, and above these are three oval attic lights. At the top is an embattled parapet with very small crenellations in the middle bay and large ones on the side bays. The S.E. front is also symmetrical and of three bays, but in an entirely different style. At the centre of the ground floor is a bow window, flanked by fluted Doric columns and capped by a classical entablature. To one side is a french window of four lights, and presumably a similar window originally opened on the other side but it has now been replaced by a sashed bay window. On the first floor are three square-headed sashed windows. The roof is low-pitched, with spreading eaves over a moulded cornice. The wing which projects S. from the main block is of similar design.
Inside, the vestibule at the centre of the N.W. front has a stone fireplace surround with a four-centred head. At the middle of the house is a compartment with a circular ceiling supported on four pendentives and four elliptical arches with reeded soffits. The southern room of the S.E. front has a circular plan with round-headed recesses on the diagonals, moulded pilasters to the doorways and a reeded marble fireplace surround with corner roundels.’

<3> Newman, J, and Pevsner, N, 1972, The Buildings of England: Dorset, 352 (Monograph). SWX1290.

<4> National Record of the Historic Environment, 201801 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Jan 13 2022 11:31AM