Summary

Late Arts and Crafts detached house in Neo-Tudor style, built circa 1928 by Edwin Davidson for W F Watson, a director of Rolls-Royce, extended in the mid-1930s in matching style and materials, probably by the same architect.

Description

A late Arts and Crafts detached house in Neo-Tudor style, built circa 1928 by Edwin Davidson for W F Watson, a director of Rolls-Royce, extended in the mid-1930s in matching style and materials, probably by the same architect.

MATERIALS: brick in Flemish bond and timber-framing with plastered infill. Bronze window frames. Hoppers and downpipes constructed from lead. Tiled roofs with three tall moulded and clustered brick chimneystacks.

PLAN: the original plan was rectangular with a projection to the north and south. It was of two storeys and attics and comprised three ground floor reception rooms and a staircase hall on the ground floor with bedrooms above. To this was added on the north-east side a triangular-shaped garage and billiard room on the ground floor and bedrooms above (possibly service quarters originally) and a sun room single-storey extension on the south-west side (now - 2014 - games room).

EXTERIOR: the original part of the north-west or entrance front is mainly built of brick with a brick string course between floors. The roof has two side gablets with half-hipped dormers with timber gables, and there are three triple casement windows on the first floor, all with leaded lights. An asymmetrical timber-framed projection with some curved braces breaks through both ground and first floors. This has two irregularly-sized carved gables with pendants, with carved wooden barge-boards incorporating trefoil, quatrefoil motifs and carved grotesque masks. In the centre is a five-light first floor casement window with trefoil heads and hexagonal leaded lights, incorporating three stained glass armorial shields. Below is an oak doorcase with a segmental, penticed weather hood supported on massive brackets and a studded plank door with dragon door knocker, and three casement windows, two with hexagonal panes. At each end are two drainpipes with elaborate lead hoppers, one dated 1614 with the initials J T. A single-bay, two-storey link block leads to an angled two-storey and attic M-shaped, double timber-framed gable, with carved and cusped barge-boards with pendants, a mullioned window to each floor and a segmental-arched garage entrance below.

The original part of the south-east or garden front has two hipped dormers with triple casements and a continuous hip below, interrupted by a projecting two-storey and attic timber-framed, M-shaped, double gable with carved barge-boards and a five-light window with hexagonal lead panes, supported on the ground floor on two circular sandstone columns. The first floor has two further mullioned windows and the ground floor has a bay window with hexagonal panes to the drawing room on the left side, a smaller central casement with a segmental arch to the dining room, and a five-light window with a segmental arch to the wide Tudor-arched doorcase. This links to the north-eastern wing which has a series of timber-framed gables.

INTERIOR: the staircase hall has oak plank and muntin panelling with a frieze, a series of panelled oak doorcases in Tudor arches, with spandrels with blank shields and willow decoration, and an elaborate Gothic-style carved radiator case. The straight-flight staircase has square newel posts with guilloche moulding and urn finials, carved arches to the balustrade, dado rail and a segmental-shaped gallery with five carved heads. Adjoining this is an elaborate Gothic style carved oak screen. The ceiling has a cross beam with eagle carving to the brackets. The drawing room has chamfered oak axial beams, a built-in window seat and original oak parquet floors. The fire surround was brought in later. The dining room also has chamfered oak axial beams, a marble bolection fireplace, a built-in curved corner cupboard, original oak parquet floors and an ornamental oak radiator case. The service end retains its original room divisions although the fittings are of later C20 date.

The master bedroom has a Neo-Georgian fireplace with a cast iron firegrate. An adjoining door is glazed with an Art Deco design of cloud, sun and sea in leaded panes. There is a built-in window seat and built-in wardrobes with Tudor-arched doors. Another bedroom has a wooden fire surround and built-in cupboards and a third a cast iron fireplace and built-in cupboards. Bathrooms retain original mirrored cabinets.

A narrower staircase with plain newel posts and balustrading leads to the attic which has two built in window sets and a brick fireplace with a cast iron fire back dated 1935 with the initials of the original owners, W F W and J W.

The former service rooms above the garage have plainer painted panelled doors, a brick fireplace and built-in cupboards.

History

Aldwick Hundred was built circa 1928 and extended in the mid-1930s. It was built by Edwin Davidson for a Director of Rolls-Royce, W F Watson.

The building does not appear on the 3rd Edition OS map of 1912 but is first shown on the 4th Edition 25 inch map of 1932 with a smaller rectangular profile than the current building, with a projection to both the south and north sides. The 1932 map also shows detached buildings to the north of the house, a detached building to the east, later engulfed by a mid-1930s extension, and a small detached building in the south-east corner of the plot, shown much extended on the latest maps. In the mid-1930s a garage extension was attached to the north-east of the house and a sun room to the south-west.

W F Watson was a Director of Rolls-Royce and had the house built for himself and his family. He is recorded in 1950s editions of 'Motorsport' as entering his 1913 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost in various races and buying a 1934 Rolls-Royce in 1959. Overall the Watson family were in residence for about fifty years. The second owner sold some land to the north of the property which had been used as a tennis court and two bungalows were built on the site.

Reasons for Listing

Aldwick Hundred, built in Neo-Tudor style circa 1928 by Edwin Davidson for a director of Rolls-Royce, W F Watson, extended in matching style circa 1935, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Architectural interest: a Neo-Tudor style detached house built of good quality materials with varied and well-articulated elevations;
* Notable decoration: there is fine joinery to the barge-boards, staircase and corridor screen, doors, radiator cases, window seats and built-in cupboards, also fine quality rainwater goods, ironmongery to doors and stained glass;
* Intactness: the house has an intact exterior and a virtually complete interior.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26676685

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Warwickshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Gloucestershire 2: The Vale and The Forest of Dean: Vale and Forest of Dean Pt. 2 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Oxfordshire: North and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)