Building record 15282 - Carter Bench House

<1> English Heritage, 2005, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, 57934 (Digital Archive). SCH4666.

Formerly Rock Bank House, later hospital, now offices: c.1840 for Martin Swindells. Ashlar buff sandstone, Welsh slate roof and 5 stone chimneys. Tudor Gothick style. T-shaped in plan. Two and a half storey, four-bay south front, with first and third bays stepping forward under gables. These have projecting three-light wooden mullioned and transomed windows in massive chamfered stone surrounds below and similar windows, supported on moulded brackets under hood moulds above. Top storey has a three-light casement under a chamfered head in the barge-boarded gables. Second bay has a massive projecting porch with chamfered jambs, contains a four-centred arched doorcase with a pair of heavy Gothick doors. End bay to right has single lights under hood moulds. Castellated enclosed bridge over passage to rear. Interior: Hall has Tudor panelled ceiling with facial and foliage bosses. Dog-leg mahogany staircase has pierced iron balusters and trefoil mouldings on the newels and open string. Room to left of hall has Elizabethan panelled ceiling with pendants in circular panels. Room to right of hall has Gothick blind arcading as a cornice for a panelled ceiling. Room to the rear of this has a broad frieze of a delicate running foliage pattern. Most doors and shutters have trefoil cusped heads to lancet mouldings.

<2> Boddington, T, 1996-2017, Happy Valley, https://happyvalley.org.uk/?page_id=4869 (Web Site). SCH8292.

During the First and Second World Wars, Rock Bank House was used as a recovery home for injured servicemen. Through the 1950s, 60s, 70s and 80s, the house was used as offices. Now apartments.