Summary
School building, dated 1766, extended in the C19.
Reasons for Designation
Paston College is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as a substantial and attractive educational building, constructed in 1766 of red brick and extended in the C19, employing elegant symmetry and proportions.
Historic interest:
* for its association with figures of regional and national historic interest, including its founder Sir William Paston and alumnus Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson;
* for the contribution it makes to the evolution of the historic town of North Walsham.
Group value:
* for its proximity to and strong visual relationship with other listed buildings in the historic town centre.
History
The settlement of (North) Walsham was owned by the Abbey of St Benet at Holme by the early C11 and was recorded in the Domesday survey (1086). The town had an established market by 1275, helped by the local wool trade, especially following the arrival of Flemish weavers in the C14. Lightweight ‘Walsham’ cloth reflects the town’s significant position in the wool and weaving industry. The large size of the medieval parish church of St Nicholas expresses some of the prosperity derived from the trade.
Much of the town’s medieval fabric was destroyed by fire in the summer of 1600, including 118 houses, 70 shops and warehouses, and even more barns, stables, malthouses and outhouses. The town changed in the reconstruction, with new building styles and materials used, but the layout of the marketplace and the narrow width of plots remained. Despite the declining wool trade, the town remained a significant market centre as an agricultural trading point and, from the early C19, a place of manufacturing. The North Walsham and Dilham Canal was opened in 1826, and by the end of the C19 the town had two railway stations.
Paston College was founded in 1606 as the Paston Free School by local magistrate and landowner Sir William Paston. The present building stands on the site of the previous free school building and is dated 1766. Horatio Nelson, later Admiral Lord Nelson, was a pupil at the school between 1769 and 1771.
Details
School building, dated 1766, extended in the C19.
MATERIALS: The roof has a pantile covering, and the walls are constructed of red brick.
PLAN: It is rectangular on plan, facing south to a grassed area.
EXTERIOR: The school building, constructed in 1766, is three storeys in height and built of red brick. The roof is hipped with a pantile covering, and there are two long red-brick chimneystacks to the ridge. There are seven bays of windows; the five central bays have gauged-brick flat arches containing six-over-six pane sash windows, and the outer bays are round-arched containing four-over-four pane round-arched sash windows; the outer bays of the second floor and east bay of the first floor are blind. A single-storey red-brick porch was added to the centre of the front elevation in the C19 and has a pitched roof and a carved stone coat of arms over a pair of C20 half-glazed doors.
