Uphill Manor

Details

ST 35 NW UPHILL ROAD SOUTH Uphill 3/61

- II*

Large house. Probably c1805, extended 1835 by Henry Rumley of Bristol for Thomas Knyfton, who bought the house in 1832 from a bankrupt Daniel Beaumont Payne; further extended and internally refurbished in 1855 as wedding present from Thomas Tutton Knyfton to his second wife, the interior designs being probably by JG Crace after Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin. Built of dressed and rubble limestone brought to course; ashlar quoins and dressings; slate roofs with crenellated parapets and octagonal ashlar stacks. PLAN: T-plan with rear service wing; the front (south) range has right-of-centre porch to stairhall flanked by library to right, dining room to far left and smoking room to centre; extensions of 1855 comprise rear octagonal-plan hall with doorways opening into drawing room projecting to rear right (east) and entrance hall and porch to rear; conservatory, also of c1855, placed at angle between library and drawing room. Picturesque Tudor Gothic style. EXTERIOR: viewed from the south, the composition is mostly of 2 storeys, with towers incorporating dining room to left and bedroom/services to far left; to the right the bay including the library has also been made into a tower, and a tall 3-storey octagonal tower is set over the octagonal hall. Tudor-arched doorway to crenellated porch, and stone-mullioned windows mostly with label moulds to 1:1:3:1 fenestration. Buttresses to library and dining room towers, and fine carved gargoyles to octagonal tower and associated stack. Conservatory and square bay (with quatrefoil-pierced parapet) lighting drawing room have Tudor-arched windows, the Decorated-style 3-light windows (one broken by arched doorway) to the rear porch ( with carved gargoyles to parapet) being of a more roguish design; cusped lancets to rear entrance tall. Mullioned windows of a more simple design to the rear. INTERIOR: exceptionally fine and well-preserved interior, decorated in Gothic Revival style by the firm of JG Crace in c1855, which includes painted decoration, stencilling, wallpapers, gasoliers and elaborate radiator covers. The rear entrance hall has Gothic-style oak outer door and a single inner door in simpler style; the floor has patterned tiles and the panelled ceiling is supported by carved corbels; the ceiling and walls have stencilled decoration, the frieze has homely mottoes. This leads to lobby with octagonal lantern light and then octagonal-plan hall which has fine stencilled decoration, Gothic arches to each facet, panelled ceiling and stone fireplace with overmantel following the shape of the arch. The inner (south) hall has an open-well staircase with barley-sugar balusters, a very fine Gothic lantern and a vaulted wooden ceiling with moulded ribs to quadripartite vault supported on foliate-carved stone corbels. Library has concave curved end walls with fitted book shelves. Dining room has panelled walls and ceiling and enriched cornicing. The drawing room, the most elaborate room in the house, has a richly decorated and stencilled panelled vaulted ceiling and fine wallpapers; matching overmantle mirrors over white marble fireplace and marble-topped radiator cover. The service wing includes cool rooms, larders and cast-iron kitchen range. The most complete Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin-inspired Crace scheme in existence, with the exceptions of Abney Hall near Manchester and Eastnor Castle in Herefordshire. The wallpaper in the drawing room is to a Pugin design used by Crace elsewhere and other decoration is adapted from Pugin's designs. The stencil patterns are derived from Pugin's "Floriated Ornament" published in 1849 and frequently used by Crace as a source in the 1850s.

Listing NGR: ST3190959009

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

33244

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.