Goldney House and Attached Walls

Details

BRISTOL

ST5772NW CLIFTON HILL, Clifton 901-1/14/782 (South side) 08/01/59 Goldney House and attached walls

GV II

House. c1720. Possibly by George Tully. Recased, altered and extended 1864-5 by Alfred Waterhouse. Limestone ashlar with lateral and ridge ashlar stacks and a slate hipped roof. Double-depth plan. Early Georgian style with Second Empire style alterations. 2 storeys and basement; 11-window range. Symmetrical C18 front with recessed end and linking sections to C19 right-hand stair tower; 1-window entrance section broken forward with rusticated pilaster strips, left end quoins, ground-floor cornice, deeper second-floor cornice and balustraded parapet. The entrance has fluted Corinthian columns to an entablature and pediment, semicircular-arched doorway and C20 door. 3:1:3 windows, with ground-floor pediments, segmental to the middle one, and keys to the first floor, panelled aprons. Plate-glass sashes. Square 4-stage tower has a blind lower stage with a left-hand doorway, second stage with a pedimented window, and oval panel with eared architrave to the left, 3 third-stage windows, blind to the left, and an open fourth stage with arcades of 3 semicircular arches on paired Tuscan columns, pierced balustrade of circles, modillion cornice, pierced parapet with lozenges, and steep pyramidal roof with wrought-iron widow's walk. Pedimented dormers to the tower and house roofs. Largely C19 sides and rear, including a link to the road with 4 semicircular arches with LF to the keys. The C18 stable attached to E end has a central gable with a banded ashlar surround to the doorway, altered windows, and an ashlar ridge stack, a through arch linking it to the house, and keyed bull's eyes in the end gables. INTERIOR: a c1825 fine mahogany panelled dining room with paired fluted Doric pilasters to a frieze, good Hotwells marble fireplace with glazed tile back and fine overmantel in the Gibbons manner carved with birds and flowers. Garden entrance to a c1865 hall and axial passage divided by elliptical arches, a large stair hall to the right with an open-well stair with twisted balusters and newels with ball finials, and a good stone fireplace with 3/4 fluted Ionic columns to an entablature and acroteria. Stair tower has open-well service stair. The former stables now altered late C20. SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached rubble walls extend for approx 30m E from the street doorway to a carriage entrance with ashlar piers with ball finials attached to the stables, curved rubble wall extends approx 20m from the stable to the SE, and English garden wall bond brick wall for approx 40m to Constitution Hill. HISTORICAL NOTE: possibly based on a previous house of 1694. Built for the Quaker merchant Thomas Goldney, whose family created the important garden and grotto (qv), and recased for Lewis Fry by Waterhouse. (Gomme A, Jenner M and Little B: Bristol, An Architectural History: Bristol: 1979-: 116).

Listing NGR: ST5740672843

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

379240

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Gomme, A H, Jenner, M, Little, B D G, Bristol, An Architectural History, (1979), 116

Other
Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic interest in England, Part 1 Avon,

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.

Print the official list entry