Details
LEEDS
SE2835NW HEADINGLEY LANE, Headingley
714-1/64/769 (South West side)
05/02/87 No.53
John Taylor Teachers' Centre
GV II
Formerly known as: Spring Bank HEADINGLEY LANE Headingley.
House, now teachers' centre. c1857. By John Fox. For Robert
Ellershaw; additions and alterations 1877-78 by CR Chorley for
James Kitson and 1885-6 by William Thorp for William Harvey.
C20 alterations. Rock-faced sandstone with gritstone
dressings; graduated Welsh slate roof.
Originally L-shaped in plan, entrance on S front, with bay
extension at SE corner and large 1885-6 addition in NW angle.
In Jacobethan style.
2 storeys with basement/cellar and attics. Plinth; quoins;
mullioned and transomed windows, those of original build with
stopped hoodmoulds; 1st-floor string; curvilinear shaped
gables with ashlar coping and finials; offset, quoined
chimneys with multiple octagonal flues. 4-bay entrance front
has single-storey castellated buttressed porch to bay 2 with
moulded pointed-arched entrance, decorative tessellated floor
and inner 4-panel double door in quoined surround;
single-light window above; external stack to left bay; bay 3
projecting slightly under gable with 4-light window under
3-light oriel (both later) and single-light attic window;
1877-8 two-storey castellated bay on right with 3-light under
2-light window.
Garden front (left return) 4 bays, the 2 on left being
additions of 1885-6; of these the left bay has
segmental-arched moulded doorway under squat window with
blind, ogee-arched, top lights, on left of transomless 2-light
window with 3-light window above; the gabled right bay
projects slightly, having 6 lights to ground floor, the
central pair flanked by attached pilasters which support
oriel.
Original right-hand bays, the right bay projecting under gable
having 2-storey castellated bay window, now with door on
ground floor and without mullions and transoms, single-light
attic window; wider left bay has added ashlar castellated
canted bay window with steps down to central door, on
1st-floor former 3-light window flanked by single-light
windows, roof dormer.
Rear: 4 bays stepping forward, 2 under gables; 2 oriels. Right
return: 3 bays, added bay projecting on left, right-hand bays
stepping forward under gables, right one possibly an addition.
INTERIOR: surviving from the first build are the wooden,
closed-string, open-well stair with octagonal balusters and
castellated newels; 4-panel doors, in principal rooms with
bolection-moulded architraves and pulvinated friezes;
panelling; moulded cornices, some with egg-and-dart motifs
(these possibly later).
c1880 work by A Heaton in hall and principal rooms including
Adam-style decorative plasterwork to soffits and jambs of
various arches and openings. 1885-86 work includes fine
painted- and stained-glass stair window and lantern and porch
overlight by Messrs Powell Bros; and also the very fine tiled
fireplaces in the principal rooms, the tiles by William de
Morgan, an associate of William Morris et al. There are 5
fireplaces in all, having polished stone fenders, iron grates,
and elaborate wood and stone architraves, the tiles being of
different colour-schemes and with different themes, in the
former breakfast room (front left) pink-on-white animal, bird
and flower designs; in former dining room (rear left)
green-on-white ships and ferny flowers; in former drawing room
(front right) blue, and green-on-white foliage with peacock
and lizard side panels; in stair hall red-on-white leaf
patterns with sunflower frieze in architrave; in former
principal bedroom (1st floor, front right) sunflowers, the
architrave with panel of dancing children.
Originally called Spring Bank, from c1871-85 this was the home
of James Kitson, later Lord Airedale, locomotive manufacturer,
leader of Leeds Liberal Association and 1st Lord Mayor of
Leeds 1896-97, Gladstone staying here in 1881. Kitson was
followed by William Harvey, a notable local Quaker, 1885-92;
and then by Charles F Tetley, of the brewing company, a
Conservative and Lord Mayor in 1897.
(The Architect, May 28th: 1886-: 327; Gazzard, M: Decorated
tiles by William De Morgan at Springbank, Headingley: 2;
Lackey, R: Quality Pays: The Story of Joshua Tetley & Son:
1985-: 121-122; Marshall, J: A Biographical Dictionary of
Railway Engineers: 1978-: 135).
Listing NGR: SE2811035786
