Details
TF 84 SE HOLKHAM THE AVENUE
(West side)
1122/5/56
Longlands Estate
20.05.1983 Workshops and Clock Tower
GV II*
Estate Workshops and offices. 1850-56, with minor C20 alterations. By G.A. Dean, for the Longlands Estate. Yellow Holkham brick, with stone dressings and with Welsh slate roof coverings supplemented by some corrugated iron.
PLAN: MAIN RANGE, including OFFICE, CLOCK TOWER, WHEELWRIGHTS' AND CARPENTERS' SHOP, BLACKSMITHS SHOP and ENGINE HOUSE faces east, with builders yard and TIMBER and WAGGON SHEDS , incorporating ENCLOSED WORKSHOPS extending east of main range from north end of yard buildings to form one side of a second yard.
EXTERIORS: MAIN RANGE, FRONT (east) ELEVATION: 2-storey clerk of works office with elaborate clock tower to centre. Verandah with slated roof to office front. First floor tripartite window with pilaster mullions and semi-circular arched heads. Tall clock tower with pyramidal lead roof surmounted by octagonal bellcote with finial and weathervane. To north (right) wheelwrights' and carpenters' shops entered through double-arched doorways. One tripartite window between doorways. and 3 to first floor carpenters shop above, having 3 ridge ventilators. To left (south) blacksmiths' shop entered through central sliding door with original runners. Double width arched windows in original door openings on either side. Square chimney with decorative cap to north end. At south end of building, an engine house entered through single width door under triangular pediment, with 2, 6-light windows beneath brick arches to the right and one to the left of the door, a pair of 9-light windows in the south gable, with slated ventilator above and ventilation clerestorey in the roof. Coal house between engine house and blacksmiths' shop.
MAIN RANGE, REAR (west) ELEVATION : 2 storeys to rear of wheelwrights' and carpenters' shop, double window to south with part-glazed double door. Goods-handling platform opening into first floor carpenters shop. To the north, double arched doorway and 3 tripartite windows. Central ground floor bay window to office overlooking builders yard and tripartite window baove; single storey to south with lean to machine shop, originally open-fronted,now infilled. Tall tapering red brick chimney for engine house on stone base to corner.
To north side of yard, open fronted timber and wagon sheds extend west of the main range, with, opposite the main range, enclosed workshops for plumbers and painters/glaziers, with lean-to stores behind, wide double doors and chimneys to east and west ends. At the west end, masons' and slaters' enclosed workshop with privies to the rear. To east of glaziers' shop, long range, mostly open, but with some recent enclosure. West side with 3-bay open shed and separate 11 bay open timber store. South side has 7-bay open sided sawing shed to the rear of the engine house.
INTERIORS; . engine house with single cast-iron roof truss supporting iron laths for roof slates. Single cylinder steam engine by Garrett of Leiston, c1914,mounted on boiler with circular firebox. The engine, last used in 1963, powered the sawmill, machine shop and machinery in a nearby barn (by means of underground line shafting). Further metal trusses are found in the adjacent room, and in the coal store, which also houses a cylindrical water tank. Blacksmiths' shop with double hearth in north wall and 4 iron roof trusses with iron laths. Wide door in rear wall leads to lean-to machine shop with line shafting in situ. Ground floor of the carpenters' workshop with 5 bays of brick vaulting along the length of the building, and above, a single workshop with 7 iron roof trusses , well lit by windows along both side walls. Pivoting oak crane hoist for loading timber in upper floor. Service ladder for clock tower and wooden casing for chain mechanism for clock in staircase to end of workshop.
HISTORY: this workshop complex, for which Dean' s drawings survive , is an outstandingly complete survival. Designed for a notable improving estate, the Longlands complex demonstrates the planned integration of office administration, building material storage and processing facilities, and powered workshop provision on a single central site.
(Manning K., D. and M., Longlands Farm, Holkham Estate', Journal of the Norfolk Industrial Archaeology Society, Vol. II, No. 5 (1980), pp17-26. G.A. Dean, Select designs for Country Residences,etc. (1867), plates 32 and 34. S. Wade Martins, A Great Estate at Work (1980), p.173.)
Listing NGR: TF8796840100
