Reasons for Designation
The Old Vicarage, Market Drayton, constructed in 1839-40, is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Architectural interest: a good example of a mid-C19 vicarage displaying good-quality Gothic detailing, emphasising its formal status as a clergyman's house.
* Interior: its interior contains a number of good quality fixtures and fittings.
* Group value: it forms an important group with St Mary's Church (listed at Grade II*), with which it is historically associated.
Details
MARKET DRAYTON
1573/0/10019 CHURCH STREET
03-NOV-10 (Southeast,off)
The Old Vicarage
GV II
A former vicarage built in 1839-40, re-fronted in the mid- to late C19, with Gothic detailing.
MATERIALS: It is constructed of red brick in Flemish bond with ashlar quoins, a pitched slate roof and tall grouped polygonal chimneys to the south roof.
PLAN: It is roughly square on plan with a small rear extension (late-C20), and has two storeys with attic and cellar.
EXTERIOR: The principal elevation is symmetrical, of five bays with a central projecting gabled bay, and faces south-east. The addition of a later flue within the wall has meant that the central bay is slightly modified to the right. There is a decorative brick corbel table below the eaves and corbelled masonry brackets at the outer corners and to the corners of the projecting bay. A dormer window to the left of the central bay was added in the late-C20. The windows are principally twelve-light timber sashes with Gothic style detailing. The north-west and north-east elevations also have stone dressings and similar style windows. The attic windows are generally smaller three over three pane sashes. The flank elevations are multi-phased, gabled brick ranges that adjoin later C20 extensions to the rear of the building. The central range of the north-east elevation has a corbel table below the eaves and the main entrance to the house defined by a fluted door case (possibly from elsewhere), with a semi-circular fanlight under an open pedimented hood.
INTERIOR: Internally, the rooms retain their fireplaces, decorative moulded cornices, and carpentry, including skirting boards, panelling, doors and cupboards. Hinged shutters with locking bars and boxed recesses for storage of shutters survive in most ground floor rooms. There is a three-centred arched recess in the sitting room, possibly a niche for a sideboard. The larger south-east reception room has been opened up from an original two-room layout. This alteration caused the loss of a central double fireplace, servicing each former room, which is blocked on the first floor and the flue visible in a cupboard in the attic storey. The chimney was replaced by a new flue on the south-east elevation, which was later blocked and a second new fireplace was built on the north-east elevation. The straight-flight staircase of 1839, with stick balusters, and plain moulded handrail, is lit by a rectangular lantern. Steps to the rock-cut cellar are below this staircase. The cellar has three rooms and is supported by large chamfered timber beams, with two chutes in the west room.
On the first floor there is a central open landing, altered on the north-west side to form a passageway linking to the west range. A C20 staircase leads off the landing to the attic storey, cutting across an original window. A small C19 fireplace survives in one of the attic storey bedrooms. Sections of the timber roof are exposed in the attic storey and in the roof space, displaying a variety of scantling and assembly methods.
HISTORY: The Old Vicarage replaced an earlier vicarage which stood close to the west door of the church, and was built on land further to the south-west of the church in 1839/40. No building occupied the site prior to this, according to an estate map of 1833, and a Faculty plan dated 20 March 1839 shows the proposed vicarage in its current location. The Faculty approving the construction of the vicarage was passed as the old vicarage was `very ruinous and much out of repair'.
The 1839 plan shows the vicarage on a narrow plot with a bowling green to the west and a National and Sunday school to the south-west. It was constructed on an L-shaped plan, with a small rectangular out-building to the north-west as shown on a tithe map of 1840. The vicarage is shown on an 1843 map of Market Drayton with outbuildings, including stables or a coach house, to the north-west. The First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (published 1886) shows additions to the vicarage including a range added on the north-west elevation; structural evidence shows that the main front was remodelled in the Gothic style in the mid to late C19. A number of further modifications were made to the building and gardens in the C20, and it remains in residential use in 2010.
SOURCES:
1833 Plan of Estates belonging to the Trustees of the late Sir Corbet Corbet Bart. in the parishes of Drayton, Stoke, and Hinstock, in the County of Salop (Shropshire Archives 1096/2-4)
20th March 1839 Faculty for erection of the new vicarage and demolition of old (with plan)(Shropshire Archives P97 2997/8/190)
August 1839 Bargain and sale relating to land for the new vicarage (Shropshire Archives P97 2997/8/191)
1840 Tithe map and apportionment
1843 Map of Market Drayton (Shropshire Archives)
OS maps: 1:2500. published 1887, 1901, 1924
Mid-C20 aerial photograph - view of vicarage's south-west elevation (Shropshire Archives PH/M/6/1)
Early to mid-C20 photograph of east corner of house, looking towards church(Shropshire Archives PH/M/6/1)
Early to mid-C20 photograph of south-east elevation (Shropshire Archives PH/M/6/1)
Brittain-Catlin,T, The English Parsonage in the Early Nineteenth Century (2008)
REASONS FOR DESIGNATION:
The Old Vicarage, Market Drayton, is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Architectural interest: a good example of a mid-C19 vicarage displaying good-quality Gothic style architectural detailing, emphasising its formal status as a clergyman's house.
* Interior: its interior contains a number of good quality fixtures and fittings.
* Group value: it forms an important group with St Mary's Church (listed at Grade II*), with which it is historically associated.
