Description

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 07/12/2012

SK 50 SE 17/156
23.2.55
5304

AYLESTONE
Aylestone Hall

II*

Mediaeval with later alterations of all periods, the external appearance,
with all the windows, being largely C19. Two storeys grey roughcast,
windows generally painted wood mullion and transom. The house consists
of a centre with two wings all in one place, the divisions being marked
by changes in roof shape. At the left hand is a hipped slate roof portion,
the central portion a tall slate roof, then to the right a continuation
of the same roof but to a lesser height. To the left of the centre part
is a two-storey gabled porch of Jacobean type, but possibly of C19 date,
the ground floor having a four-centred archway giving access to a simple
C18 door. Large chimney stacks, roughcast, but apparently old with grouped
hexagonal shafts rising from massive bases. Rear has two projecting wings,
the right hand gabled, the left with a hipped roof. Door to right hand
with open pediment and round arched fanlight with Gothic tracery. The
outside has a rainwater head with initials of the Manners family F.J.M.
1768. Interior almost certainly had a central great hall open to the
roof with solar and kitchen wings the porch opening into a screens passage.
In the sixteenth or seventeenth centuries a floor was inserted probably
retaining the ground floor as a great hall, and later further partitions
and other features were inserted. The northern ground floor room is lined
with early mid. C17 oak panelling; inserted C19 mantelpiece, The new
stairs have reused C17 splat balusters. Upstairs certain of the rooms
have beamed ceilings with a chamfered tie-beams supporting Queen posts
etc. There are no features visible which can certainly be described as
mediaeval, but the proportion and general shape and form of the structure
indicate that period. The house is supposed to have been where Prince
Charles Stuart (Charles II) lodged during the Battle of Leicester.
The south wing has an exposed stud partion on the upper floor with arched braces
supporting the tie beam, and the partly exposed roof structue also has arched braces to the
purlins. This suggests that this southern wing was the earliest section of the building,
probably early C16, which was probably the original hall, which was converted into the
solar wing when the larger central hall was added.

Listing NGR: SK5743101132

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17553789

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  The green guide for historic buildings: how to improve the environmental performance of listed and historic buildings
• 
  Staffordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Cumbria: Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Central Leinster: Kildare, Laois and Offaly (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)