Description

997/0/10500 EDGBASTON PARK ROAD
22-SEP-09 33

II
A nursery school, formerly a house, of C16 or C17 date with extensive C19 additions and alterations. The building has rendered and painted walling with painted stone dressings and a plain-tiled roof. It is of two storeys with attic and has an irregular plan. The oldest, C17, portion consists of a large, ground-floor room with a similar room immediately above it to the southern corner of the building with a large chimneybreast to its south-western flank and a C19 canted bay to its south-eastern face. The show fronts are to the south-east and south-west. Extending to the north-west is a lower, L-shaped service wing.
EXTERIOR: The building is rendered with painted stone dressings and quoins and a plain-tiled roof and much of the earlier fabric is also clothed in this C19 covering. The south-east front has a projecting gabled wing to the left which is the oldest portion of the house. This has a later two-storey canted bay window with hipped roof, stone quoins to the corners and ashlar coping to the gable. In the re-entrant angle between this earlier wing and the later body of the house which extends to the right, is a smaller, gabled porch wing, with cross window to the ground floor, which may once have been a doorway. Above this is a relieving arch with hood mould and at first floor level is a three-light casement with arched heads to the lights. Recessed and at left is the later C19 dining room wing which has a canted bay window to the ground and first floors and a gabled dormer window of three lights to the attic. The south-west flank of the house has a prominent chimney stack to the side of the C16 or C17 wing which appears to be of the same early date. It has numerous offsets to either side and supports two-diamond-shaped flues. To the left of this is the gable end of the late-C19 dining room wing. It too has a prominent stack, in emulation of the early fabric which also supports two diamond-shaped flues. The north-east front has a gabled wing at left with square bay window of two storeys and at right is the lower service wing.
INTERIOR: The C16 or C17 part of the house has a panelled ceiling to the ground floor room with large, richly-moulded beams which run axially and cross-axially to form four compartments which are in turn divided by smaller beams which also run in two directions. There is a chamfered wall post to the centre of the north-eastern wall and opposite this is the inglenook fireplace. This has been re-modelled in the C19 with fire surround and bressumer shelf, which nonetheless appear to indicate the underlying form of the C17 fireplace. Immediately above this is a further, C17 room which has a pair of sizeable beams which cross at the centre, and which have ovolo mouldings to their edges. The entrance hall has a floor of encaustic tiles and the staircase which rises from it has oak newel posts and painted, chamfered balusters. The late-C19 dining room has a panelled inglenook with a basket-arched bressumer and decoratively-leaded windows to either side of the fireplace, above which is a recessed panel of needlework. Elsewhere at ground and first floor levels are stone fireplaces of mid-C19 date which have been painted and which have Gothic ornament of quatrefoils to the spandrels or clusters of colonettes to either side of the hearth.
HISTORY: The building dates in part from the C16 or C17 and internal photographs taken during restoration in the 1980s show close-studded timber framing to the walls at ground floor level in this older part of the interior and substantial timbers of a similar age to the roof. The property is clearly marked on a map for the Calthorpe Estate of October 1839 which shows the central block including the south wing with a bay window to its south-east front and deep chimney breast to its south-west face. Later additions appear to have occurred in the mid-C19, at which time the house was clothed with Gothic revival ornament to both its exterior and interior, and at the end of the century or the start of the C20 when the dining room wing was added to the south-west. The house was used as a residence until the C20 and now operates as a nursery school.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION:
No 33, Edgbaston Park Road, Birmingham is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

* The house contains a sizeable portion of a C16 or C17 building of quality.
* The mid-C19 additions which were attached to this are largely intact and give a good impression of the functioning of the house in that period.
* The later C19 or early-C20 dining room has greater quality including an inglenook fireplace with good joinery.

Reasons for Listing

No 33, Edgbaston Park Road, Birmingham is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* The house contains a C16 or C17 building of quality which has a good degree of completeness
* The mid-C19 additions which were attached to this are largely intact and give a good impression of the functioning of the house in that period.
* The later C19 or early C20 dining room has greater quality including an inglenook fireplace with good joinery.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26672610

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.

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