Roundhouse at Forest Lodge, Blyth, Nottinghamshire

Summary

Former lodge, built in the late C18, converted to a gardener’s cottage around 1936 to the designs of Robert Lowry FRIBA for Francis Egerton Pegler, now a house.

Description

Former lodge, built in the late C18, converted to a gardener’s cottage around 1936 to the designs of Robert Lowry FRIBA for Francis Egerton Pegler, now a house.

MATERIALS: clay tile roof, red brick walls, red brick chimneystack, and leaded casement windows.

PLAN: Octagonal in plan, with a rectangular-plan porch projecting from the west side (replaced around 2017).

EXTERIOR: the one-and-half storey house is octagonal in plan, with a central octagonal red-brick chimneystack, and steeply-sloped plain clay tile roof. Each of the north, east, south and west slopes of the roof have a dormer window clad with hanging clay tiles (introduced around 1936). The walls of the ground floor are constructed of red brick laid in Scottish bond. A gabled porch was added to the west elevation around 2017, replacing a late-C20 porch, containing a replacement timber-panelled door and metal-framed overlight of around 1936. The east elevation has a blocked door opening (from which a porch protruded on the 1886 and 1899 OS maps). The pointed-arch metal-framed casement windows of the ground-floor (of around 1806) and first-floor leaded casement windows (of around 1936) were replaced with pointed-arch timber-framed casements around 2017.

INTERIOR: the ground floor, reconfigured around 1936, comprises a living room to the west side, and a corridor running east to a stair, off which there is a dining room to the south (formerly a kitchen), and a kitchen to the north (formerly a scullery). The dining room retains an Art-Deco style fireplace of around 1936, and has been covered for safety reasons. The U-plan stair, inserted around 1936, has a plain concrete closed balustrade and leads to the first floor landing, off which there is a main bedroom to the west, a bathroom to the north (formerly a linen cupboard) and a second bedroom to the south. The internal doors were replaced around 2017 in the same style as the 1930s doors they replaced.

History

The Roundhouse near Forest Lodge was constructed in the late C18 for William Mellish of Blyth Hall, as a lodge to the wider Blyth Hall estate, located on the route between Blyth Hall (to the north-west) and the junction with the ancient Bawtry-to-Nottingham road at Blyth Law Hill (to the south-east). The building first appears on the 1782 ‘Map of Part of the Parish of Blyth’. It is likely the windows were replaced around 1806, when the Rotherham ironfounder Joshua Walker purchased Blyth Hall. Various other buildings in Blyth village also had metal-framed windows with pointed-arch tracery installed at this time, including several on Sheffield Road and High Street, many of which are listed at Grade II.

The form of the octagonal-plan lodge bears similarities to a toll house, such as that at Carlton, south-west of Blyth (listed at Grade II), with windows facing each direction. The building is shown on Sanderson’s map of Blyth of 1835, and the 1841 Tithe map of Hodsock near Blyth, when it was recorded as a ‘Lodge and Garden on Spital Forest’, owned by Henry Frederick Walker Esq (of Blyth Hall) and occupied by John Steadman. The lodge is shown on the 1886, 1899 and 1922 Ordnance Survey (OS) maps with a projection to the east side, most likely a porch.

In the early 1930s, the land and plantations south of Plantation Road were purchased by Francis Egerton Pegler (1890-1957), heir to the Northern Rubber Company in Retford and Peglers Ltd plumbing company in Doncaster. Pegler employed architect Robert Lowry to construct a residence and associated buildings at Hodsock Plantation, the new residence named Forest Lodge. Born around 1882, Lowry is recorded as having trained at the Architecture Association School of Architecture in London, working as an Assistant at the offices of Clyde Young and East and Mewes and Davis, before commencing independent practice in Richmond, Surrey. Lowry became Deputy Principal of the AA School of Architecture, and was recorded as a being a Lecturer in Greek, Roman and Renaissance architecture in 1924. He was awarded Associate membership of RIBA in 1916, and Fellow membership in 1925. His known works include: a house at 37 Bryanston Square, Marylebone, London W1 for the Hon Cecil A Campbell; a house in Brook Street, Mayfair, London W1 for the Marquis of Lansdowne; a concrete cottage 'White Steading' for F R Yerbury Esq, Amersham, Bucks (1921); a suburban house 'Queenslea' in Richmond, for W R Watkins Esq; 12 Frognal Lane, Hampstead, London, for J Marks Esq; and Forest Lodge near Blyth in Nottinghamshire, for F E Pegler Esq (1936).

Drawings of the proposed buildings at Forest Lodge by Robert Lowry FRIBA, approved by Worksop Rural District Council in 1936, record the architect’s address at that time as 16 Grafton Street, London, W1. Drawings included plans and elevations of the Gardener’s Cottage (now known as the Roundhouse), the Chauffeur's Cottage and Garage (now known as the Woodhouse), the Gate Lodge (now known as the Gatehouse), and Forest Lodge itself. The buildings were certainly completed by the time of an aerial photograph in May 1938. During Lowry’s remodelling of the former lodge as a gardener’s cottage, the entrance on the east side was blocked to facilitate a stair on the east side of the interior, an entrance was created on the west elevation, and leaded dormer windows were added to light the attic. A porch was added to the west elevation in the late C20 and was replaced around 2017. The metal-framed casements of the ground floor and leaded casements of the first floor were replaced by timber casements with pointed-arch tracery around 2017.

Reasons for Listing

The Roundhouse, a former lodge, built in the late C18, converted to a gardener’s cottage around 1936 to the designs of Robert Lowry FRIBA for Francis Egerton Pegler, now a house, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as a former lodge of the historic Blyth Hall estate, remodelled around 1936 by respected architect and architectural educator Robert Lowry FRIBA, who designed a number of elegant residential buildings;
* as a well-composed and attractive estate building, remodelled around 1936 to complement its associated country house;
* for the survival of original and 1930s features of architectural quality, including but not limited to its structure, roof covering, stair and plan form.

Historic interest:

* for the historic association the former lodge holds with the nearby Blyth Hall estate;
* as a key building in an architect-designed private country estate of the 1930s, exemplifying a popular style of the inter-war period.

Group value:

* for the survival of this 1930s country estate, which also includes the associated country house (Forest Lodge), gate lodge (Gatehouse), and chauffeur’s cottage and garage (Woodhouse), each listed at Grade II.

External Links

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