Manor House, Bury St. Edmunds, West Suffolk, Suffolk, IP33 (Grade I)

BURY ST EDMUNDS

TL8563NE HONEY HILL 639-1/11/447 (South side) 07/08/52 Manor House (Formerly Listed as: HONEY HILL (South side) No.5 Manor House and County Council Offices)

GV I

House. 1736-8; by Sir James Burrough for Lady Elizabeth Hervey, wife of the 1st Earl of Bristol. Red brick: Flemish Bond on the front, English Bond on the sides and rear, with a high moulded stone plinth, rusticated stone quoins and stone details. Tiled roof with a plain parapet above a moulded stone cornice. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys and basement. 9 windows, arranged 3:3:3, the centre breaking forward with a triangular pediment and stone quoins. All windows are 15-pane sashes with eared stone architraves on stub brackets. The central double entrance doors are approached by a flight of stone steps with cast-iron railings. 12-panel doors, round-headed and recessed; a stone doorcase with semicircular arched opening with architrave, pilasters and a segmental pediment on long console brackets. To the west of the main range a high C19 extension has a screen wall in red brick with white brick dressings: this links Manor House with No.6 Honey Hill (qv). It has a large arched central recess, flanked by smaller recesses with bulls-eye windows above, and formerly contained a squash court. The parapet, with a moulded brick cornice, is continued round the sides and across the back of the house. On the east of the rear is a large canted bay, added in the early C19: 3 long narrow 12-pane sash windows to the upper storey have 3 smaller sashes immediately below them. The centre breaks forward slightly with three 15-pane sash windows to the upper storey and a larger central 15-pane sash window below, set into a former doorcase and flanked by 2 blocked windows. On the west, a 15-pane sash to each storey and a small 9-pane lower sash. All the windows on this front have dressings and flat gauged arches in darker red brick. INTERIOR: retains its original C18 fittings with ornate plasterwork and woodwork, carved fireplace surrounds and a fine stair. The entrance hall is paved with limestone flags. A

triple arched arcade with a higher central arch leads to the rear hall and stair, which has very light vase-on-reel balusters, open strings with ornate brackets, a ramped and moulded handrail and a bolection-moulded dado. At a higher level a plaster band of vitruvian scrolls. All the rooms have heavy enriched modillion box cornices, often also with a plaster band of egg-and-dart ornament. 6-panel doors with raised fielded panels and panelled reveals; panelled internal shutters, some enriched with bead-and-reel ornament. The fireplace in the entrance hall is particularly ornate, but all the fireplace surrounds have a variety of decorations, including egg-and-dart, dentils and bayleaf on the architraves. The dining room, to the left of the entrance hall, has 2 supporting fluted pillars with Corinthian capitals at one end and matching pilasters along the walls. The Salon or ballroom above has an enriched coffered ceiling. (BOE: Pevsner N: Radcliffe E: Suffolk: London: 1974-: 150; Rowntree CB: The Manor House, Bury St Edmunds, further notes on its history: 1989-).