| Description | Egremont House, 71 Northgate, Wakefield. High status house built c.1810.
'Substantial late C18 or early C19 house of 3 storeys, five windows. Red brick with stone dressings including plinth band, ground floor cill band, top frieze and cornice with diagonal dentils concealing very low pitched hipped Welsh slate roof. On returns paired brackets to eaves gutters. Finely gauged flat brick arches and stone cills to replaced sash windows. Central early C20 neo classical stone doorcase'.
(English Heritage listed building description. Date listed 01/02/1979. http://list.english heritage.org.uk/resultsingle.aspx?uid=1273417. Web site accessed26/11/2013).
Egremont House was the subject of an archaeological assessment by Colum Giles in 1979 as part of the WYAS/RCHME Rural Houses Survey. The photographic image produced by the assessment is held by WYAAS (Giles, C. (WYAS/RCHME). 1979). The fieldwork report is transcribed below:
'This is a brick house of c.1810. It was built by John Egremont, whose wife Hanah had, shortly before, come into her father's fortune. Made in the cloth trade of Wakefield. The house faces east onto Northgate and is of three full storeys and cellars. The facade is of five bays with a central door. The brickwork on this front is in Flemish bond, and the windows have square heads. There is a dog tooth brick eaves cornice. The sides and rear of the house are in random bond brick work, and the windows have segmental heads.
The internal details of the house have been obscured by later alterations, but it is likely that the basic room description is largely original. The door opens into an entrance hall flanked on either side by the main reception rooms. That to the south is larger than the northern room, and shares the whole of the south side of the house with another reception room. The north side of the house has, in addition to the large reception room to the east, the main stair and a further, smaller room. That the stair is in its original position is demonstrated by the existence of two stair windows on the north wall: the lower is of Venetian form, possibly a later alteration. The stair is possibly original, with slender iron balusters alternately straight and wavy. The stained glass Venetian stair window is of late 19th century date. The ground floor retains many original doorcases.
The first and second floor plans differ little from the ground floor. There is an interesting feature found on both the upper floors. Between main rooms on the east front there is, as is often encountered, a small room, probably a dressing room. To the west of the dressing room, however, is another small room, almost and ante chamber. The explanation for this feature is not immediately apparent.
The cellar runs beneath the northern half of the house and was used for storage of drink, food and possibly fuel. There is no sign now of the original kitchen either on the ground floor or in the cellar, and it is probable that the cooking was done in outbuildings at the rear of the house. The form and extent of these service buildings cannot be determined, for a late 19th century range butts against the rear of the house.
(Giles, C. (WYAS/RCHME). 1979. 'Egremont House, Northgate. Wakefield').
Building is now in use as Council offices (OS Mastermap 2011). |