NHER 6569 (Building record) - Barningham Hall

Magnificent mansion built for Sir Edward Paston 1612.
Extended 1805 to 1807 by J.A. Repton.

1756.
Medieval English psalter dug up, now listed under NHER 44550.

See brief notes in file.

Listed Grade I, coach house and stables Grade II*, gates and walls Grade II. Kitchen garden Grade II, vases and steps Grade II.
See (S1) and NHER 44547 to 44549 for full details.
Press cuttings and photographs in file.
E. Rose (NLA) 6 April 1990.

Brick with stone dressings and castellated brick cornice, plain tiles. Double depth, 5 bays, 2 storeys and 2 attic floors. Crow stepped gables. Symmetrical principal facade to west:central bay breaking forward and rising to 2 storeyed dormer with crow stepped gable. Two storeyed crow stepped gable dormers with clasping polygonal buttresses to bays 1,2,4 and 5. All windows in stone, pedimented, with mullions and transoms, in stone surrounds; those to ground and first floors, bays 1,2, 4 and 5 having 5 lights, those to bays 1 and 5 being canted; that over doorway of 4 lights, those to lower attic floor of 3 lights, those to upper attic floor of 2 lights without transoms. Central doorway: semicircular porch arch in stone with date 1612 on spandrel shields; extended imposts; pediment with strapwork decorated frieze supported by brackets; above in stone are arms of Paston impaling Berney with motto ‘De meux en meux’ under pediment supported by columns. Clasping brick polygonal stepped buttresses, the steps articulated by stone string courses, to angles of facade and projecting central bay with moulded stone plinth caps and rising to onion capped stone finial shafts. Similar finials to dormers and their clasping polygonal buttresses.
South Front: now symmetrical of 3 bays. Originally 2 bays, but extended to 3 by H. & J.A. Repton, 1805, who inserted canted bay windows to bay 1 and central oriel window. Central ground floor mullioned and transomed window of 4 lights reaching to the ground. Canted bay mullioned and transomed windows of 4 lights to bays 1 and 3, ground and first floor and 4-light central oriel window all beneath brick embattled parapets. Clasping polygonal buttresses and finials as to west facade at facade angles and flanking central bay. Crow stepped gabled dormer with 2-light window to central bay. Crow stepped gables of first and third bays with finials and having a 3-light window to lower attic floor and a 2-light window to upper attic floor, that to bay 3 being dummy. Stacks of 4 octagonal brick shafts with oversailing star caps either side of central bay.
East Front: 3rd bay addition by Repton, 1805, to left; large central canted flay under brick embattled parapet with 5 light mullioned and transomed window; 3 first floor windows, mullioned and transomed, that to centre of 3 lights, those to bays 1 and 3 of 2 lights; crow stepped gable to one storeyed dormer with 3-light window. Clasping polygonal shaft with finial to angle of third bay. North facade to courtyard, double depth, gabled to right, varied fenestration. Interior: much altered by Repton in 1805. Porch: stone vault of 1805; 6 panelled door with upper 3 panels glazed under 4-centred arch. Hall: door rear arch and arcading with Gothick ogees; heraldic fireplace and panelling to north; fleur de lys coving; imperial staircase of 1805, closed string with open ogee arches between square sectioned balusters, ground newel posts with large 15th century oak statues of Elizabeth of Hungary to right and St Anne to left, upper newel posts with smaller statues of apostles; some 17th century fragments of Flemish glass in stair window. Front room to south has 4-centred fireplace arch lined with 17th century moulded terra cotta tiles; chimney piece of stone with marble scroll work additions and central Italian marble plaque in relief showing Belissarius. Repton room to rear with wide fluted coving. 17th century staircase to rear of bay 2. First floor: front room to bay 1 with 17th century panelling and delicate strapwork plaster ceiling; 4-centred arch to fireplace. 3 central bays to front formed one room, now subdivided, with Gothick decorations of 1805.
Information taken from (S1).
S. Spooner (NLA) 10 May 2006