York Historic Environment Record

House, now school. Early C18, raised and re-roofed 1786; small late C19 extension.

MATERIALS: front and right return painted render, possibly Portland cement, on painted chamfered plinth incised to resemble ashlar; painted stone dressings; timber doorcase and cornice: rear of orange-red brick in English garden-wall bond on basement of squared limestone; slate hipped roof with rendered brick stacks.

EXTERIOR: basement and 3 storeys; 5-bay front: 2-storey 1-bay extension to right. Flight of stone steps leads to front door of 8 raised panels and radial fanlight recessed in moulded architrave: plain doorcase with moulded and dentilled cornice hood on consoles. Ground floor windows are 12-pane sashes with painted stone sills and sunk-panel shutters. First floor windows are unequal 15-pane sashes, over sunk-panel aprons: centre window has apron flanked by pedestals with ball finials and pediment hood on consoles.

Attic windows are squat 6-pane sashes. Prominent moulded modillioned cornice, returned at right end to fluted inverted bell rainwater head, and continued without modillions across right return. First and second floor bands. Extension has splayed corners and right return has 12-pane sash windows on both floors, segment-headed on ground floor, in painted stone architraves with sills. Raised first floor band; moulded and modillioned cornice. Rear: basement and 3 storeys, 4 bays, left end bay slightly projecting. Off-centre panelled door and small window beneath guttering inscribed: 'This house repair'd and the roof new slated in the year 1786'. Above door, tall radial-glazed sash window in round-arched opening. Ground and first floor windows to right are 12-pane sashes, to left 16-pane sashes, all with 1-course segmental brick arches. Second floor windows are squat 6-pane sashes. 5-course raised brick bands to first and second floors: brick dentil eaves cornice below boxed guttering. Composite rainwater head dated 1783 in re-entrant with left bay, and fall pipe with crossed key clamps.

INTERIOR: brick vaulted cellars. Ground floor. Entrance hall: stone flagged floor; semicircular stairhall arch on fluted pilasters with imposts and radial-glazed fanlight in the head. Main staircase has open string, slender turned balusters and serpentine handrail wreathed at foot around turned newel on shaped curtail step; moulded dado rail to well; half-landing window in moulded surround. Secondary staircase to second floor has close string, square newels and flat moulded handrail. Left front room: panelled on four walls above dado rail; painted wood fireplace with eared surround and overmantel panel, and pulvinated frieze; dentilled cornice.

Left rear room: panelled as front room; fireplace in eared surround with enriched cornice shelf on foliate brackets; overmantel panel flanked by fluted pilasters with triglyph frieze and broken pediment; modillioned ceiling cornice; panelled shutters. First floor. Landing: two doorcases with eared architraves; main one with door of 6 raised and fielded panels recessed in semicircular arch on plain pilasters with imposts; moulded ceiling cornice. Large front room: distyle in antis screen of cast-iron columns with foliate capitals, and moulded frieze; fireplace with eared architrave, sunk panel jambs and enriched moulded shelf has altered grate in late C19 tiled slips; doorcases have fasciated architraves and cornice heads; panelled window reveals; moulded ceiling cornice. Smaller front room: plain marble fireplace and lincrusta dado. Rear left room, sub-divided: moulded dado rail and cornice; fireplace in eared moulded surround enriched with egg-and-dart, and moulded cornice shelf.

(City of York: RCHME: The Central Area: HMSO: 1981-: 163). Listing NGR: SE6041852161

Derived from English Heritage LB download dated: 22/08/2005

The Old Residence, No. 6, standing in a detached position close to the S.E. angle of the Minster, of three storeys and basement, has brick walls, mostly rendered and painted, and slate-covered roofs. It was built in the second quarter of the 18th century, and was the prebendal house of Strensall before being sold to the Dean and Chapter in 17834 for the Canons Residentiary, in which use it continued until 1827, when the New Residence (154) was built in the Dean's Park. Repairs were made in 1786 and 390 was spent in 1792, when the bricklayer was James Rusby and the joiner William Halfpenny. In 1827 it was recorded that the house was 'about to be faced with composition in imitation of Portland stone' (YML, Hornby MSS. 274). The front rooms on the first floor were refitted in the late 19th century and about the same time a two-storey annexe was added on the S.W. side. Now used as a school, it is a substantial house with a number of good original fittings. In the basement are several rubble stone walls which probably survive from an earlier building.

The front elevation, five bays wide, has a stone plinth, bands at the first and second floors, and an Ionic timber cornice and modillions. The rendered wall has incised lining to represent ashlar, now barely discernible. The eight-panel front door, approached by a flight of steps, has a half-round fanlight, moulded architrave, and is surmounted by a dentil cornice on consoles. On the first floor the windows have panelled aprons and the centre one over the doorway is emphasised by a pediment on consoles, and pedestals with ballfinials flanking the apron. The rear elevation is of brick in random bond, with the basement in limestone; the second floor appears to be a late 18th-century heightening, and has a corbelled brick eaves cornice. There are brick bands marking the first and second floors on the main body of the wall but not on the wing, which projects at the S. corner. The main windows have low segmental arches, except for the large round-arched stair window. Over the back door is a lead rainwater gutter, inscribed 'This house repair'd and the roof new slated in the year 1786'. The side elevations, which formerly had buildings against them, are irregular. The roof is hipped.

Entry through the front door is into a stone-flagged hall; this leads through an archway, enclosing a fanlight, to the main staircase which has an open string, two balusters on each step and a moulded handrail with a large scroll at the foot on a substantial turned newel. The two principal ground-floor rooms are on the N.E. side and have panelled walls above plain dados. In the front room the fireplace has an eared surround and pulvinated frieze and the over mantel is a large panel also with moulded eared surround. In the back room the fireplace surround is eared and enriched, the plain frieze has a carved block at each end, and the overmantel has a panel flanked by fluted pilasters carrying a Doric triglyph frieze and broken pediment; the cornice in this room has modillions. On the first-floor landing the doors have moulded, eared architraves and the door to the larger front room is set within an arched recess with plain pilasters. The two front rooms are modernised, but the E. rear room, though divided by a modern partition, retains the original cornice and moulded and enriched fireplace surround. The service staircase, with close strings and square newel-posts, continues to the second floor, which has simple original fittings. The basement rooms at the front of the house have brick barrel vaults.

Monument 277; City of York: RCHME: The Central Area: HMSO: 1981-: 16

NMR Information

List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest. District of York, 14-MAR-1997

BF060856 THE OLD RESIDENCE, YORK File of material relating to a site or building. This material has not yet been fully catalogued.

RCHME, 1981, City of York Volume V: The Central Area (Monograph). SYO65.

NMR, 2019, NMR data (Digital archive). SYO2214.