Description

0/D EGHAM U.D. RIDGEMEAD ROAD (north side, off) Englefield Green Ridgemead II Country house, now old people's home. 1938 by Robert Lutyens for Captain Woolf Barnato, with C1974 addition. White painted brick with Clipsham aslar dressings and pantile roof. Double-pile U-shaped plan. 2 storeys: elongated 19-bay range facing garden; main entrance at rear, opening onto courtyard framed by side wings projecting from house at obtuse angle and terminating in 3-storey towers; another entrance on right return opening into courtyard enclosed by bulbons curvilinear walls, that on right returning to adjoin reap side-wing. In spanish Mission style, rear fortress-like. 2-light leaded casement windows with wooden frames and taller windows with transoms. Broken roof line with hipped roofs and various stacks. Garden elevation: treated as 2 sections, of 8 and 11 bays: right section fairly plain with central bay projecting under hipped roof and bays to right lower. Left section has single-storey pavilions projecting at ends flanking round-arched arcade to internal loggia; on 1st floor central 4-bay internal balcony under hipped roof mirroring main roof; pavilions have pilastered and corniced architraces to tall 3-light front windows and to glazed side doors; arcade has central paired glazed doors with glazing bars and traceried fanlights, circular motifs to spandrels, central one below sundial; balcony has pilastered parapet broken by openings containing decorative flower tubs, French windows to house and round-tile-arched recesses to return walls. Projecting from left return a colannade of square-section tile piers supporting timber lintels. In front of pavilions stone flower troughs. Projecting forward on right, single-storey added wing, in similar style, not of special interest. Rear elevation: fortress-like appearance given by towers, pilaster butresses, blind walls with small square windows, tall lower storey and recessed upper storey to main range. Central ashlar entrance up broad, shallow, steps has tall panelled double door and panelled fanlight is indented-quoined round-arched surround below cartouché which breaks cornice; flanking windows set on battered bases have elaborate keystones; tripartite windows to side walls and wings; broad elliptical-arched through-way to left tower and garage doorway (with panelled doors) to right tower, each with pedestrian side door; bulbons pot finials. Right return, maksed by stone-coped pilastered yard walls approx. 2 and 2 1/2 metres high, has double panelled door in stone surround with bracketed pediment, and hipped 1/2-dormers on right. Left return: round-arched arcade to left infilled with french windows and with recessed paired double-doors on right; 1st floor, 2 semi-domed stone niches with keystones lettered "W" and "B". Interior: stone dressings; round archways; coffered ceilings downstairs; panelled walls and doors; panelled stairway has clock and barometer on side wall and gently rising stair; landing has stone fireplace below niche containing compass with pointer (to weathervane?); fine marble bathroom with pilaster, cornice and round-arched mirrors. C Hussey, "Ridgemead - Englefield Green", Country Life, 10 February 1940 pp 144-148 and 17 February 1940, pp 172-176.

Listing NGR: SU9898872458

External Links

• Wikidata Q26658500

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Recommended Books

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  A Buying and Owning a Listed Building: A Brief Guide
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  Old House Care and Repair
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  Hampshire: Winchester and the North (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
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  Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair