Grade II * House Maidstone Kent Area

Grade ii* Principle reason for the star is its major early eighteenth-century phase of works, consisting of panelled rooms, a twisted baluster stair and notably, a front range faced in some of the finest brickwork in the country. John Newman in his West Kent volume of Pevsner’s Buildings of England series, describes that brickwork as SUPERLATIVE and likens it to similar work at Brabourne in East Malling. Its composition of tall, close-set sash windows surmounted by rubbed brick arches and framed by a giant order of pilasters is typical of the English Baroque and in those respects reminiscent of the great west house at Matfield (c1728) and at Finchcocks (c1725). However, The House is likely to be earlier (c 1715) than both of these other examples of the style, and has a quality of brickwork, picked out in four separate colours, which surpasses them both.

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