Date: -
Audience: SPAB Members and their guests
Price:
£10 members £15 non members
Including teas & coffees.
Event details
Sunday 29 March 1.30pm
Join the Essex and Suffolk Group at Alston Court a Grade I listed private home with parts older than 700 years. Highlights include decorative timberwork, stained-glass and a well-preserved grand hall. This is a unique guided visit with an architectural historian and the owners.
One of the most impressive medieval timber framed merchants houses in England, Alston Court (Grade 1 listed) looks to be well-worth visiting from the outside with its magnificently carved oriel window on the street. However, the inside is even more impressive. The building surrounds an open courtyard.
The earliest part of the house is the two storey service cross-wing facing onto the street which has a roof structure with passing braces and lap joints. Being dendro-dated to 1301 this is one of the earliest two storey cross-wings in the country. Adjacent to this wing parallel to the street is the replacement hall and parlour cross-wing built in the early fifteenth century. Part of this wing was then replaced in the early sixteenth century by a parlour with solar above containing magnificent carving seen internally and in the courtyard.
At the same time a range of workshops including a dyehouse was added to the back of the medieval service wing, completing the courtyard in conjunction with a new side entrance and the gable of a neighbouring house.
In the hall and dining room there is a rare collection of early sixteenth century heraldic stained glass relating to East Anglian gentry families with links to the clothier thought to have owned the house at the time.
We shall be seated in the grand open hall for an introductory talk about the property by Leigh Alston a well renowned architectural historian with great knowledge of the building, its construction, history and inevitable care programme.
We shall split into two groups to prevent overloading the upper floors. Leigh and the owner, Angela, will each take a group to tour the house and courtyard. We shall then break for teas and coffees so that we can swap groups – each group enjoying the full experience.
There will also be an opportunity to visit the back garden and see the house from the rear.
The owner has most generously allowed us to visit her home. Please respect that it is a private home and stay with your group. There must be no photography within the building.
You will need
Sensible flat- soled shoes and outdoor clothing. Part of the tour will be outside even in poor weather.
How to get there
Final meeting point will be sent with booking confirmation. There is limited on-street parking nearby on High Street, Nayland.
Accessibility
Seating will be provided for the introductory talk, but not during the tour of the house. Seating will be available when taking refreshments.
Some staircases are narrow and steep with some floors are uneven.
Not suitable for wheelchairs.
Anything we can do to make this event more accessible for you? Please email membership@spab.org.uk.
Photos and filming: There must be no photography within the building. For other photography, participants may take photos and short videos for personal use, with permission of the builging owner and all other participants in frame. Please do not share on social media or elsewhere.
All bookings are subject to our Terms and Conditions.
Photo credit: Alston Court Courtyard: © Nigel Wall