Forcett Hall is an

English country house image:Blenheim - Blenheim Palace - 20210417125239.jpg, 300px, Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a Townhou ...

in the village of

Forcett Forcett is a village in the county of North Yorkshire, England. It lies near the border with County Durham, on the B6274 road about 8 miles south of Staindrop. Nearby villages include Eppleby, Caldwell and Aldbrough. From 1974 to 2023 it wa ...

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in Northern England.The Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority areas of City of York, York and North Yorkshire (district), North Yorkshire are in Yorkshire and t ...

, England, some west of

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. It lies on the River Skerne, west of Middlesbrough and south of Durham. Darlington had a population of 107,800 at the 2021 Census, making it a "large town" ...

. It is a Grade I listed building.

History

Forcett had been in the possession of the Shuttleworth family of

Gawthorpe Hall Gawthorpe Hall is an Elizabethan country house on the banks of the River Calder, in Ightenhill, a civil parish in the Borough of Burnley, Lancashire, England. Its estate extends into Padiham, with the Stockbridge Drive entrance situated there. ...

, Lancashire since 1582. Forcett Hall was originally an Elizabethan house, modified in 1710 by William Benson. After a fire in 1726 it was substantially redesigned in 1740 in the Palladian style by architect

Daniel Garrett Daniel Garrett (died 1753) was a British architect who worked on the Burlington Estate, Culloden Tower, Raby Castle, and Banqueting House. History Garrett started as a clerk of works, then in 1735 set up his own practice in the North of Engl ...

under Richard Shuttleworth, MP, vacating the family seat at Gawthorpe to move in. It passed to his son

James James may refer to: People * James (given name) * James (surname) * James (musician), aka Faruq Mahfuz Anam James, (born 1964), Bollywood musician * James, brother of Jesus * King James (disambiguation), various kings named James * Prince Ja ...

, MP for Preston and

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...

and

High Sheriff of Yorkshire The Sheriff is the oldest secular office under the Crown. Formerly the Sheriff was the principal law enforcement officer in the county but over the centuries most of the responsibilities associated with the post have been transferred elsewhere o ...

for 1760–61. James' son Robert inherited the property on his father's death in 1773 but sold it in 1784. His son Robert moved back to live at Gawthorpe. Robert, let Forcett Hall to

Algernon Percy, 1st Earl of Beverley Algernon Percy, 1st Earl of Beverley, (21 January 1750 – 21 October 1830), styled Lord Algernon Percy between 1766 and 1786 and known as the Lord Lovaine between 1786 and 1790, was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1774 ...

, who remained in occupation when Robert Shuttleworth sold the Forcett Hall Estate in 1785 to Frances Michell and her son, Charles Michell. Forcett Hall passed by descent until 1938 when it was bought by Lieutenant Colonel Hardress Waller. It acted as family home to the Heathcote family from 1938 to 2020, managed by James and Alison Heathcote, who provided hospitality for special and corporate events. In 2011, the property was placed on the market with an asking price of £5.5 million. The house featured in 2016 in the

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...

series ''

Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners ''Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners'' is a Channel 4 television series about people with obsessive–compulsive disorder, narrated by John Thomson. The first series ran from February to March 2013, the second from October to December 2013, the thir ...

''. The price was lowered to £4 million, and according to the listing, is in need of some refurbishment. In 2021 the hall was acquired by property developer Karen Stephenson.

Architecture

The building has three floors, and a basement with four main reception rooms, 15 bedrooms and a self-contained east wing with three further bedrooms. It is approached through an arched carriageway with four Roman Doric columns and a Doric frieze. Nearby are Grade II listed north and south lodges. Several other buildings in the grounds are listed.

Dovecote

dovecote A dovecote or dovecot , doocot (Scots Language, Scots) or columbarium is a structure intended to house Domestic pigeon, pigeons or doves. Dovecotes may be free-standing structures in a variety of shapes, or built into the end of a house or b ...

at Forcett is first mentioned in 1566. The current building in the grounds of the hall was constructed in about 1740. It is built of

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

and brick, with a band, a moulded

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative Moulding (decorative), moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, ar ...

, and a hipped

Westmorland Westmorland (, formerly also spelt ''Westmoreland''R. Wilkinson The British Isles, Sheet The British IslesVision of Britain/ref>) is an area of North West England which was Historic counties of England, historically a county. People of the area ...

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

roof. It has a hexagonal plan, and two stages. On each face in the ground floor is an open round arch, and on the angles are

piers Piers may refer to: * Pier, a raised structure over a body of water * Pier (architecture), an architectural support * Piers (name), a given name and surname (including lists of people with the name) * Piers baronets, two titles, in the baronetages ...

with bases and imposts. The upper stage contains blind round-arched openings with a sill band and an impost band. On the roof is a wooden

colonnade In classical architecture, a colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or curv ...

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...

with a lead conical roof and a

weathervane A wind vane, weather vane, or weathercock is an list of weather instruments, instrument used for showing the wind direction, direction of the wind. It is typically used as an architectural ornament to the highest point of a building. The word ' ...

. It is

grade II* listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, H ...

Stable block

The stable block to the east of the hall was built about 1770. It is constructed of

with hipped

roofs, and consists of a two-storey main range and single-storey wings to the rear, forming a U-shaped plan. The main range has nine

bays A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a ''gulf'', ''sea'', ''sound'', or ''bight''. A ''cove'' is a small, ci ...

, the middle three bays projecting under a

pediment Pediments are a form of gable in classical architecture, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the cornice (an elaborated lintel), or entablature if supported by columns.Summerson, 130 In an ...

. In the centre is a round-arched carriageway, and the outer bays contain arcades with round-arched

sash window A sash window or hung sash window is made of one or more movable panels, or "sashes". The individual sashes are traditionally paned windows, but can now contain an individual sheet (or sheets, in the case of double glazing) of glass. History ...

s in recessed round arches, and a continuous impost band. The other ranges contain various openings, in the south range is a pump in a wooden box, and at the end of the north range is a lean-to store with a Welsh slate roof on an Ionic column. It is

Grotto and icehouse

The

grotto A grotto or grot is a natural or artificial cave or covered recess. Naturally occurring grottoes are often small caves near water that are usually flooded or often flooded at high tide. Sometimes, artificial grottoes are used as garden fea ...

and

icehouse Icehouse or ice house may refer to: * Ice house (building), a building where ice is stored * Ice shanty, a shelter for ice fishing also known as an ''Icehouse'' * Ice rink, a facility for ice skating. * Ice hockey arena, an area where ice hockey i ...

in the grounds of the hall are built of

and brick. The grotto has three

, and a passage from the middle bay leads to a circular brick icehouse. The grotto has three roundish arches, behind which are three

barrel vault A barrel vault, also known as a tunnel vault, wagon vault or wagonhead vault, is an architectural element formed by the extrusion of a single curve (or pair of curves, in the case of a pointed barrel vault) along a given distance. The curves are ...

ed chambers. From the outer sides, doorways with pointed arches lead to the garden. The building is grade II* listed.

East gateway and lodges

At the east entrance to the grounds of the hall is a gateway and lodges in

, built in the early 18th century and all

. The gateway has a central round-arched carriageway flanked by flat-headed pedestrian entrances. It has four

Roman Doric The Doric order is one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of the ...

half-columns carrying an open central

, and a large Doric

frieze In classical architecture, the frieze is the wide central section of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic order, Ionic or Corinthian order, Corinthian orders, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Patera (architecture), Paterae are also ...

over the side gates, and is surmounted by five large urn

finial A finial () or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a dome, spire, tower, roo ...

s. The decorative gates are in

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content of more than 2% and silicon content around 1–3%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloying elements determine the form in which its car ...

, and the gateway is linked to the lodges by walls with cast iron railings with decorative finials. Each lodge has a single storey and a single bay, and contains a Venetian window within a round arch, and above it is a pediment. The doorway has a usticated quoin (architecture), quoined surround, and a

lintel A lintel or lintol is a type of beam (a horizontal structural element) that spans openings such as portals, doors, windows and fireplaces. It can be a decorative architectural element, or a combined ornamented/structural item. In the case ...

with a large tripartite keystone.

Park

It stands in 85 hectares of parkland which contains several listed buildings including a grotto incorporating an ice house and mount, a wilderness garden, the Stanwick Late Iron Age

Oppidum An ''oppidum'' (: ''oppida'') is a large fortified Iron Age Europe, Iron Age settlement or town. ''Oppida'' are primarily associated with the Celts, Celtic late La Tène culture, emerging during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC, spread acros ...

, and a large collection of veteran and rare trees, including one of the largest cedar trees in the country. The park is on the English Heritage Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest. The

is a

Grade II listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, H ...

of 1740, designed by Garrett.

References

{{coord, 54, 30, 23, N, 1, 44, 9, W, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Country houses in North Yorkshire Grade I listed houses in North Yorkshire Houses completed in 1710 1710 establishments in England