Architecture in Thorpe Salvin

 

Thorpe Hall

 

When I last visited Thorpe Salvin back in 2016, I took advantage of the annual Thorpe Salvin Garden Trail to have a look inside St. Peter’s church, which was opened especially for the event, but I didn’t venture any further than the Coronation Garden.

 

A modern bugalow

Having walked up the path from the bridge at Top Triple Lock on the Chesterfield Canal, after visiting Hawks Wood quarry, I arrived on the Worksop Road at the east end of the village, where the first building that I saw was a modern bungalow, built in a cream/yellow limestone with a red pantile roof - a combination that can be seen along the length of the Magnesian Limestone.

 

A house on Worksop Road

The Thorpe Salvin Conservation Area contains virtually the entire village, apart from Common Road - where there are C20 houses of various ages - and this pattern of building materials is found in most of the houses, both old and modern, which can be seen all along Worksop Road.

 

An agricultural building on Worksop Road

Except for St. Peter's church, Thorpe Salvin Hall and 5-9 Little Wood Lane, which I haven’t seen, the only other listed buildings in the parish are the various locks, bridges and associated structures along the Chesterfield Canal.

 

A general view of Worksop Road

Most of the older buildings are simple vernacular houses of varying sizes, with no decorative features, and these are mixed with working agricultural buildings that are still part of a working farm or have been converted for residential use.

 

A house on Worksop Road

I didn’t stop to examine any of the buildings closely, but they are all built with blocks of massive stone with a bed thickness that is much greater than the limestone that I had seen earlier at the delph in Hawks Wood.

 

A house on Worksop Road

A local historian, who is familiar with the quarrying trade along the Chesterfield Canal, would no doubt be able to tell me more about the possible sources of the limestone used for all of the buildings in the village.

 

Modern architecture on Worksop Road

I only stopped to take a couple of snaps of the new houses on Worksop Road, and I have to say that I like them much better than the various modern houses that I had seen a week earlier along Lindrick Dale.

 

Thorpe Salvin Hall

Carrying on down Harthill Road to the junction with Lady Field Road, I went to look at the ruins of Thorpe Salvin Hall, a fine example of the work of Robert Smythson – the master mason/architect who also designed Wollaton Hall, Hardwick Hall and the 'Little Castle' at Bolsover Castle.

 

Thorpe Salvin Hall

This very fine example of Elizabethan architecture is in private ownership and I have never got close enough to take a good look at its stonework. Looking from afar, the bulk of it comprises roughly squared and coursed dolomitic limestone, with the better quality limestone used for its windows having a slight pink colour, but I couldn’t see the details of the dressings.

 

The gatehouse at Thorpe Salvin Hall

 

In the gatehouse, limestone is again used for basic walling, with “Rotherham Red” sandstone for the quoins and dressings. The latter has all the colour variations and physical characteristics of this variety of the Mexborough Rock, including its tendency to weather with pronounced cavernous decay. The stone probably came from Harthill, a small village 3 km to the west, which once had a thriving quarrying industry. 

 

A view along Lady Field Road

Walking back to Lady Field Road, I headed back to Harthill Road and along to the main entrance to St. Peter’s church, after passing an outcrop of very thinly bedded limestone in the roadside, which has the churchyard wall built directly on top of it.

 

The churchyard wall and a rock outcrop on Harthill Road