A Brief Survey of Tapton Hall

 

The south elevation of Tapton Hall

After briefly surveying the stonework at Kersal Mount, which was a pleasant surprise and would later feature in my talk to the Ranmoor Society, I continued up Manchester Road past a couple of large houses and then turned down Shore Lane towards the entrance of Tapton Hall.

 

A view down Shore Lane

 

When preparing my walk, I had looked at the I855 Ordnance Survey map and noted that the site of Tapton Hall was then occupied by Tapton Grove, a substantial house of unknown date that was occupied by Mary Shore, the grandmother of Florence Nightingale, and that there was an old quarry marked next to Shore Lane. 

 

The 1855 Ordnance Survey map

Walking down the hill, I was hoping that I might see remains of the quarry but, all along the side of the road where this was located, there is a high boundary wall and the site now forms part of the private grounds of West Royd on Manchester Road. 

 

A boundary wall on Shore Lane

 

The rubble wall is constructed of thinly bedded sandstone, which has a very high proportion of dark rusty brown blocks that look very similar to those seen in boundary walling and various cottages etc. around Fulwood. The old quarry is sited on the Rough Rock and I presume this has been used for the walling and that its typical physical characteristics are exhibited here. 

 

The gateway to Tapton Hall

Arriving at the entrance to Tapton Hall, I just took a few general photos of the tall rusticated gate piers, which are built with a uniformly coloured massive sandstone. I didn’t stop to examine the stone, but it looks like one of the medium grained sandstones from the Millstone Grit Group in Derbyshire or West Yorkshire, such as Stoke Hall stone and Crosland Hill stone. 

 

The approach to Tapton Hall

 

Moving to the house itself, it was built in 1855 on the site of the demolished Tapton Grove for another one of the Sheffield steel magnates, Edward Vickers, and designed by Flockton & Son in a Classical style, with Italianate features. It was restored, with alterations and a very large modern extension by Hadfield, Cawkwell, Davidson & Partners in 1967. 

 

The east elevation

 

From 1867 to 1967, the house was the home of the Wilson family, snuff manufacturers at Sharrow Mills on the Porter Brook. It was then purchased by the Sheffield Masonic Hall Company, who turned it into its present form and use as a wedding venue, conference centre and restaurant, while still retaining their headquarters and museum there. 

 

The concrete mural sculpture by William Mitchell

The new extension has been described as “large and uncompromisingly modern”, with a large abstract concrete mural symbolising the 'turmoil and chaos of the outside' by William Mitchell next to the main entrance to the extension.

 

A detail of the concrete mural sculpture

Nearly 30 years previously, I had worked on a temporary project for the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England, now part of Historic England – to acquire as many examples of post-war architectural sculpture that I could find and supply 7"x5” black and white photographs at £10 each - and am always interested to see such sculpture, although it is not to my taste. 

 

A detail of the south elevation

 

My main objective was to look at the stonework and, after introducing myself to the museum curator, I was briefly shown around the museum and parts of the old house and the restaurant and bar in the extension. Having discovered that the panes of glass in the large bow window on the south elevation are curved, I went to explore its exterior. 

 

The bow window

I took a quick walk around the house to photograph it from a few angles, including the western extension that I did not see closely, but I did not see any particularly interesting features on the various elevations or examples of stone carving. 

 

A view of the old house and the new extension

On the south and west elevations, the lie of the land has necessitated the construction of what is in effect a small retaining wall, which incorporates entrance steps at the south-west corner that rise up to a reasonably large patio area. 

 

Entrance steps on the south-west corner of the patio

 

The wall has a textured finish that has attracted the dirt and I thought that it could be built of local Chatsworth Grit, which is very often used for similar walls in this part of Sheffield; however, looking much closer, I think that it is the same medium grained gritstone as used in the house, which is probably from Derbyshire.

 

A detail of the steps and adjoining pier

Except for one small section adjacent to the quoins on the east end of the south elevation, where one of the stones is losing its surface, the sandstone is still in very good condition and I didn’t notice any sign of recent restoration to any of the stonework. I spent less than 10 minutes to get all the photographs that I needed for my talk and headed back to Shore Lane and continued along the Fulwood Road towards Broomhill. 

 

A weathered block on the south elevation