House near Dorchester (Little Court, Charminster) Dorset

This house has just been completed and is on the road between Dorchester and Charminster. There is the greatest difficulty in getting any building land near the town of Dorchester, so there is very little choice in the matter of sites. This particular site commands a pretty view of Dorchester, but until the garden scheme becomes matured it is somewhat bare and forms no setting for the house. The natural building material of this locality should be stone, but none of the local quarries are now available, and the expense of cartage prohibited general use of the stone. Some rough local stone has been introduced into the porch and as a base to the house—using this in large unsquared pieces, irregularly mixed with the rough-cast and red brick of chimneys in the old local manner. The roof is covered with special hand-made roofing tiles of a very beautiful colour. The general arrangement of house, stable, and garden explains itself and calls for no particular comments, beyond pointing out the value of thus connecting up all the buildings and forming a pleasing quadrangular form. The walled kitchen garden is a particular feature of the scheme, and on a bare site of this kind adds greatly to the sense of settled occupancy and gives unusual variety and privacy to the kitchen wing. When the walls get naturally clothed with fruit trees and the lines of garden get more definite, the value of the general arrangements of the house and garden will be apparent. Holt and Son, of Croydon, were the general contractors. Ham Hill stone was used for the window frames, the casements and leaded lights for which came from W. Smith, of London. The roofing tiles came from R. Swallow, Cranleigh; the sanitary ware from J. Bolding & Son, London; the door furniture from Pheil, Stedall and Son, London; and the pump from Lott & Walne, Ltd., Dorchester. The well was sunk by G. Lane, Dorchester.

LITTLE COURT, DORCHESTER - This is a much smaller house than "Horncastle," but an effect of size has been given by grouping the stables with the house and linking up the garden wall to house and boundaries of site. The house is built with brick, roughcast, the mullions being of local stone; and a certain amount of stone dressings gives solidity to the base of house. The roof is covered with old hand-made tiles. Mr. P. Morley Horder, F.R.I.B.A., was the architect. [Recent English Domestic Architecture 1912 Page 31 and 34]

Reference    Mervyn E Macartney: Recent English Domestic Architecture 1909 page 103-105
Reference    Mervyn E Macartney: Recent English Domestic Architecture 1912 page 31 and 34

Note: The house was extended about 1925-29 by the addition of a new wing.