Knightshayes Court
Enthusiasm for medieval art and architecture, particularly early French Gothic, drove Burges. He declared ‘I was brought up in the 13th-century belief and in that belief I intend to die.’ But the house’s High Victorian confidence is unmistakable.
The exterior remains very largely as Burges designed it for Sir John Heathcoat Amory in 1868-9. Powerful and imposing, it is a statement of position and wealth. Burges composed it with immense skill, deliberately avoiding symmetry. Prominent steep, roofs, gables and chimneys create a varied skyline.
Exploiting the colours of materials was characteristic of High Victorian Gothic. The house, stables and lodge were all built of local red Hensleigh stone, contrasting golden Ham stone from Somerset and bright red clay tiles.
‘Muscular’ details include chunky shapes and windows with unmoulded stone window mullions, plate tracery looking as if punched through solid stone, and cast iron lights. The craftsmanship is top quality. Enjoyably quirky Burges details include medieval-inspired gargoyles and fantastic beasts springing from Burges’s fertile imagination, carved by his favourite sculptor Thomas Nicholls.