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Description: Clay House

Address: Clay House Rochdale Road Greetland Halifax West Yorkshire HX4 8AN

Grade: IISTAR

Group detail: Rochdale Road (off, north side)

Full description:
House now used as a museum, clinic, meeting hall and flat. c1650 for John Clay. Dressed stone to south front with finer ashlar to return wall of east wing and hammer-dressed to return wall of west wing and rear. Stone slate roof. Of unusual plan; it has a 4-roomed front with 4 identical gables; there are two entrances mullioned and transomed windows with king-mullion to both floors of 16 lights except the third which has 26-light window to main hall or housebody, with 20-light window over. Cross windows over each doorway which have cambered dripmoulds with circular stops and shaped architraves with decorated lintels. All gables have stepped attic window of 3 lights with arched heads, copings and finial to apex. Continuous round building is a weathered plinth and string course, with cavetto section, over ground floor windows. First floor windows have hoodmoulds over with heart shaped stops to the front range and circles to the rear. Rear has 4 gables with kneelers surmounted by ball finials and some double chamfered mullioned windows. At the north-east corner of the house is the kitchen; this has a large gable stack, and a drain spout projects from the east wall at floor level. Several other stacks, but main hall stack runs on horizontal ridge parallel with south front at junction of third bay with east wing on a line with main entry door which leads straight into much altered hall, c1873. Interior: Hall is lit by windows on both south and north and is open to first floor with gallery on 3 and a half sides approached by a stair which is close strung with turned balusters and a moulded hand-rail. Large fireplace which has depressed arch, moulded jambs and lintel with spiral termination. Hall retains some original doors of 2 panels with round heads and ogee heads. Stone reset reads 'IMC 1661', Hall window has painted panel with Clay coat of arms and 'IMC 1675'. Etched in glass are the lines:- 'Where e'er she treads the blushing Flowrs shall rise and all things prosper where she turns her Eyes.' The house originally may have been designed as two dwellings. John Clay died in 1654 leaving to Margaret, his son's widow £10 a year and the east end of the 'newly builded house'. Hunter, Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, Vol. 2 (1873) p.129. L. Ambler, 'The Old Halls and Manor Houses of Yorkshire' (London 1913) p.22, 89. N. Pevsner, 'Yorkshire West Riding' (1979) p.626, A. T. Longbotham, H.A.S. (1934). A. Comfort 'Ancient Halls in and about Halifax' (1912), 4.