Listed building or place reference: CL0085

Historic site reference
Property: Samares Manor
Road name: La Grande Route de St. Clement
Parish: St. Clement
Location: View on map
Grade: Listed Building Grade 1
Category: Residential (rural house)
Statement of significance: An outstanding manor house with associated outbuildings set within landscaped gardens. The site is of medieval origins and includes a rare 11th / 12th century undercroft of international significance and an early colombier. The house was enlarged and remodelled in the 18th and 19th centuries and includes an impressive 1924-34 interior. The site includes a 19th century farm complex. The manor house garden is of the highest significance, laid out in phases since at least the C17. Features from the most important phases that survive relate to the walled gardens (possibly of C17 origin) and to the 1920s-30s work of Sir James Knott and Edward White. The garden has an outstanding collection of plants including camellias. The 1920/30s entrance lodge is of modest interest and does not form part of the listing.
Context: n/a
External Description: The manor house has always been on its present site and incorporates work of many different dates. The oldest surviving part of the house is the early medieval undercroft (often interpreted as the crypt of the former manorial chapel of St Martha although it is possible that this was the undercroft of a large chamber block at right angles to the hall). The stone-vaulted undercroft forms the lower floor of the west wing of the house. It is of 3 bays by 2 and unusually aligned north-south. The groin vaulting is carried on rough corbels and, in the centre, on two sturdy columns, one octagonal (possibly a re-used shaft from a roadside cross) and the other round. The latter has a Romanesque capital, indicating an original 11th or 12th century date for the chamber. A small rectangular window set in an immensely deep splayed reveal may also be an original feature. The other Tudor arched and moulded windows to the undercroft appear to be 19th century insertions. The main house is of uniform appearance but is the result of various phases of construction. It is 2-storey with half H-plan and a 5-bay front elevation flanked by shallow projecting 3-bay gabled wings. The external walls are rendered. There are Tudor arched window openings on the ground floor of the west wing, casement windows with octagonal glazing pattern to the central range, and painted softwood sash windows to the east wing and entire first floor. A pair of granite Tuscan columns supports the first floor above a niche in the west wing, with 2 matching rendered pilasters on the sides of the niche. There is a parapet wall around 3 sides of the building and a slate roof. The west wing and central section are built of granite and the works probably date after the sale of the fief and manor by Debora Dumaresq in 1734 - the treatment of the south front of the wing being akin with that of several buildings of that period in St Helier and St Aubin. By contrast, the east wing is of brick and may have been added at the same time as the house was given its present uniform appearance in the early 1800s, with symmetrically-arranged windows and a coat of render. There is a large single storey 19th century farm complex to the east of the house surrounding 4 sides of a square courtyard. Dominant is the cottage along the north side: 2 storeys, 5 bays, with painted softwood sash windows. All buildings are in granite with brick window surrounds and slate roofs. The farm buildings may be contemporary with the east wing of the house, though restored and updated in the 1920s. They replaced a cluster of outbuildings near the colombier which are shown on the Duke of Richmond's map of 1795. The round colombier is believed to be the oldest on Jersey and may date to as early as the 12th century. A heraldic stone of c.1500 bearing the arms of Payn and Dumaresq is built into the wall near the entrance to the farm court. The main approach to the house is to the south-west. The main gateway is set back with rusticated granite piers between curved rendered wing walls. The boundary wall is of granite rubble punctuated by occasional gateways. Behind this wall is a belt of mature trees and shrubs including many pines. The drive curves north-east through lawns planted with shrubs and specimen trees to a turning circle in the forecourt on the entrance front of the manor house. A second drive approaches from the north between a straight oak avenue. The garden is divided into a number of areas including the informal entrance lawns on the south and west fronts, a granite-walled kitchen garden to the north of the house, a walled ornamental garden to the north-west (the Herb Garden) and beyond this to the west a rock and water garden (the Shade and Water Garden), the Long Garden and the Japanese garden. The informal lawn to the west of the house has a rectangular pool with a central fountain aligned on the centre of the loggia on the west front. The garden is laid out in a geometric pattern of gravel and paved paths between beds. A large cast iron ornamental arch straddles the main north-south axial path on which are various stone ornaments. The path is aligned on the distant colombier to the south. The Shade and Water Garden is a large, naturalistic rock and water garden dominated by a very large Oriental Plane on the southern side. The rockwork, pools and bridges are of Cumberland limestone, which also paves the numerous winding paths running through the shrub planting. At the south-east corner a Japanese style 1920s/30s timber summerhouse stands against the Herb Garden wall. The main island has a large Taxodium distichum (Swamp Cypress) planted by Sir James which dominates this long section of the garden. To the west the paths lead up a shallow slope covered in rocks and centred on a cascade and pools up to a small artificial hillock. The site overlooks a gap in the rocks to give a view east down the cascade between many shrubs including large Japanese maples, to the pond below and the swamp cypress. The site of the summerhouse is enclosed by a circle of exotic pine trees. The long, narrow area west of the Japanese House is enclosed by mature trees and shrubs screening the agricultural land and golf course beyond into which this area extends. In this area are various specimen trees and shrubs including, as well as the Swamp Cypress, a grove of willows (Salix Viminalis), also individual Japanese maple, weeping pear, contorted willow (Salix matsudana Tortuosa) and corkscrew hazel. The whole garden has an outstanding collection of garden plants, including one of the most extensive camellia collections on Jersey.
Internal Description: The interior of the house was transformed between 1932-34, when it was owned by the shipping magnate Sir James Knott. The French walnut-panelled dining-room, with its limewood carvings after Grinling Gibbons, the great central oak staircase, and the Siberian pine drawing-room all date from this period.
Special interest: Archaeological,Architectural,Historical

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01/12/2015

Schedule Schedule Listed Building Grade 1

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