Wikimedia Commons
Canons Garth is a late 14th-century Grade II* listedStructure of particular architectural and/or historic interest deserving of special protection. house in Helmsley, North Yorkshire. The original timber-framed building has been extensively added to and restored, particularly during the 17th and late 19th centuries.[1]
The house may once have belonged to Kirkham Priory;[2][a]Kirkham Priory was founded between 1133 and 1139.[3] its first occupants are known to be vicars appointed by the priory. The history of the building after the dissolution of the priory in 1539 is uncertain. It may have served as a vicarage until the 1770s, but in 1605 the vicar is recorded as living in a half-timbered house known as Rectory House, now part of the Black Swan hotel.[3]
By 1889 Canons Garth had fallen into serious disrepair, and the Earl of Feversham donated the house to Vicar Gray – who lived at Rectory House – as a trustee on behalf of the parish. The architect Temple Moore was commissioned to oversee the refurbishment of the house and the addition of a kitchen extension on the east side. Writing in the August 1893 edition of the parish magazine, Gray celebrated the work that had been done in transforming a structure fit only for rats to a “fine, large range of building … ready for work”.[3]
By the early 20th century Canons Garth was a retreat for the sisters of the community of All Saints.[2] In 1970 it became the vicarage for the nearby All Saints’ Church, but was put up for sale in 2010.[4] The house was sold in 2011 for £600,000, and is now a private dwelling.[5]
Architecture
The ground floor of the house is in sandstone rubble; the upper parts are timber-framed, and the roof is stone-tiled. It has two storeys and attics, and consists of a main range and projecting cross-wings, all gabled. The windows are 19th-century casements throughout, and in the attic are gabled dormers. Inside, the hall has a fireplace with a massive bressumerHorizontal load-bearing timber beam., and the passage has what may be a built-in salt box. The chapel has medieval floor tiles brought from Rievaulx Abbey, and the study has a 16th-century fireplace brought from Helmsley Castle.[1]