Chapter 3: The House that Fagg built

Preparing the site
The well and the front terrace
The house: main structure
The roof
Original disposition of rooms
Overall cost

The well and the front terrace

Equally significant, a well was constructed, which was evidently deliberately placed so that it is half inside and half outside the rear of the house, the wall of which spans it with a gauged brick arch. The well is currently forty foot (12 metres) deep, but it may have been deeper: when it was restored in 2004, paint tins and other debris that had been thrown down it were removed prior to reaching a compacted layer of silt which it would have been very laborious to dig through and remove; this was therefore left in place. The well was predominantly made by digging a circular shaft down through the sandstone with an adze. Then, at the top, the construction comprises a circle of about two foot of brickwork without mortar, a technique evidently known as ‘steening’ or ‘steining’ (this allows for slight movement, whereas mortar would have cracked).


16

The well


Again, Elsam offers figures for the construction of such a well, making allowance for the cost of digging (and for steining) for the first 10 foot (3s 3d per foot) and then for each subsequent 20 foot in depth (1s 3d per foot).19


Lastly, at the front of the house was a terrace, approximately twelve foot wide (3.6 metres), standing about nine foot (2.75 metres) above the newly marked-out road that was to become Exmouth Place, from which ascent was made by steps. The terrace was presumably - then as now - paved with York stone slabs, and was surrounded by the railings with pineapple finials which still survive.


11

Front terrace looking south west


19 Ibid, pp. 122-3.