Mount Pleasant, Sheffield facts for kids
Mount Pleasant is a grand old house built in the 1700s. You can find it on Sharrow Lane in the Highfield area of Sheffield, England. It's about two kilometers south of the city center. This house is very special, so it's listed as a Grade II* building. People even say it's "one of the best 18th-century houses in Sheffield"! The old stables and coach house next to it are also listed buildings.
A Look Back in Time
Mount Pleasant was built in 1777 by a man named Francis Hurt Sitwell. His family, the Sitwells, were important landowners from Derbyshire who owned a big ironworks. John Platt, a famous architect from Rotherham, designed the house. He also worked on other grand buildings like Clifton Hall and Wentworth Castle.
When Mount Pleasant was first built, it was in the countryside. It had farms all around it and overlooked the valley of the River Sheaf. But the Sitwells didn't own it for long. In 1794, they sold it to Samuel Broomhead Ward. He later became the Master Cutler in 1798, which was a very important job in Sheffield's metal industry.
Later, in the 1850s, a merchant family named Tillotson lived there. After that, the building was used for many different things. In 1868, it was used by a hospital from Wakefield to help with too many patients. About 75 people stayed there with eight staff members. In 1872, everyone moved to a new hospital called South Yorkshire Asylum.
In 1874, Mount Pleasant became the Girls’ Charity School. This school moved from its old spot near Sheffield Cathedral. In 1927, the school changed its name to the Mount Pleasant School for Girls.
During World War II, the government used Mount Pleasant. After the war, different government departments continued to use it as office space. Mount Pleasant was officially recognized as a special building in May 1952. By 1961, only a couple of government offices were left there.
After the government left, the building started to fall apart in the late 1960s and early 1970s. But luckily, it was fixed up in the mid-1970s! It was then turned into a Community centre, and the old stables became a Youth club called The Stables Connexions Centre.
How It Was Built
Mount Pleasant is made of brick with special stone decorations. It has a sloping slate roof. The house has three stories, and on its south side, there's a big, full-height bay window that sticks out. Most of the windows are the kind that slide up and down, called sash windows.
The most fancy side of the house is the shorter east side. The middle three sections of this side stick out and have a triangular top part called a pediment. On the first floor, there's a special window called a Palladian window. It's set in an arch with a small railing, or balustrade, below it. The main doorway is also very decorative, with fancy Corinthian columns and another pediment.
The old stables and coach house are built in a similar way to the main house. They are also made of red brick with stone decorations and have sash windows.
Images for kids
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The more decorative eastern side of the house.
