Churche's Mansion

Churche's Mansion is a timber-framed, black-and-white Elizabethan mansion house at the eastern end of Hospital Street in Nantwich, Cheshire, England. The Grade I listed building dates from 1577, and is one of the very few to have survived the Great Fire of Nantwich in 1583.

Built for Richard Churche, a wealthy Nantwich merchant, and his wife, it remained in their family until the 20th century. In 1930, it was rescued from being shipped to the USA by Edgar Myott and his wife, who began restoration work. As well as a dwelling, the mansion has been used as a school, restaurant, shop, and granary and hay store.

The building has four gables to the front; the upper storey and the attics all overhang with jetties. The upper storeys feature decorative panels, and the exterior has many gilded carvings. The principal rooms have oak panelling, some of which is Elizabethan in date. The architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner considered Churche's Mansion to be among the best timber-framed Elizabethan buildings in Cheshire, describing it as "an outstanding piece of decorated half-timber architecture."

Churche's Mansion was built for Richard Churche and his wife Margerye by Thomas Clease in 1577. A panel under a window to the right of the main entrance bears the inscription:

Rychard Churche, and Margerye Churche, his wyfe mai iiii

Thomas Clease made this worke, anno dni, M,ccccc,lxxvii,
in the xviiii yere of the reane of our noble queene elesabeth

The only other remaining work signed by craftsman Thomas Clease (also Cleese) is the Queen's Aid House on Nantwich High Street, known for its inscription thanking Elizabeth I for her aid in the town's rebuilding after the Great Fire.

The land in "Hospitull Strete" on which the mansion was built had been granted to John and Nicolas Churchehouse of Grayste (Gresty) in 1474/5 by John Marchomley and his son John, Richard and William Cholmondeley, and John Bromley. By the late 16th century, the Churche family (known variously as Church, Chirche, Kyrke and Churchehouse) was a prominent one in Nantwich. Richard Churche was a wealthy local merchant who, at his death in 1592, owned "one wiche-house of six leads in Wich Malbank", as well as considerable land holdings both locally and in Shropshire and Stafford. His wife, Margerye or Margaret Churche, daughter of Roger Wright, came from another significant Nantwich family; she survived her husband, living until 1599.

...
Wikipedia