The house is built in
sandstone rubble with
slate roofs in
Elizabethan style. Its plan is an L-shape, with south and east ranges partly enclosing a
courtyard. The south range forms the main block while the east range is the service wing which incorporates a four-storey
castellated tower. To the east of the main house subsidiary buildings form a second courtyard. The south range has two storeys plus attics and is entered by a porch on its north side. The façade of the north (entrance) front is irregular, and consists of five
bays, three of which project forward and are surmounted by
gables of different sizes with ball
finials. The front also includes
mullioned and
transomed windows, a
dormer, and a pair of round-headed arches in ground floor of the right bay. The outer doorway of the porch has a
Tudor arch with the
Molyneux arms carved above; it is flanked by small single-storey
turrets. The south (garden) front also has five bays, three of which project forward and two of these are
canted. The front again contains mullioned and transomed windows and each bay has a gable with a ball finial. Tall brick chimneys rise from the roofs. Internally, the entrance hall has two fireplaces with
panelled overmantels; one of the panels carries a carving of the Molyneux arms. At the back of the room is a timber
arcade and the staircase has barley-sugar
balusters. Douglas' biographer,
Hubbard, describes Abbeystead as the finest of Douglas'
Elizabethan houses and one of the finest and largest he ever designed. Hubbard also suggested that Douglas' plan of a house with irregular gables and a tower grouped round a courtyard may have been inspired by nearby Lancashire
medieval houses with
pele towers, such as
Borwick Hall. However, as Hartwell and
Pevsner point out, Douglas also designed towers for his houses in
Cheshire and
Wales, so it may rather have been "rooted in his own style". ==Associated buildings==