76-583: Hewell Grange is a former country house in Tardebigge , Worcestershire , England . "One of the most important late 19th century country houses in England", the mansion was built between 1884 and 1891 by George Frederick Bodley and Thomas Garner for Robert Windsor-Clive , later first Earl of Plymouth . Constructed in the Jacobethan style, it was "perhaps the last Victorian prodigy house". After
152-463: A Grade I listed building . Its Historic England listing describes it as "an outstanding example of a late-Victorian country house, [with] an interior of remarkable quality, [that] survives substantially intact". Its park and gardens are listed Grade II*. The lake is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). The park contains a large number of listed buildings: three lodges , the North and South at
228-455: A château or a Schloss can be a fortified or unfortified building, a country house, similar to an Ansitz , is usually unfortified. If fortified, it is called a castle, but not all buildings with the name "castle" are fortified (for example Highclere Castle in Hampshire ). The term stately home is subject to debate, and avoided by historians and other academics. As a description of
304-463: A Category D open prison for adults. The prison was closed in 2020, after a number of incidents of violence, and a report by Her Majesty's Inspector of Prisons which condemned the facility as "squalid, demeaning and depressing". Following closure, the grange was sold to Midlands-based hoteliers in March 2023. Hewell Grange and its gardens have previously, although rarely, been open to the public through
380-722: A country house at Tardebigge which was built around 1711–1712. It has been attributed to Francis Smith of Warwick or his brother William and was redesigned by Thomas Cundy in 1815–1816. The surrounding estate was landscaped, firstly on the advice of William Shenstone , then by Capability Brown and lastly by Humphry Repton . The 19th century saw the Windsors prosper, partly through marriage, and partly through industrial development. Robert Windsor-Clive , on his coming of age in 1878, inherited 30,500 acres in Worcestershire, Shropshire and South Wales, including three major houses,
456-700: A country house, the term was first used in a poem by Felicia Hemans , "The Homes of England", originally published in Blackwood's Magazine in 1827. In the 20th century, the term was later popularised in a song by Noël Coward , and in modern usage it often implies a country house that is open to visitors at least some of the time. In England, the terms "country house" and "stately home" are sometimes used vaguely and interchangeably; however, many country houses such as Ascott in Buckinghamshire were deliberately designed not to be stately, and to harmonise with
532-428: A fortunate few; it was the centre of its own world, providing employment to hundreds of people in the vicinity of its estate . In previous eras, when state benefits were unheard of, those working on an estate were among the most fortunate, receiving secured employment and rent-free accommodation. At the summit of this category of people was the indoor staff of the country house. Unlike many of their contemporaries prior to
608-538: A highly critical report by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Prisons . The Windsor-Clive family descended from Walter FitzOther , Constable of Windsor Castle during the reign of William the Conqueror . They came to Tardebigge in the 16th century and over the next two centuries expanded their land holdings in Worcestershire, Shropshire and South Wales. The development of the South Wales Coalfield in
684-603: A letter written in 1741 Shenstone became the first person to record the use of " floccinaucinihilipilification ". In the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary this was recognised as the longest word in the English language. The word shrubbery is first recorded by the OED in a letter of Lady Luxborough in 1748 to Shenstone: "Nature has been so remarkably kind this last Autumn to adorn my Shrubbery with
760-472: A lifelong friendship with Richard Jago . He went up to Pembroke College, Oxford in 1732 and made another firm friend there in Richard Graves , the author of The Spiritual Quixote . Shenstone took no degree, but, while still at Oxford, he published Poems on various occasions, written for the entertainment of the author (1737). This edition was intended for private circulation only but, containing
836-452: A long friendship with Edward Burne-Jones , who painted her portrait, a "masterpiece of symbolist art" which hung on the stairway at Hewell. The Windsor-Clives were members of The Souls , a grouping of intellectual aristocrats, with Gay Windsor-Clive conducting a long, and acknowledged, affair with George Wyndham , the group's most prominent member. The Souls held relaxed attitudes to extra-marital liaisons. The novelist Elinor Glyn , herself
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#1732790270999912-404: A long-term lover of another Soul, George Curzon , recorded her impressions of their country house weekends; "the good-looking unattached men had a wonderful time...while many husbands were the lovers of their friends' wives". Windsor-Clive's first encounter with the firm of Bodley & Garner is recorded in his wife's memoir of her husband, privately published in 1932: "Although I first discussed
988-529: A mixture of high architecture , often as interpreted by a local architect or surveyor, and determined by practicality as much as by the whims of architectural taste. An example of this is Brympton d'Evercy in Somerset, a house of many periods that is unified architecturally by the continuing use of the same mellow, local Ham Hill stone . The fashionable William Kent redesigned Rousham House only to have it quickly and drastically altered to provide space for
1064-477: A sequence of Moral Poems , its intention having been satirical , as evidenced by the ludicrous index appended to its original publication. In 1741 he published The Judgment of Hercules . He inherited the Leasowes estate, and retired there in 1745 to undertake what proved the chief work of his life, the beautifying of his property. He embarked on elaborate schemes of landscape gardening which gave The Leasowes
1140-429: A wide celebrity (see ferme ornée ), but sadly impoverished the owner. Shenstone was not a contented recluse. He desired constant admiration of his gardens, and he never ceased to lament his lack of fame as a poet. In 1759, Shenstone made the acquaintance of James Woodhouse , a shoe-maker from nearby Rowley Regis who had started writing poetry. Shenstone encouraged Woodhouse's literary efforts, allowing him access to
1216-496: Is Italianate Quattrocento in style. Bodley had originally planned Jacobean-style decoration, but was over-ruled by Windsor-Clive who insisted on Elizabethan and Renaissance designs. The house is dominated by the massive Great Hall, comprising half the total space of the house. The elaborate decoration is largely "well-preserved". Entrance to the house is through a vestibule into the Great Hall. This enormous room runs along
1292-752: Is graded II* on the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens . The lake is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). The ruins of an earlier hall stand near to the lake. The Tardebigge estate was originally a grange for Bordesley Abbey and came to the Windsor family in 1542 at the Dissolution of the Monasteries . The Windsors came originally from the south, holding the ancient barony of Windsor. They claimed descent from Walter FitzOther , first Constable of Windsor Castle during
1368-473: Is politics; they talk politics; and they make politics, quite spontaneously. There are no written terms for distinguishing between vast country palaces and comparatively small country houses; the descriptive terms, which can include castle , manor and court , provide no firm clue and are often only used because of a historical connection with the site of such a building. Therefore, for ease or explanation, Britain's country houses can be categorised according to
1444-493: Is preserved in the British Museum letters to Lady Luxborough (Add. MS. 28958), Dodsley's letters to Shenstone (Add. MS. 28959), and correspondence between Shenstone and Bishop Percy from 1757 to 1763 the last being of especial interest; To Shenstone was due the original suggestion of Percy's Reliques, a service which would alone entitle him to a place among the precursors of the romantic movement in English literature. In
1520-513: Is the ITV series Downton Abbey . William Shenstone William Shenstone (18 November 1714 – 11 February 1763) was an English poet and one of the earliest practitioners of landscape gardening through the development of his estate, The Leasowes . Son of Thomas Shenstone and Anne Penn, daughter of William Penn of Harborough Hall, then in Hagley (now Blakedown ), Shenstone
1596-542: The 2nd Glamorganshire Artillery Volunteers . Windsor-Clive and his wife pursued a wide range of artistic interests. He was a Trustee of the National Gallery , a long-serving chairman of the National Trust and author of what was the standard work on John Constable . Lady Windsor established an Arts and Crafts workshop at Hewell, decorated some of the rooms in partnership with her mother, and enjoyed
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#17327902709991672-563: The Agricultural Depression . The Windsor-Clives lived in their new home for less than 50 years before consolidating their estates in Shropshire in the mid-20th century. Hewell Grange is a Grade I listed building , its structure, interiors and setting having survived remarkably well despite over 70 years of institutional use. The park surrounding the house was landscaped by both Capability Brown and Humphry Repton and
1748-464: The Buildings of England series, describe it as "perhaps the last Victorian prodigy house". The house is of Runcorn Red Sandstone , of three storeys, with a central lantern and towers with pyramidal roofs. The entrance front is recessed, with a two-storey porch and a porte-cochère . The chapel in the porch contains carving by Detmar Blow . The garden front is a long, nine-bay, range. The interior
1824-628: The Heritage Open Days and the National Gardens schemes. As at 2020 no public access is permitted, although access to the lake is possible. Hewell Grange is constructed to an Elizabethan H -plan and built in the Jacobethan style. Montacute House , Somerset is the main influence, with elements of Charlton Park , Wiltshire and Bramshill in Hampshire. Alan Brooks and Nikolaus Pevsner , in their Worcestershire volume of
1900-759: The Second World War , the third earl sold the Hewell estate to the Crown and it was redeveloped as a prison. The mansion was used to house young offenders, and later low-risk prisoners, while adult prisons were built in the grounds. The site was subsequently consolidated as HM Prison Hewell . In 2019, the Ministry of Justice announced the closure of the Category D open prison housed in Hewell Grange, after
1976-399: The agricultural depressions of the 1870s , the estates, of which country houses were the hub, provided their owners with incomes. However, the late 19th and early 20th centuries were the swansong of the traditional English country house lifestyle. Increased taxation and the effects of World War I led to the demolition of hundreds of houses ; those that remained had to adapt to survive. While
2052-512: The 1850s, with the English economy booming, new mansions were built in one of the many revivalist architectural styles popular throughout the 19th century. The builders of these new houses were able to take advantage of the political unrest in Europe that gave rise to a large trade in architectural salvage. This new wave of country house building is exemplified by the Rothschild properties in
2128-404: The 18th and 19th centuries saw their wealth greatly increase, as the coal was transported worldwide from their ports at Barry and Penarth . At his coming of age in 1878 Robert Windsor-Clive inherited some 30,500 acres and an income from ground rents and port royalties which allowed him to undertake the building of Hewell Grange at a time when many landed aristocrats were facing retrenchment due to
2204-419: The 18th century with houses such as Castle Howard , Kedleston Hall and Holkham Hall . Such building reached its zenith from the late 17th century until the mid-18th century; these houses were often completely built or rebuilt in their entirety by one eminent architect in the most fashionable architectural style of the day and often have a suite of Baroque state apartments, typically in enfilade , reserved for
2280-474: The 20th century, they slept in proper beds, wore well-made adequate clothes and received three proper meals a day, plus a small wage. In an era when many still died from malnutrition or lack of medicine, the long working hours were a small price to pay. As a result of the aristocratic habit of only marrying within the aristocracy, and whenever possible to a sole heiress, many owners of country houses owned several country mansions, and would visit each according to
2356-459: The Italianate decoration drew on sketches made by the Windsors on their Italian tours. A grand staircase gives access to the upper bedroom floors, including Lady Windsor's dressing room, decorated by her mother with murals evoking Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony . Many of the other murals and painted ceilings were undertaken by a pair of Bavarian artists, Behr and Virsching. Hewell Grange is
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2432-541: The Shah of Persia, and many members of the British royal family. Ferdinand de Rothschild , the builder of the even grander Waddesdon Manor and another Soul, suggested that Hewell was the only modern English house he really envied. But the house was obsolete almost as it was being built. Lady Windsor, in her memoir of her husband, wrote "had we any idea how quickly the circumstances of life in this country, and indeed throughout
2508-545: The Windsor estates. Heavy death duties forced him to sell Hewell Grange and the ground rents from his land in Barry, Penarth and Grangetown . St Fagans Castle was donated to the National Museum of Wales . The Hewell Grange estate was sold to the state which established a borstal at the house. This operated from 1946 to 1982 and then as a Young Offender Institution until 1991, when it became HM Prison Hewell Grange,
2584-432: The actual case brought under them leads to an improper conception" are called equivocations. He continued: But a perfect specimen of a sustained and magnificent equivocation is Shenstone's incomparable epitaph on a justice of the peace, which in its high-sounding lapidary style appears to speak of noble and sublime things, whereas under each of their concepts something quite different is to be subsumed, which appears only in
2660-467: The best-known examples of the showy prodigy house , often built with the intention of attracting the monarch to visit. By the reign of Charles I , Inigo Jones and his form of Palladianism had changed the face of English domestic architecture completely, with the use of turrets and towers as an architectural reference to the earlier castles and fortified houses completely disappearing. The Palladian style, in various forms, interrupted briefly by baroque ,
2736-524: The circumstances of their creation. The great houses are the largest of the country houses; in truth palaces, built by the country's most powerful – these were designed to display their owners' power or ambitions to power. Really large unfortified or barely fortified houses began to take over from the traditional castles of the crown and magnates during the Tudor period, with vast houses such as Hampton Court Palace and Burghley House , and continued until
2812-463: The country saw the building of the first of the unfortified great houses. Henry VIII 's Dissolution of the Monasteries saw many former ecclesiastical properties granted to the King's favourites, who then converted them into private country houses. Woburn Abbey , Forde Abbey and many other mansions with abbey or priory in their name became private houses during this period. Other terms used in
2888-428: The design of the wing around the next corner. These varying "improvements", often criticised at the time, today are the qualities that make English country houses unique. Wealthy and influential people, often bored with their formal duties, go to the country in order to get out of London, the ugliest and most uncomfortable city in the world; they invented the long week-end to stay away as long as possible. Their métier
2964-427: The early 1970s, hundreds of country houses were demolished . Houses that survived destruction are now mostly Grade I or II listed as buildings of historic interest with restrictions on restoration and re-creation work. However such work is usually very expensive. Several houses have been restored, some over many years. For example at Copped Hall where the restoration started in 1995 continues to this day. Although
3040-402: The ecclesiastical firm Bodley & Garner to prepare estimates. These proved to be so high that he instead resolved on building a new house, on a site selected by the landscape architect Edward Milner . The old house was partially demolished, but its ruins remain as an eyecatcher by the lake. Robert Windsor-Clive married Alberta Victoria Sarah Caroline Paget, always known as Gay, in 1883. Gay
3116-435: The first draft of The Schoolmistress , it attracted some wider attention. Shenstone tried hard to suppress it but in 1742 he published anonymously a revised draft of The Schoolmistress, a Poem in imitation of Spenser . The inspiration of the poem was Sarah Lloyd, teacher of the village school where Shenstone received his first education. Isaac D'Israeli contended that Robert Dodsley had been misled in publishing it as one of
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3192-479: The home counties and Bletchley Park (rebuilt in several styles, and famous for its code-breaking role in World War II). The slow decline of the English country house coincided with the rise not just of taxation, but also of modern industry, along with the agricultural depression of the 1870s. By 1880, this had led some owners into financial shortfalls as they tried to balance maintenance of their estates with
3268-435: The household. These houses were always an alternative residence to a London house. During the 18th and 19th centuries, for the highest echelons of English society, the country house served as a place for relaxing, hunting and running the country with one's equals at the end of the week, with some houses having their own theatre where performances were staged. The country house, however, was not just an oasis of pleasure for
3344-556: The immediately preceding war then in World War I, were now paying far higher rates of tax, and agricultural incomes had dropped. Thus, the solution for many was to hold contents auctions and then demolish the house and sell its stone, fireplaces , and panelling . This is what happened to many of Britain's finest houses. Despite this slow decline, so necessary was the country house for entertaining and prestige that in 1917 Viscount Lee of Fareham donated his country house Chequers to
3420-438: The income they provided. Some relied on funds from secondary sources such as banking and trade while others, like the severely impoverished Duke of Marlborough , sought to marry American heiresses to save their country houses and lifestyles. The ultimate demise began immediately following World War I . The members of the huge staff required to maintain large houses had either left to fight and never returned, departed to work in
3496-491: The landscape, while some of the great houses such as Kedleston Hall and Holkham Hall were built as "power houses" to dominate the landscape, and were most certainly intended to be "stately" and impressive. In his book Historic Houses: Conversations in Stately Homes , the author and journalist Robert Harling documents nineteen "stately homes"; these range in size from the vast Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard to
3572-698: The last word of all as the unexpected key to the whole, and the reader discovers with loud laughter that he has read merely a very obscene equivocation. Shenstone's works were first published by his friend Robert Dodsley (3 vols., 1764–1769). The second volume contains Dodsley's description of the Leasowes. The last, consisting of correspondence with Graves, Jago and others, appeared after Dodsley's death. Other letters of Shenstone's are included in Select Letters (ed. Thomas Hill 1778). The letters of Lady Luxborough (née Henrietta St John ) to Shenstone were printed by T. Dodsley in 1775; much additional correspondence
3648-544: The latter two are ducal palaces, Montacute, although built by a Master of the Rolls to Queen Elizabeth I, was occupied for the next 400 years by his descendants, who were gentry without a London townhouse , rather than aristocracy. They finally ran out of funds in the early 20th century. However, the vast majority of English country houses, often owned at different times by gentlemen and peers , are an evolution of one or more styles with facades and wings in different styles in
3724-487: The library at the Leasowes and including one of Woodhouse's works in a collection of poems published in 1762. Shenstone died unmarried on 11 February 1763. Shenstone's poems of nature were written in praise of its most artificial aspects, but the emotions they express were obviously genuine. His Schoolmistress was admired by Oliver Goldsmith , with whom Shenstone had much in common, and his Elegies written at various times and to some extent biographical in character won
3800-655: The minuscule Ebberston Hall , and in architecture from the Jacobean Renaissance of Hatfield House to the eccentricities of Sezincote . The book's collection of stately homes also includes George IV's Brighton town palace, the Royal Pavilion . The country houses of England have evolved over the last five hundred years. Before this time, larger houses were usually fortified, reflecting the position of their owners as feudal lords , de facto overlords of their manors . The Tudor period of stability in
3876-416: The most eminent guests, the entertainment of whom was of paramount importance in establishing and maintaining the power of the owner. The common denominator of this category of English country houses is that they were designed to be lived in with a certain degree of ceremony and pomp. It was not unusual for the family to have a small suite of rooms for withdrawing in privacy away from the multitude that lived in
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#17327902709993952-399: The munitions factories, or filled the void left by the fighting men in other workplaces. Of those who returned after the war, many left the countryside for better-paid jobs in towns. The final blow for many country houses came following World War II ; having been requisitioned during the war, they were returned to the owners in poor repair. Many estate owners, having lost their heirs, if not in
4028-468: The names of houses to describe their origin or importance include palace , castle , court , hall , mansion , park , house , manor , and place . It was during the second half of the reign of Elizabeth I , and under her successor, James I , that the first architect-designed mansions, thought of today as epitomising the English country house, began to make their appearance. Burghley House , Longleat House , and Hatfield House are among
4104-402: The nation for the use of a prime minister who might not possess one of his or her own. Chequers still fulfills that need today as do both Chevening House and Dorneywood , donated for sole use of high-ranking ministers of the Crown. Today, many country houses have become hotels, schools, hospitals and museums, while others have survived as conserved ruins, but from the early 20th century until
4180-633: The north-west gate, and the Paper Mill Lodge to the south; a range of estate buildings including the water tower , home farm , game larder , ice house and walled garden ; three bridges on the lake, one to the north, one to the south and a footbridge giving access to an island; a real tennis court, with two adjacent bridges; and various ornamental features, including a temple, gates to the French Garden and five statues. Nikolaus Pevsner 's original Worcestershire guide from 1968 records
4256-472: The old Hewel Grange, St Fagans Castle on his Glamorgan estates, and Oakly Park on his Shropshire lands. The Welsh property was much the most valuable, the opening of the Penarth and Barry Docks for the transportation of coal brought the family immense royalties. Shortly after his marriage Windsor-Clive determined on reconstructing the old grange and engaged George Frederick Bodley and Thomas Garner , of
4332-468: The owner of a "power house" or a small manor, the inhabitants of the English country house have become collectively referred to as the ruling class, because this is exactly what they did in varying degrees, whether by having high political influence and power in national government, or in the day-to-day running of their own localities or "county" in such offices as lord/deputy lieutenant , magistrates , or occasionally even clergy. The Country house mystery
4408-529: The owner's twelve children. Canons Ashby , home to poet John Dryden 's family, is another example of architectural evolution: a medieval farmhouse enlarged in the Tudor era around a courtyard, given grandiose plaster ceilings in the Stuart period , and then having Georgian façades added in the 18th century. The whole is a glorious mismatch of styles and fashions that seamlessly blend together. These could be called
4484-512: The ownership or management of some houses has been transferred to a private trust , most notably at Chatsworth , other houses have transferred art works and furnishings under the Acceptance in Lieu scheme to ownership by various national or local museums, but retained for display in the building. This enables the former owners to offset tax, the payment of which would otherwise have necessitated
4560-471: The plans with Mr Bodley in the very small dog kennel of the Athenaeum Club , it was Mr Garner who came to see us to discuss the details and the designs from the very beginning were [his]". The resulting house has been described as "one of the most important late 19th century country houses in England", and is Bodley and Garner's most significant country house. The house was hugely expensive and building
4636-826: The praise of Robert Burns who, in the preface to Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect (1786), called him ... that celebrated poet whose divine elegies do honour to our language, our nation and our species . The best example of purely technical skill in his works is perhaps his success in the management of the anapaestic trimeter in his Pastoral Ballad in Four Parts (written in 1743), but first printed in Dodsley's Collection of Poems (vol. iv., 1755). Arthur Schopenhauer mentioned Shenstone in his discussion of equivocation. "[C]oncepts", Schopenhauer asserted, "which in and by themselves contain nothing improper, yet
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#17327902709994712-541: The presence in the garden of an Italian wellhead brought back by the Windsors from the Palazzo Marcello in Venice but it is no longer in situ. Country house An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house . This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these people,
4788-462: The private sale of the art works. For example, tapestries and furniture at Houghton Hall are now owned by the Victoria and Albert Museum . In addition, increasing numbers of country houses hold licences for weddings and civil ceremonies . Another source of income is to use the house as a venue for parties, a film location or a corporate entertainment venue. While many country houses are open to
4864-472: The public and derive income through that means, they remain homes, in some cases inhabited by the descendants of their original owners. The lifestyles of those living and working in a country house in the early 20th century were recreated in a BBC television programme, The Edwardian Country House , filmed at Manderston House in Scotland. Another television programme which features life in country houses
4940-539: The reign of William the Conqueror . The Victoria County History records that Andrew, Lord Windsor , was obliged by Henry VIII to exchange his historic manor at Stanwell , near Windsor, for the Bordesley Abbey estate, and did so “much against his will”. By the 17th century, Thomas Hickman-Windsor had been elevated to the Earldom of Plymouth . His grandson, Other Windsor, 2nd Earl of Plymouth , commissioned
5016-464: The season: Grouse shooting in Scotland , pheasant shooting and fox hunting in England. The Earl of Rosebery , for instance, had Dalmeny House in Scotland, Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire, and another house near Epsom just for the racing season. For many, this way of life, which began a steady decline in 1914, continued well into the 20th century, and for a few continues to this day. In
5092-444: The second category of Britain's country houses are those that belonged to the squirearchy or landed gentry . These tend either to have evolved from medieval hall houses, with rooms added as required, or were purpose-built by relatively unknown local architects. Smaller, and far greater in number than the "power houses", these were still the epicentre of their own estate, but were often the only residence of their owner. However, whether
5168-572: The term distinguished between town and country. However, the term also encompasses houses that were, and often still are, the full-time residence for the landed gentry who dominated rural Britain until the Reform Act 1832 . Frequently, the formal business of the counties was transacted in these country houses, having functional antecedents in manor houses . With large numbers of indoor and outdoor staff, country houses were important as places of employment for many rural communities. In turn, until
5244-493: The true English country house. Wilton House , one of England's grandest houses, is in a remarkably similar vein; although, while the Drydens, mere squires, at Canons Ashby employed a local architect, at Wilton the mighty Earls of Pembroke employed the finest architects of the day: first Holbein , 150 years later Inigo Jones, and then Wyatt followed by Chambers. Each employed a different style of architecture, seemingly unaware of
5320-483: The whole of the entrance front and is two-storeys high. Colonnades of marble and alabaster terminate each end. Brooks and Pevsner conclude that "other rooms are insignificant compared to the overwhelming display of the hall". The billiard room, dining room and Lord Windsor's study all lie off the hall. Lady Windsor's sitting room is decorated with a painted ceiling copied from the Ducal Palace, Mantua and much of
5396-513: The world, would change, I do not think that we should have dreamt of building a house of that size". Charles Robert Ashbee , an architect and family friend, visiting in 1913 described it as "a noble example of something now I suppose extinct". The estate remained a seat of the Windsor-Clive family (who were made Earls of Plymouth ) until just after World War II . The death of the 2nd Earl, Ivor Windsor-Clive in 1943, saw his son inherit
5472-520: Was a popular genre of English detective fiction in the 1920s and 1930s; set in the residence of the gentry and often involving a murder in a country house temporarily isolated by a snowstorm or similar with the suspects all at a weekend house party. Following the Industrial Revolution of the 18th century, a third category of country houses was built as newly rich industrialists and bankers were eager to display their wealth and taste. By
5548-477: Was born at the Leasowes, Halesowen on 18 November 1714. At that time this was an exclave of Shropshire within the county of Worcestershire and now in the West Midlands . Shenstone received part of his formal education at Halesowen Grammar School (now The Earls High School ). In 1741, Shenstone became bailiff to the feoffees of Halesowen Grammar School. While attending Solihull School , he began
5624-517: Was the daughter of Augustus Paget , a diplomat, and his German-born wife, Walburga , diarist, artist and intimate friend of Queen Victoria . Windsor-Clive held a number of, relatively minor, political offices, serving as Paymaster General under Lord Salisbury from 1890 to 1892, and First Commissioner of Works under Arthur Balfour from 1902 to 1905. He also had an array of local positions, related to his estates, including Mayor of Cardiff , Lord Lieutenant of Glamorganshire and Honorary Colonel of
5700-422: Was to predominate until the second half of the 18th century when, influenced by ancient Greek styles, it gradually evolved into the neoclassicism championed by such architects as Robert Adam . Some of the best known of England's country houses were the work of only one architect/designer, built in a relatively short, particular time: Montacute House , Chatsworth House , and Blenheim Palace are examples. While
5776-489: Was undertaken at a leisurely pace. The foundations were laid in 1884, and the Windsor-Clives moved in during 1891, when the house was still incomplete. The building was technologically advanced; one of the first in the country to be lit by electricity and with hydraulic lifts powered from the water tower in the park. The Windsor-Clives entertained at Hewell on an appropriate scale, with guests including Lord Salisbury,
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