Hanworth Park House, Hanworth Park, London

Summary

A former country house, dating from the late C18 or early C19 with mid-C19, late-C19 and C20 additions and alterations.

Description

A former country house, dating from the late C18 or early C19 with mid-C19, late-C19 and C20 additions and alterations. Built for the fifth Duke of St Albans, or Henry Perkins.

MATERIALS: red brick and London stock brick, tuck pointed on the show front, with stone dressings and cast iron embellishments and a slate roof.

PLAN: the oldest part of the present house dates from the late C18 or early C19 and is L-shaped, formed of a principal range containing the entrance hall and reception rooms which faces south-east, and a service wing which extends to the north-west from the northern end of the principal range. To this a single-storey ballroom wing was added, also extending north-west from the southern end of the principal wing. This terminates in a free-standing belvedere tower. The whole arrangement forms a three-sided courtyard, which appears to have been designed as a service court with a screen across its north-western side. A first floor, containing bedrooms, was added above the ballroom later in the C19. The building has a tall, semi-basement and two upper floors.

EXTERIOR: the principal front faces south-east and has eleven bays symmetrically arranged. The basement storey has a series of arched openings with segmental heads, lighting a sunken area. These arches support a cast-iron veranda which extends for the whole length of the front across both upper floors and has paired columns, moulded balusters to the ground floor and trellis panels to the first floor. The front projects slightly for the lateral pairs of bays and the central three bays. The centre also has a colonnade of four Greek Doric ashlar columns at ground-floor level, with an entablature, approached by a flight of stone steps which run the width of the colonnade. There is a pedimental gable above the central three bays, with decorative bargeboards and a circular window. Cast iron lampstands flank the staircase. The roof above the veranda has a concave curve. The lateral pairs of openings on both floors of the veranda were glazed and boarded at some stage, and parts of this treatment are still present.

The south-western flank has three bays of red brick laid in Flemish bond at far right, which form the end of the principal range, with deep basement windows extending almost to ground level. The central basement window is blind and so are the lateral bays to the upper two floors. The ground floor has a prominent, square, oriel window, supported on pillars and four elaborate cast iron brackets. It continues the pattern of balustrade seen on the verandas of the south-eastern front and has three arched openings above with delicate tracery to the spandrels between. Above is a concave, dished roof. The mid-C19 ballroom wing to left of this is slightly recessed and has a semi-basement as before with verandas before the basement and ground floors. A single bay at right links to the earlier house and has a doorway at ground floor level with half-glazed doors in a moulded surround with bracketed head and guilloche moulding, above which is a plain sash. To left again are three bays, of which the central one has a canted bay window, flanked by French windows. At first-floor level are four pairs of arched lights, with detached columns forming the central mullions. Chimney stacks have panelled sides and moulded tops. The detached belvedere tower to left of this has a single bay to each of its four stages with a projecting aedicular surround, supported on brackets to the first floor, above which is a clock face. The former conservatory wing projected to the south-west, just in front of the tower. Its brick basement storey still stands and now supports a C20 extension to the nursing home, with a flat roof.

The north-eastern front is to the service wing. It has five bays at left which are largely masked by the late-C19, two-storey polygonal addition, apparently built as an estate office. This is joined to the house by a corridor range which has a fire escape against its north-western side. Slightly recessed and at right of this are a further four, widely-spaced bays. The last of these is a quadrant bow which terminates the wing.

The open courtyard on the north-western side of the house has random fenestration and additions to the rear of the principal range and the ground floor and basement of the ballroom wing were masked by protective sheeting at the time of survey (March 2019), indicating demolition of additions associated with the use of the building as a care home. The service wing has six bays, of which the basement windows have been enlarged and now hold metal-framed C20 casements. The ground- and first-floor windows at the left end have been blocked, with the exception of a ground-floor window which was adapted to form a doorway. The belvedere tower has an arched door to its base and projecting first-floor window surround, as before. Brick piers to either side show where a screen completed the enclosure.

INTERIOR: water ingress, vandalism and dilapidation have caused the collapse of some ceilings and floors and this is particularly true of the rooms at the eastern end of the principal range, where the floors and ceilings from the top of the house to the basement have all fallen. The spinal corridors to the rear of each floor remain, however. The central entrance hall has a floor of C19 encaustic tiles and a cornice which may be of C19 date. To the rear is an open-well staircase with stone treads and a mahogany hand rail which ends with a wreathed curtail. The south-western side wall of the entrance hall opens through two, later-C19 round arches to a former reception room which was remodelled in the C19 to form an extension of the entrance hall. It has three further round arches to its rear wall opening onto the spinal corridor which runs along this wing. The ceiling has collapsed. The reception room in the southern corner has lost the plaster on its walls and ceiling, but with some moulded cornice retained. The ballroom retains its rich ceiling decoration with Rococo decoration and deep cornice. This was propped at the time of survey (March 2019). The principal staircase ascends through the house to an octagonal lantern above the first floor. The staircase in the service wing has an open string, stick balusters and a column newel. Fire surrounds, where retained, are plain, often with replaced grates.

The basement storey has been altered to cope with changing usage. It appears that the floor level in rooms along the principal front has been raised and the original paviours can be seen below the low brick walls supporting the raised level. The central cellar below the entrance hall has a groin vault of brick which leads to a further cellar below the flight of steps which approach the entrance.

History

The original house connected to the park and the lordship of the manor of Hanworth was situated to the south of the present building on a moated site. It was used as a hunting lodge by Henry VIII and then gifted to Anne Boleyn in 1532. It reverted to the Crown at her death and was given in 1544 to Catherine Parr, who lived there with her second husband, Sir Thomas Seymour. Elizabeth I gifted the house to Anne, Duchess of Somerset in 1588. The Crown ceased to own the property in the C17 and the manor passed to Lord Cottington, sometime Chancellor of the Exchequer to Charles I in 1627. Confiscated under the Protectorate, the house was recovered by a cousin of Cottington who then sold it to Sir Thomas Chambers. In the early C18 the manor passed by marriage to the Dukes of St Albans. In 1798 the house was almost completely destroyed by fire, although the church and stable block remained, together with lengths of walling.

A new house was erected at some distance from the former site. This was either built by Aubrey Beauclerk, fifth Duke of St Albans in the early years of the C19, or else by Henry Perkins, the brewer and bibliophile, who bought the estate and house in 1828. Although records are scarce the sales particulars of 1827 refer to ‘a beautiful Villa called Hanworth park’, whilst a lease of 1832 (when Perkins rented out the house) describes a ‘newly erected splendid mansion’. The difference between a ‘villa’ and a ‘mansion’ would imply that one building was of middling size and the other was considerably larger and it is certainly possible that the Dukes of St Albans erected a small replacement villa close to the stable block and church and that Perkins then built on a new site. The patronage of Perkins for the newly built house is favoured by Cherry and Pevsner (see London 3, North West p. 422).

This house consisted of an L-shaped arrangement with a principal range, which included the entrance and reception rooms running south-west to north-east and with a show front facing south-east. It is not clear if the veranda and balcony with cast iron posts and balcony fronts was contemporary with the building of this front, or added slightly later. Extending to the north-west was a service wing, attached to the eastern corner of the principal range. To this initial arrangement a ballroom wing was added by the time of the publication of the Ordnance Survey map in 1869, extending north-west from the western end of the principal range and ending with a detached belvedere tower, thus making on open courtyard of three sides. A second storey in the same style was added above the ballroom wing in the later C19 and the cast-iron verandas and balconies along the south-western flank of this wing also date from this later addition. The estate was bought by speculators who sold off much of the parkland and the house was then sold to Alfred Lafone in 1874, a leather merchant who became a Member of Parliament and Justice of the Peace. At the end of the C19 a conservatory was added to the south-western side of the ballroom wing, and a polygonal estate office was added to the north-eastern flank of the service wing at approximately the same time.

The building ceased to be a house following Lafone’s death in 1910. In 1914 it was requisitioned as a Red Cross hospital and the surrounding parkland was bought by Alexander Whitehead and became an airfield. During the First World War it was an Aircraft Acceptance Park, but the aerodrome closed after the war. In 1929 it was revived and opened as the London Air Park and a number of flying clubs were based there, Hanworth Park House becoming the club house in 1935. Annual air displays during the 1930s attracted huge crowds, and the Graf Zeppelin landed here in 1932. In 1938/9 London Air Park Flying Club joined the Civil Air Guard, a government scheme set up to encourage an interest in flying and giving free training to young men not affiliated to any military body, with the agreement that members of the flying club would be available for call up into the RAF in the event of war. After the Second World War, the aerodrome ceased operating in 1946 due to its proximity to the new Heathrow Airport. The house continued as an hotel until 1953. The house and grounds and the airfield; an area of c.150 acres, were purchased jointly by Middlesex County Council and Feltham UDC in 1956. The park was opened to the public in 1959, largely laid out for recreational purposes including a swimming bath. The house became a retirement home, accommodating approximately 60 residents, which caused alterations at basement level and to the courtyard. In the late-C20 the house was sold for redevelopment, but has remained vacant since then.

Reasons for Listing

Hanworth Park House, Hounslow, an C18 country house with later additions and alterations, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* the house has a notable south-eastern front with long verandas to both principal floors and some good interiors;

* notwithstanding damage to the house from vandalism and weather penetration, the internal spaces have interest.

Historic interest:

* the use of the house as a club house and the surrounding landscape as an airfield in the inter-war period adds interest.

Group interest:

* with the Church of St George, Castle Way, Hanworth (Grade II*) and the Grade II- structures associated with the former Tudor house, Hanworth House.

External Links

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