Category: Stately Homes

Knebworth House in Hertfordshire, just north of London, was the home of Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873), politician, statesman, and author of dozens of novels. Our tastes in literature have left poor B-L far, far behind.  But his house is often a star in its own right, currently as the home of Logan Mountstuart’s wife, Lottie (Lady Laeticia) and her father, the earl of Edgefield, in the series Any Human Heart on PBS’s Masterpiece.

Any Human Heart is based onWilliam Boyd’s 2002 novel, subtitled The Intimate Journals of Logan Mountstuart. The story goes from Logan’s coming of age through his lifetime. Though the novel is said to be a literary attempt to put political and social events into a personal context, the television version seems more to be an amazingly frequent set of encounters with famous persons, such as Miro, Hemingway, Wallis Simpson, James Joyce, et. al., while Logan has a series of life crises in which he usually turns out to be a cad.
But the point of this post is the house, Knebworth, playing the role of fictional Thorpe Hall. Knebworth has been in many films and tv shows, including The King’s Speech, and Batman, where it purports to be David Wayne’s elegant manor. Kristine and Victoria, with a group of their friends, visited Knebworth on cloudy day a few years ago. The grey skies seemed a perfect background for the ornately gothic pile of yellowish sandstone. Take a look at the Knebworth website here.

A mere thirty miles north of London, Knebworth House raises its ornate turrets, decorative crenellated chimneys and fanciful columns topped with heraldic beasts to the Hertfortshire sky. The Lytton family has occupied the property for more than 500 years.


Although every stately home in England has a fascinating history peopled with interesting inhabitants, Knebworth is particularly well endowed with eccentric, even tragic, characters. The medieval era house, with assorted changes, stood until the early 19^th century. Freed from an unhappy marriage by the death of her husband, the redoubtable heiress, Elizabeth Lytton (1773-1843), made the first of extensive architectural changes in the early 19^th century.

She and General William Bulwer (1757-1807), had several children, the youngest of whom became Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, (1803-1873), probably the most famous family member, immortalized by Snoopy’s efforts to begin his novel, “It was a dark and stormy night.”

Elizabeth had three sides of the sprawling old structure demolished. The remaining side, preserving the ancient Banqueting Hall with its carved screen, was remodeled in the fashionable gothic style, with a medieval style towers and battlements.

Bulwer-Lytton, a budding poet, had a love affair with Lady Caroline Lamb (known particularly for her pursuit of Lord Byron, the poet) in the 1820’s. A copy of her notorious novel Glenarvon (1816) is on display at Knebworth inscribed by Bulwer-Lytton: “Poor Lady Caroline . . . she could not but inspire deep pity that was heightened by admirations for talents and qualities that well trained, might have made her one of the first women of her time.”

Soon after the affair concluded and against the wishes of his mother, Bulwer-Lytton married Rosina Doyle Wheeler in 1827, one of the most disastrous mismatches of the era. Always short of funds, nevertheless they lived extravagantly. Their two children, a daughter, Emily, and a son, Teddy (later first Earl of Lytton), both suffered from the constant battles between their parents.

At times Rosina was banished from her husband’s presence. Once, after she interrupted a political campaign meeting to denounce him, she was placed in a mental institution until public outrage brought her release. Rosina published thirteen novels and many other works on women’s issues. Quoting the guidebook to the house (p. 11), “Ostracised (sic) by the family for a century, Rosina has now been readopted. Her contribution to the struggle for women’s rights has been recognized . . . and the present Lord Cobbold (David Lytton Cobbald) named his daughter after her.”

Additional changes to the house were made by his grandson, Victor, second earl of Lytton, with the help of his brother-in- law, the renowned architect Sir Edwin Lutyens. In addition to the fine ancient banqueting hall, today’s visitors will enjoy the army’s many suits of armor, the High Gothic State Drawing Room, and Elizabeth’s regency-era bedroom, preserved as it was in her day at the request of her son. All the afore-mentioned persons are pictured in the extensive family portrait collection. The house gave me a rather melancholy impression, only partially offset by the handsome Knebworth gardens. Below are views of Knebworth, inside and out.

Entrance Hall The Amoury Two pictures above, the adventure playground woods

Like so many stately homes in Britain, Knebworth House must pay its own way, and thus is not only a fascinating historical site and a rich source of settings for films.  There are a variety of attractions for children, frequent corporate events and weddings, charity fetes and shows is all kinds (antiques, cars etc etec.) and many, many concerts, mostly rock music, with audiences upwards of 50,000.  Dark and stormy it was not!

It isn’t always easy to find the entrance. Though the west facade faces Green Park (above), you must wander around in the cluster of streets west of St. James’s Street.   There are several little twists or turns to take, but don’t despair if you don’t  find it right away. The scenery is delicious — and though there are few pedestrians or autos, the people watching CAN be excellent.  Watch for top hats– these will be the doormen  at the hotel!

One day, on my way to Spencer House, I took this picture of a perfect
house in a row of 18th century buildings.  It shows the torch snuffers on the lamp poles, for the footmen to extinguish their guiding torches after travel at night. Also, the fan light above the door would serve as an address before there were numbers on the houses.  The picture of the unique fan light would be shown on your invitation to identify the proper venue!

Also nearby, The Stafford Hotel

Someday, I want to stay at the Stafford, a truly elegant establishment now part of the international Kempinski chain. I admit to entering its portals once to have a drink in the bar. Delicious.

Here’s a floor plan of the house. According to the guidebook, the house retains its essential Georgian neo-classical bones though it has been remodeled, renovated, updated and conserved many times over its many years.  The basic layout was the design of John Vardy(1718-1765), a pupil of William Kent (1685-1748). The west façade facing into Green Park is almost entirely his work (as restored), and as such, it is one of the finest, most authentic examples of Imperial Roman architecture and one of the first built in 18^th century England.

The ground floor contains the Entrance Hall, a morning room, library, and the principle dining room.  The entrance hall is described as austere, in muted colors, with classical decorations based on Greek or Roman foundations.  The relief over the fireplace portrays Antonius, a favorite of the emperor Hadrian, and one of the first pieces the 1^st Earl Spencer purchased.  Vardy is suppposed to have been responsible for most of the ground floor, with James “Athenian” Stuart taking over for the design and decoration of the first floor.



The ante room, left.  Many of the furnishings and architectural details of Spencer House, such as fireplace surrounds,  were removed to the Spencer country estate of Althorp during times of war or when the family leased out all or part of the building.  Thus, some of the present furnishings are original, others exact copies of the originals, others similar to the originals, some purchased for the renovation, completed in 1989, and many more pieces on loan  from the royal collection, the National Trust, the VandA, or other sources.

The Palm Room with its gilded columns and palm fronds is thought to be much as Vardy designed it, although many others have worked on the house. The chairs and benches are exact copies of Vardy’s; the originals are now in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The Medici Venus, in the central apse, was a very popular sculpture in the 18th and 19th centuries, one of the most graceful and beautiful statues copied or based on the Greek original, thought to be by 4th century B.C. master sculptor Praxiteles. Replicas can be found in stately homes, palaces, gardens, and museums worldwide. This copy was made by in white marble by Francis Harwood in 1765.

The Painted Room is the piece de resistance of the entire structure, executed by Athenian Stuart and fully restored to his designs. One of the most celebrated 18th C. interiors in Europe, the Painted Room actually changes according to variations in the light, both natural and artificial. The work took Stuart six years to complete; the designs celebrate the triumph of love, in honor of the happy marriage of the 1st Earl Spencer and his wife, Georgiana, nee Poyntz (parents of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire). On one panel, Venus is supposedly a portrait of the 1st Countess.

Here is another view of the Painted Room with different lighting and an angle which shows the ceiling, one of its most attractive features.  Many of the paintings and sculptural features of the room are based on themes related to love and marriage from ancient Greece and Rome. Intertwining  circles and vines are related to wedding rings, for example.  Roses, wreathes and flower garlands relate to the same premises.

Another view of a detail of the Painted Room, showing the figures of loving couples from mythology and the elaborate decoration which covers the walls and ceilings.


Needless to say, this would be the perfect setting for a wedding, and the current owners would be delighted to arrange one.  Just be sure the groom is a billionaire.

Now all you have to do, to prove your excellent Georgian taste, is to plan your special event, such as a grand ball, at Spencer House. Please don’t forget to invite Kristine and Victoria. We’ll be sure to attend!
And put the pictures right here.

Victoria here. I subscribe to a number of British publications — and always save them until I can sit down with a cuppa — and enjoy them without pressure. Needless to say, they pile up. The BBC History magazine for December 2010 had to wait until last weekend when my DH was immersed in football games. I had much more fun reading “All in the best possible Taste” on p. 42, which was written to accompany the BBC Two series At Home with the Georgians, presented by Amanda Vickery. Her book, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England, was published in the U.S. by the Yale University Press in 2010.

Amanda Vickery is a professor of history at Queen Mary, University of London. While investigating the subject of taste, she discusses Lady Shelburne.  Faithful readers of this blog will already be familiar with Lady Shelburne’s taste, as shown in her homes.  Lansdowne House, London, and Bowood, in Wiltshire, were the topics here last March 29 and 31 and April 4, 2010.   As Earl and Countess of Shelburne, William and Sophia established prominence in Georgian social and political circles. Later, after Lady Shelburne’s early death at age 25, the earl was named first Marquess of Lansdowne.

Amanda Vickery has specialized in matters domestic in her latest book as well as in her earlier work,The Gentleman’s Daughter: Women’s Lives in Georgian England, winner of the Longman History Today Prize in 1998. Marriage, child-bearing and housekeeping are described based on Vickery’s research into the letters and diaries of 18th and early 19th century women.


I am sorry to report that the BBC Two website does not have a replay available for the three-part series At Home with the Georgians.  Why not, I’d like to know?  Perhaps it will show up in one of those catalogues or PBS will run it.

Vickery, in the brief article in the December BBC History magazine, tells of the arranged marriage of William, Earl of Shelburne, and Lady Sophia Carteret in 1765 which blossomed into a true love match. Together they chose furnishings for their households, including paintings, decor, statuary and carpets.

Taste, in the prevailing view of their time and class, was based on classical themes, evidence of knowlege of the Greek and Roman civilizations. At right is the Adam Room in London’s Lansdowne Club, part of the former mansion belonging to the Shelburne/Lansdownes, as recently restored. Note particularly the elaborate ceiling design.

At left is the Shelburne/Lansdowne dining room as it was reconstructed in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art after the partial demolition in the 1930’s of the London house just off Berkeley Square.  Shelburne was a rising Whig politician and the family homes were important arenas of social and political life in those days. 

After the sad death of Lady Sophia (1745-1771), he married again. I suppose it was necessary to have a hostess to preside over these fine rooms!

The drawing room from Lansdowne House can be seen in the

The Shelburne/Lansdowne family also entertained at the Wiltshire property of Bowood, their principle country home not far from Bath.  At left is the dining room from Bowood which is now the Board Room in the venerable Lloyds of London, occupying a place of honor in the otherwise extremely modern building in the City of London
.
The taste of the furnishings provided the proper setting for the establishment of national policy and thus had an important effect upon them.

Above are two editions of Amanda Vickery’s The Gentleman’s Daughter, highly recommended. The BBC History magazine article also suggests visits to two other houses to study the taste of the Georgians: Spencer House, in St.  James, and Syon House, on the outskirts of London. This blog will take you to both soon.  Stay tuned.

Basildon Park is in Berkshire overlooking the lovely Thames Valley, built in the 1770’s in the strict Palladian style by architect John Carr of York.

Basildon Park was abandoned about 1910 and stripped of its furnishings even including flooring, fireplace surrounds and woodwork. It was used to house troops or prisoners in both world wars. Some rooms were removed and reconstructed in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City (ballroom, below).

Basildon Park stood mostly empty and deteriorating until 1952 when Lord and Lady Iliffe, a newspaper tycoon and his wife, rescued the house. Lady Iliffe writes, “To say it was derelict is hardly good enough: no window was left intact, and most were repaired with cardboard or plywood; there was a large puddle on the Library floor, coming from the bedroom above, where a fire had just been stopped in time; walls were covered with signatures and graffiti from various occupants….It was appallingly cold and damp. And yet, there was still an atmosphere of former elegance, and a feeling of great solidity. Carr’s house was still there, damaged but basically unchanged.”

Views of the outside show the Bath stone construction. The Palladian window in the Garden Front  is in the Octagon Room.

The Iliffes were fortunate enough to find genuine Carr fireplaces and woodwork removed from other houses, mostly in Yorkshire. Carr employed meticulous craftsmen and used standard measurements so that the pieces were virtually interchangeable.

Again, Lady Iliffe: “Carr was such a precise architect that his mahogany doors from Panton (in Lincolnshire) fitted exactly in the sockets of the missing Basildon ones.” Thus Basildon is both authentic and a recreation in one.

contemporary pieces, including the inevitable floral chintzes that simply drip with that country house charm. Right, the Octagon Room interior.

Upstairs the generously sized rooms were adapted to alternating bedrooms and huge bathrooms. It is a bit of a shock to see one of the perfectly proportioned rooms with its decorative plaster ceiling and elaborate woodwork and marble fireplace decked out with nothing more than the finest 1950’s plumbing fixtures.

Basildon Park was built between 1776 and 1782 by Sir Francis Sykes, created a baronet in 1781. His roots were in Yorkshire and he chose Carr of York to build his house, a classical Palladian villa with a main block of rooms joined to pavilions on either side. The Sykes fortune was made during his service in India. Right is the view of the countryside.

In 1838, the Sykes family sold the house to James Morrison (d. 1857), a Liberal MP who had turned his London haberdashery business into an international concern. By the way, when he was a shopman at Todd and Co., he married his employer’s daughter, and eventually took over the firm. Morrison engaged architect John Papworth to design handkerchiefs for his company and later to remodel Basildon. Morrison had acquired a fine collection of paintings and was one of the founding fathers of the National Gallery in London. Papworth worked at Basildon from 1837 to 1842, making some changes to the Octagon Room and other interior designs, all in keeping with the original spirit of Carr’s house. Morrison’s daughter Miss
Ellen Morrison was the last resident before Basildon Park fell into disuse.

Basildon Park was used to house soldiers during World War II, as were many country houses, and certainly suffered occasional, if not constant, abuse.

The Iliffes were collectors of the work of the distinguished English artist Graham Sutherland, whose gigantic tapestry adorns the modernist reconstruction of the Coventry Cathedral. (The 14th century cathedral was destroyed in 1940 by German bombs; a modern cathedral was built and filled

with works of contemporary art.) A number of Sutherland’s paintings and many studies for the tapestry he designed hang at Basildon. The Iliffe family  presented the house to the National Trust in 1978.

Basildon Park has often served as a set for costume dramas for the BBC and other producers. Here is a scene from the 2005 Pride and Prejudice, where Basildon enacted the role of Netherfield Park.

This picture shows how carefully designed temporary baseboards can hide 21th century electrical outlets or cable connections.

To Basildon Park in Berkshire now in the capable hands of the National Trust, we wish as many more rebirths as necessary to keep out the damp and bring in the tourists.