Hewell Grange

www.historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/

Summary of Garden

A landscape park developed from the mid-C18 with advice from William Shenstone and Lancelot 'Capability' Brown, redesigned in 1812 by Humphry Repton with later alterations of the late C19 and early C20.

DESCRIPTION

LOCATION, AREA, BOUNDARIES, LANDFORM, SETTING

Hewell Grange lies east of the village of Tardebigge, separated from it by the B4096 and the A496 which run parallel to each other, the latter connecting Bromsgove 4km to the north-west and Redditch 3km to the south-east. To the east the park is bounded by a minor local road, Brockhill Lane, which around the northern part of the park has been upgraded to serve the prison complex. To the south the park boundary follows field edges. The park lies to either side of a shallow valley running roughly north/south, the bottom of which is occupied by the lake. The registered area is c.160ha.

ENTRANCES AND APPROACHES

The site is entered from the north-west via a modern entrance adjoining gates and early C19 single-storey painted ashlar lodges, attributed to Thomas Cundy Senior. The lodges were left isolated in the late C20 by the construction of a new road to the north. From the entrance a drive lined with limes (planted 1906) curves before approaching the Grange's north forecourt. That drive is joined 300m north-west of the house by a drive, also lined with limes, approaching from a brick and tile-hung lodge of 1886 on the westernmost corner of the park. That lodge, on the north side of the drive, is faced by a house of c.1880 employing much timber framing, Hewell Dairy, which served as the lodge in the early 1880s. Paper Mill Lodge, of 1876 and with elaborate timber-framed decoration, lies on the south-east corner of the park, on a drive which runs along the west bank of the lake to the stables west of the C18 house. A North Lodge, 400m east of those attributed to Cundy, was demolished in the late C20.

Realignment of the drives, most notably in the vicinity of Hewell Grange itself, and a programme of lodge building took place in the later C19 around the time of construction of the new house.

PRINCIPAL BUILDING

Hewell Grange (listed Grade II*) was built 1884-91 by Bodley & Garner for the first Earl of Plymouth. Of red sandstone, the three-storey house is in the Jacobean style and is said to have been inspired partly by Montacute (Somerset). The entrance front is of nine bays with projecting end bays and a central porte-cochere. On the garden front are two turrets and a centre loggia on the ground floor.

A new block was built close to, and north-west of Hewell Grange in the mid C20.

Hewell Grange replaced a square, stone, two-storey building, possibly designed by Francis Smith of Warwick. A huge portico was added in 1816 by Thomas Cundy who also infilled the house's central courtyard, both alterations being among those suggested by Repton in his Red Book of 1812. The shell of that house (listed Grade II), which suffered a major fire in 1889, remains 200m east of the later house, on low ground 100m west of the lake.

Immediately south-west of the old house, and separated from the French garden by a sunken road, are the former stables. Adjoining them to the south is a gymnasium with four Coade stone caryatids on the south-west front (listed Grade II), built as a real tennis court c.1820 and modernised in 1891.

GARDENS AND PLEASURE GROUNDS

To the north of Hewell Grange is a semicircular forecourt within sandstone ashlar balustraded walls completed in 1903 (listed Grade II) and designed by Lord Windsor. A centrally placed gateway with arched pedestrian entrances to either side has tall, square piers surmounted by pinnacles; the gates are now missing. In the lawn with beds in the centre of the forecourt is a Coade stone statue of 1825 in the Classical style of 'the Fallen Gladiator' (listed Grade II).

Hewell Grange's main formal garden, known as the French Garden, lies south of the house, and is approached from it via a flagged and balustered terrace. A rectangular lawn c.120m north/south by c.80m east/west is divided into four main compartments by axial paths with smaller semicircular compartments at the south end. The compartments are defined by pleached beech hedges, and in the centre of each of the four main lawns is a Coade stone statue of a draped Classical female figure, all probably by William Croggan and all listed Grade II. Each statue is contained within a yew arbour, overgrown from yew columns. The centre of the garden is occupied by a large circular bed occupying an infilled fountain basin, in the middle of which is an urn raised on a block sculpted with classical figures, an arrangement contrived in the later C20.

A terraced lawn or archery ground (in 1902 called The Southern Pleasance) runs parallel with the west side of the garden with an urn at its south end. The main east/west axis across the French Garden is continued west for 300m to the park boundary by a flight of grass terraces or 'steps' with tall yew hedges to either side. On the park boundary, and closing the vista from the garden up the terraces, is a late C19 four-storey stone water tower (listed Grade II) with pyramidal roof. It was built to power hydraulic lifts in the new house. The terraces, reputedly modelled on the hedged terraces of the 1870s at Rous Lench Court, were begun in 1900 and completed in 1903. When first constructed there were eighteen terraces in all, extending past the old house to the lake.

South of the former tennis court is what remains of the Dutch Garden, laid out in the 1840s and formerly containing radial paths and ornamental flower beds. Two small bridges crossing the adjacent ha-ha survive, one with an ornamental stone arch (listed Grade II). In the later C19 other garden areas were created including rose gardens and a maze.

The rising ground west and especially south of the house, the Planted Hill, is occupied by mature ornamental woodland and specimen trees. From the south end of the French Garden an ornamental gateway gives access past an urn to walks through the woodland, a network of paths leading through the woods and giving views (albeit somewhat obscured because of the maturity of the trees) both across the lake and the formal garden itself. One path gives access to a stone bridge crossing the southern drive to the tennis court beyond. The Planted Hill was known earlier as Hazel Hill (1655) and Walnut Tree Hill (1812).

To the east of the house the ground falls away, and steps lead to a circular Quarry Garden with exposed rock faces, a stone bench and megaliths, the whole garden being enclosed with by shrubs and specimen trees. Towards the house is an entrance contrived of large stone slabs with a central doorway with pivoted stone-slab door. On the opposite side of the garden is an arched entrance in a crude Renaissance or 'Roman' style. Within the garden is a central lawn with beds, rockeries (including slag) and a path around the exterior. Other features include a crude stone bench seat.

Most of the garden features date from the C19. The Quarry Garden, the potential for creating which in an old quarry was noted by Humphry Repton in 1812, was created in the early C19 and complete by 1840, with the revolving door and Roman arch probably being added in the 1890s. In the C19 the central area was treated formally, with raised square pools, a dolphin fountain (now nearer the house) and radiating paths.

The later French Garden, originally the site of the kitchen garden, became a flower garden in 1828, and was already called the French Garden in 1843. Edward Milner (1819-84) visited Hewell in the early 1880s after the decision had been made to rebuild the house across the garden's north end and staked out the site. The subsequent planting and development of the garden was by Andrew Pettigrew, Hewell's head gardener. Photographs show that when laid out Pettigrew's highly elaborate new garden employed rose arches inset along the lime hedges around the edge of the various compartments, within which there were box arabesques and herbaceous plants. Those arrangements were simplified over the course of the C20.

PARK

There are three main areas of parkland: north of Hewell Grange, east of the lake, and south of the Planted Hill. In the later C20 large areas of the northern part of the park are enclosed within two new prisons, Brockhill and Blakenhurst. Most of the remaining ground is improved grassland, with some arable on the northern boundary of the park and sports fields north of Hewell Grange. West of Brockhill the ground rises to a low wooded (Laurel Covert) hill. At the northern end of the lake there is a cast iron bridge (listed Grade II) on stone abutments, with an adjacent weir providing visual and aural effect to those crossing the bridge. East of the lake the ground is again largely improved grassland, rising eastwards to Brockhill Lane and the park boundary. A belt of woodland around the south-eastern shore of the lake was present in the later C19, while wood covering Cladshill, the easternmost sector of the park, was developed in the C20 from shelter belts mapped in the 1880s. This sector of the park is reached via a sandstone ashlar bridge with crenellated parapet across the channel carrying water from the south end of the lake. South of the Planted Hill is mainly arable and improved grass, although permanent pasture occupies the ground rising west of the drive from Paper Mill Lodge with several mature parkland oaks towards the top of the hill.

The lake runs north/south down the centre of the park and is c.1km long and c.200m wide at its broadest, opposite the house and the northern part of the wooded walks on the Planted Hill which overlook it. One wooded island lies near the centre of the lake; a second, gained from the west bank near the ruins of the old house by an early C19 iron bridge (listed Grade II) with an adjacent Coade stone vase.

Park Cottages, on the south-west edge of the park, are a substantial pair of mid C19 yellow-brick estate cottages with mock timber framing and ornate gables and chimneys.

KITCHEN GARDEN

The kitchen garden, surrounded by tall, externally buttressed, early C19 brick walls, lies south-west of the Home Farm and 200m outside the park. The garden is c.200m north/south and c.100m east/west, with a brick gardener's house and office (with first-floor fruit store) in the south-east corner. A range of early C19 brick stores, a later C19 cast-iron vinery (by H Hope of Birmingham) and C19 framed pits survive in the narrow central compartment among glasshouses and other structures of the later C20.

The kitchen gardens were moved here in 1828, previously having occupied the area subsequently to become the French Garden. In 1799 there were two greenhouses, a hot house, sheds and a 'succession pit'.

Reasons for Designation

Hewell Grange, a landscape park laid out for the Earls of Plymouth by William Shenstone and Lancelot 'Capability' Brown in the mid-C18, remodelled by Humphry Repton in the early-C19 and with further development throughout the C19, is Registered at Grade II* for the following principal reasons:

* Historic interest: a designed landscape laid out over a number of centuries and associated with two country houses, the mostly early-C18 Hewell Grange and its late-C19 replacement;

* Designers: it is associated with a number of influential landscape architects, including William Shenstone, Lancelot 'Capability' Brown and Humphry Repton;

* Planting and landscape: the park uses its natural topography to great and dramatic effect, planted with mature trees, lawns and formal gardens giving distinctive character to different areas within the park;

* Group value: together with the Ruins of the Old Hewell Grange (listed Grade II), the present Hewell Grange (listed Grade I), and other listed and unlisted buildings within the park, it forms an important group.

Selected Sources

Books and journals

Carter, G, Goode, P, Laurie, K, Humphry Repton, (1982), p. 163

Elliot, B, Victorian Gardens, (1986), pp. 224-9

Nash, T, Collections for the history of Worcestershirep.403

Pevsner, N, Brooks, A, The Buildings of England: Worcestershire, (2007), 625-628

Reid, P, Burke's and Savills Guide to Country Houses, Volume II, (1980), pp. 209-12

Other

Country Lide (6th December 1902), pp.732-41

Gardeners' Chronicle (2nd April 1904), pp. 209-10

Hewell Grange Historic Landscape Appraisal (Parklands Consortium, 2001)

Hewell Grange: The Development of the Landscape and Pleasure Grounds, An Historical Survey (D. Whitehead, 1993)

The Quarry or Rock Garden at Hewell Grange (D. Whitehead, 1993)