The Leasowes

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A ferme ornee landscape laid out in 1740s and 1750s by William Shenstone which was a potent influence on the style of landscape gardening then and in the later 18th century.

DESCRIPTION

LOCATION, AREA, BOUNDARIES, LANDFORM AND SETTING

The Leasowes lies c.2km north-east of Halesowen. To the west the site is bounded by the Dudley Canal and the main A458 road, while to the north, south and west it is surrounded by Quinton's suburban housing. The views westward, especially from the house and from the walk along the high, north-eastern, boundary of the site, are panoramic, albeit over the C20 sprawl of Halesowen. The Registered area comprises c.64ha.

ENTRANCES AND APPROACHES

Vehicular access to The Leasowes is via Leasowes Lane, which runs in a curving line east-west across the site. From the west it leads from the main Mucklow Hill road, and from the east off Manor Lane. A more northerly entrance, via Sylvan Green, on the west side joins Leasowes Lane north of Priory Pool. There is pedestrian access, some apparently unofficial, at various points on the perimeter of the site.

PRINCIPAL BUILDING

Shenstone's house was pulled down in 1776 and a new one built for Mr. Horne, who had bought the estate in 1773. Now the golf clubhouse, it is a grey, stuccoed, two-storey, three-bay building (listed grade I) linked by single-storeyed wings to two-storey side pavilions. Gothick stables were demolished in 1960.

OTHER LAND

The Leasowes estate slopes gently from east to west, with the house, roughly at the centre, standing on a ridge between two small valleys which lie to north and south. Both of these are wooded and have streams which flow east-west via several pools to meet at Priory Pool 350m south-west of the house. The landscape was accessible in 1997 principally through the modern paths constructed down the north and south valleys. In the description which follows no attempt is made to locate the sites of the majority of historic features of which no visible trace survives; for this see the 1991 Debois survey.

Historically, the proscribed walk around the landscape began on the western approach to the site, proceeding in an anti-clockwise circuit. Today the northern valley is most conveniently entered at the point where it is crossed by Leasowes Lane. Both valleys are well wooded, with large numbers of mature trees, mainly deciduous but also with some yews in Virgil's Grove above (north of) Lower Pool, at the end of the walk. From the point of entry the valley walk leads 200m south-west to Priory Pool, a view down which is revealed as the 150m long pool is approached. Running across its west end is the massive grassed canal embankment. The path skirts the east end of the pool, and then swings south-east up the southern valley, which is deeper and better defined than that to the north. The path climbs quite steeply up the north side of the valley for c.250m, to the area west of the kitchen garden. The path takes in a recently restored heart-shaped pond on the north side of the garden before turning down the west side of the garden to the southern perimeter of the landscape. From here the general line of the path follows edge of the golf course as it runs for c.800m north-east and north, overlooked by high ground with modern housing along the eastern edge of the site, to rejoin the eastern end of the northern valley at the east end of Beech-Water (restored c 1999). Passing around the east end of the pool the path runs north-east and then north-west for c.300m up and increasingly steep valley slope, before climbing north out of the valley up a steep flight of earth and timber steps. On reaching the top the path then turns north-west, to run for c.250m along a high shelf along the edge of the site with panoramic views west across the Leasowes, Halesowen and the hills beyond. Although in sections obscured by the tops of tall trees on the slopes below, the effect of the view, when contrasted with the dark and secret world of the wooded valley which precedes it, is still dramatic. Perhaps the best views are obtained almost at the northern extremity of the site.

The path then runs down the wooded slope along the edge of the golf course below, following its north-eastern edge before re-entering the northern valley above the Beech-Water. Retracing one's steps, past Beech-Water and dropping down into Virgil's Grove, the route runs past the site of drained pools, the obelisk to Virgil and the Chalybeate Spring. Around the house itself there are several mature specimen trees, mainly coniferous, which serve as a screen behind and either side of it, and serving as a backdrop to it when viewed from the east. The golf course itself, which surrounds the club house on all sites, is almost exclusively short, managed grassland. Planting, to divide up fairways, is mainly of fairly low trees planted in short belts.

KITCHEN GARDENS

A walled kitchen garden lies 200m south of the house. It was constructed in the 1770s by Mr Horne in a well-concealed position between the Cascade and the Serpentine Pool at the same time he rebuilt the house. Its stone-capped brick walls survive in good condition (1997). In 1936, two years after the site was purchased by Halesowen Council, the walled garden became the head quarters of the parks department. It continued to be so used until 1974. In 1984 a Horticultural Training Unit was established by Stourbridge College, and this continued to occupy the site in 1997. Old glasshouses and buildings were removed c.1984, and portakabins and new greenhouses and other facilities replaced them.

REFERENCES

There is a considerable literature on The Leasowes: look at the references in R. Desmond, Bibliography of British Gardens, 1984, 172-3. In addition see:

M. Batey and D. Lambert, The English Garden Tour, 1990, pp.181-5

Debois Landscape Survey Group, The Leasowes: A Survey of the Landscape, 1991

D.D.C. Chambers, The Planters of the English Landscape Garden, 1993

C. Gallagher, 'The Leasowes: A History of the Landscape', Garden History, 24, (1996), pp. 201-20

Country Life, no.9 (4 March 1999), pp 56-9

Description written: December 1997

Amended: May 2001