Wrest Park

The following is from the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest. For the most up-to-date Register entry, please visit The National Heritage List for England (NHLE):

Extensive and complex formal pleasure grounds and park around a country mansion. Main phases early C18 and early C19, utilising late C17 base, with mid C18 work by Lancelot Brown.

Location, Area, Boundaries, Landform and Setting

Wrest Park lies 14km south of Bedford, on the eastern edge of the village of Silsoe, on the Greensand Ridge of low hills. The c 380ha site is bounded to the west by Silsoe and the old route of the A6 Bedford to London road and on the other sides largely by agricultural land, parts of the boundary being marked by a stone wall. The late C20 A6 Silsoe by-pass cuts through the west edge of the park, set in a cutting to the north and on a low embankment to the south. The park and garden are largely level, except for the rise to the east which includes Kempson's Park and Cain Hill. The site offers views of the villages of Upper and Lower Gravenhurst from the higher ground to the east and the east drive, together with views of the low hills to north and south.

The main approach from Silsoe gives access along a straight avenue (replanted C20) through the park, past the two Louis XV-style Silsoe Lodges (Earl de Grey 1826, listed grade II) with their wrought-iron screen and gate piers. The drive crosses the sunk by-pass, then runs past the impressive entrance to the kitchen garden to the south, arriving at the house at right angles to its main axis. The drive continues eastwards to Gravenhurst Lodge, through Kempson's Park, eventually emerging at Upper Gravenhurst lane. A spur south continues between the east side of the Great Garden and Cain Hill to Whitehall Lodge, and beyond this through Whitehall Plantation to Ion Lodge. A straight spur north passes the two Louis XV Bradbury Lodges (Earl de Grey 1816, listed grade II, ruinous 1997), eventually giving access to the A507.

Gardens and Pleasure Grounds

The site consists of extensive pleasure grounds, park and woodland. The rectangular mansion (Earl de Grey 1830s, listed grade I) lies near the centre of the site, on the north boundary of the pleasure grounds, built of orange ashlar in Louis XV style and flanked to the east by the adjacent stables (Earl de Grey 1830s, listed grade II) and to the west by the extensive kitchen garden (Earl de Grey 1836, listed grade II), to which it is linked by a screen wall. The main, north, entrance front overlooks informal level lawns bounded by the main drive to the north and beyond this the shortened remains of the north avenue (replanted C20) within the north park, with a view of a low ridge to the north.

The south, garden front is aligned on the central axis of the c 40ha pleasure grounds. It overlooks the formal 1830s parterre and site of the old house 200m to the south, to the Long Water, flanked by the wooded Great Garden. At the end of the Long Water, 800m to the south, lies the Pavilion (Thomas Archer 1709-11, listed grade I), a Baroque, red-brick, domed banqueting house, with a low range of hills closing the view in the far distance. The pleasure grounds are largely enclosed by the formal canals naturalised by Brown 1758-60, flanked by Old Park, the site of the medieval park, to the west and the park leading up to Cain Hill to the east; they contain a variety of garden structures and statuary placed within various formal and informal compartments.

Park

The park, which surrounds the house and pleasure grounds to the west, north and east, has been almost completely denuded of mature trees, except for an area south of the east drive, adjacent to Poorhill Plantation, which retains mature park trees and old pasture. The land is largely open arable, with some pasture, and mown grass along the west avenue and close to the north front. A considerable development of late C20 industrial farm buildings and offices lies in the park close to the east and north-east of the house, dominating this area. A belt of woodland runs south from Pateman's Wood along the east and south boundaries, parts of which have been replanted (mid to late C20). The summit of Cain Hill is the site of Hill House, also by Archer (c 1711, removed 1830), which was a Baroque cruciform building which acted as an eyecatcher from the pleasure grounds. As with the Pavilion, each façade was designed to face a different avenue and close a vista. Hill House was replaced by a stone monument, the base of which survives in the woodland.

Maps

• Rest Park in Bedfordshire, 1719 (Bedfordshire Record Office)
• Wrest Park, John Rocque, 1735 (Bedfordshire Record Office)
• Wrest Park, John Rocque, 1737 (Bedfordshire Record Office)
• T Jefferys, The County of Bedford, 1765
• Map of several parishes of Silsoe, 1814 (Bedfordshire Record Office)
• A Bryant, Map of the County of Bedford, 1826
• OS 6" to 1 mile:
• 1st edition published 1881
• 2nd edition published 1901
• 3rd edition published 1926
• OS 25" to 1 mile: 1st edition published 1880

Description written: September 1997 Amended: April 1999

Register Inspector: SR

Edited: May 1999, August 2022