Swangrove House, Garden Walls, 4 Corner Pavilions and Gate Piers

Details

HAWKESBURY C.P. SWANGROVE ST 78 NE 4/176 Swangrove House, 17.9.52 garden walls a 4 corner pavilions and gate piers

G.V. I A 'maison de plaisance'. Dated "1703", byWilliam Killigrew of Bath. Fine ashlar, render to side and near elevations; slate roofs with coped raised verges; diagonal ashlar stacks with moulded cornice. Cotswold vernacular style but handled with considerable skill and with Palladian overtones. 2 storeys, cellars and attics in 2 steep, coped, stone gables with a flat roofed room between; lower 2 storey wings; embattled parapet, formerly with a balustrade to the wings. 1 : 3 : 1 bays; tall cross windows on first floor of centre; 2-light casements elsewhere; keyed oval windows in apex of gables; continuous string over ground and first floor, stepped up over first floor windows in centre; lead cresting to centre of string course. A straight flight of steps (with balusters, arms on the posts and a moulded handrail) leads up to front door on the first floor; 6 panel door under a 2-light overlight and in a bolection moulded surround; all under a segmental pediment which rises from the string course. Lead downpipes at the junctions between the centre and wings; portcullis badge and date '1703' to the rainwater heads. Rear elevation. Ground floor: 3 doors in bolection moulded surrounds, flat entablature over outer doors (left one blocked), pediment to central door. First floor: 3 cross windows under drip moulds. 4 detached corner pavilions; ashlar with pyramidal Cotwold stone slate roof with ball finials and moulded eaves cornice; single storey; plank doors in blection surrounds; one keyed oval window to each side. Low coped rubble walls join the pavilions and the house and enclose the site: ashlar gate piers with ball finials south. Interior: Ground floor: stop chamfered and moulded beams and cornice; oak staircase with turned balusters. Closed string and moulded handrail - the staircase continues up to the attic. First floor. Central blue room, fully panelled with raised and fielded panels; on the west wall is a bolection moulded fire surround and to either side is a cupboard with glazed doors; that to the right contains a buffet, a marble basin set on a pedestal and recessed in a marble niche which has the mask of a mandarin with a tap in his mouth over the basin (connected to a cistern above and fed by a pumphouse in the adjacent wood). Attic. Central panelled room of great importance as an intact and unrestored example of early C18th marbling and japanning; the door and dado cornice have gold leaf chinoiseries insects, birds and background on a black background; the wall panels formerly held paper or brocade. The designs for the chinoiserie may be traced to Stalker and Parker. A treatise of Japanning and Varnishing, 1688. (Lisa White, personal communication). Country Life 16.XII,1939. Gomme, A forthcoming publication in the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain.

Listing NGR: ST7970585752

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

34390

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
A Treatise of Japanning and Varnishing, (1688)
Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain in Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain, ()
Country Life in 16 December, (1939)

Other
Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic interest in England, Part 1 Avon,

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