Walled Garden adjoining site of former Bold Hall

Details

1303/0/10010

BOLD
Walled Garden adjoining site of former Bold Hall

26-JAN-05

GV
II

Rectangular brick walling, enclosing former kitchen garden to Bold Hall (demolished). The walling was completed c.1844, and altered in the late C19. Further alterations took place in the C20, with various structures erected against the wall at different times. The wall is built of red brick, laid to English Garden Wall bond, with ashlar sandstone used for flat copings to the wall head, for the v-jointed surround to the entrance gateway and for the plain lintels to other doorways.

PLAN: The walls form a rectangular enclosure, the longest dimension being north-south. The width of the upper third of the garden is slightly narrower, and its walling significantly taller than that of the remainder.

EXTERIOR: Tall brick walling with wide flat stone copings to the wall head. The south wall incorporates a centrally-placed principal entrance with a shallow depressed archway defined by v-jointed rusticated quoining and voussoirs. The arch keystone is inscribed with the date 1844. A smaller single doorway is thought to have been inserted at the east end of the south wall. The long east and west side walls have a single doorway approximately one-third of the length of the garden enclosure from the south end. These are plain openings with plank doors beneath plain sandstone lintels. At the point where the garden narrows in width the walls have dog-legged insets, with ramped copings up to the taller level of the walling to the northern third of the garden. At this point on the west wall there is a single doorway and a length of walling extending eastwards to almost the mid-point of the garden. This appears to have formed part of a glasshouse or similar garden structure, now replaced. The enclosure walling is substantially complete, and incorporates a small number triangular-sectioned buttresses at various points.

HISTORY: The walled garden was a C19 addition to the Bold Hall estate, carried out whilst it was still in the ownership of the descendants of John Bold. Bold, the M.P. for Wigan in the early C18, had commissioned the celebrated Venetian architect, Giacomo Leoni to design a new mansion for the estate, completed c.1730, together with other estate buildings. The mansion, which stood to the south-east of the walled garden was demolished c.1900, but former estate buildings, notably a wing of the stable court and its associated dwelling survive to the south of the garden. The garden is shown on the 1849 O.S map, and is mentioned in the 1848 sale brochure for the Bold Hall estate, which refers to 'Capital Gardens, inclosed and divided by lofty newly-built walls clothed with the choicest fruit trees'. Although the garden is now considerably changed, the enclosure walling is substantially the same as depicted on contemporary maps.

Forms a group with the former Home Farmhouse (q.v.) and the former Stables (q.v.)

The walled enclosure is of special interest as the principal component of an extensive, little altered and well-documented walled garden of 1844, part of the ongoing development of the estate developed by John Bold. The walled garden, together with the C18 former Home Farmhouse and stables, represent the most significant surviving built elements in the historic landscape of the Bold Hall estate, one of the largest country house parks in Lancashire.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

491589

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

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