The Whim

Details

HYTHE

687/0/10005 PARK ROAD 12-JUN-06 36 THE WHIM

II House. Built between 1874-8 to the design of the owner Henry Scott by a local builder Mr Evernden. Timberframed, clad in grooved weatherboarding with a slate roof with terracotta ridge tiles and four small cement rendered chimneys with tall plain chimneypots. Cornice of wooden pointed and fretted fascia boards.

PLAN: Circular plan with internal circular corridor and atrium, and segmental rooms.

EXTERIOR: Twelve tall narrow sash windows with horns but without glazing bars set in moulded architraves. The survival of iron hooks and grooves cut out of the window surrounds shows that there were originally shutters. Entrance now on the east side with four-panelled half-glazed door with rectangular fanlight was originally the service entrance. The main entrance was originally to the north approached through a porch. The tented canopy to the porch survives with a similar pointed and fretted cornice to the rest of the building but the remainder has been incorporated in a one storey early C20 extension, part weatherboarded, part rendered with a combination of slate, felt and corrugated asbestos roofs and either fixed sash windows or mullioned and transomed casement windows.

INTERIOR: The narrow hall leads to a central atrium with circular conservatory, originally built as a fernery. Originally this had no roof but a flat wooden roof was added in the C20. The conservatory has glazed panels with thin moulded glazing bars over plank panelling to the base and two half-glazed doors. Both conservatory and corridor have tiled floors. The inner corridor is lined with plank panelling and has a circular hipped boarded roof and a series of eight four-fielded panelled doors with moulded architraves leading to the rooms. The rooms are segment-shaped and the principal rooms, kitchen, dining room, drawing room and bedroom have inter-connecting doors in the partition walls. The drawing room has a reeded cornice and a moulded plate shelf. Both drawing room and dining room retain a tiled fireplace surround to the earlier American stoves, the dining room with late C19 floral tiles.

HISTORY: This building does not appear on the 1877 Ordnance Survey map but is shown on the 1899 map. Evidence from local directories suggests that "The Whim" was built between 1874 and 1878 as in the 1874 Kelly's Directory the first owner is shown living at Albion Villas, Hythe and in the 1878 edition at "The Whim". Park Road was an area of piecemeal residential development in the later C19 and no. 36 was built on a plot of land between existing semi-detached villas. An article in "The Hythe and Sandgate Advertiser" of 26 February 1886 suggests that the building was built to his own design (using a set of compasses) by a Mr Scott who wanted a house on one floor but couldn't find a design which he liked. The building was finally built by a Mr Evernden, a builder of Hythe, in a circular shape and the article described an inner circle with a fernery, but no roof, the walls of which formed a corridor making a smoking as well as a picture gallery, the outer roofed circle containing living compartments of 11ft 6 inches pitch comprising kitchen, sitting room, drawing room and bedroom with doors leading from one room to another. There was also a stable and coachhouse. The article also mentions coloured glass in the entrance on the east side and "American stoves, used in every room in this house, which stand out some distance from the wall, and as Mr Scott contends, retain the heat in the room, which otherwise escapes up the chimney." There were earth closets. Two Henry Scotts feature in the Hythe section of Kelly's 1859 Directory. The probable owner of "The Whim" is described as a grocer, also valuer and had a business in Ashford. The probate copy of his will divides the property between his son John Paul Scott and in trust for his wife. Henry Scott died on 3rd November 1892. The gross value of his estate in January 1893 was £1608 14s 09d. Mrs Scott probably lived in "The Whim" until 1896 as the 1896-7 Directory has the property untenanted.

STATEMENT OF IMPORTANCE: "The Whim" is a circular, one-storey house constructed between 1874 and 1878, designed in this unusual form by the owner and constructed by a local builder. The curved walls of this timber-framed building are clad in grooved weather-boarding, it has a slate roof with wooden fretted and pointed fascia boards acting as a cornice and a central circular glazed atrium. A substantially intact purpose-built circular bungalow retaining its plan form of internal corridor with central glazed atrium and segmental rooms, a possibly unique shape and plan form for a purpose-built residence, and a very early example of a bungalow.

SOURCES: Article in "Hythe and Sandgate Advertiser" February 26th 1886.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

495381

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.