Details
ASHTON
1743/0/10019 ASHTON WOLD
17-DEC-09 Cricket Pavilion at Ashton Wold
GV II
Cricket Pavilion; late 1920s-early 1930s; probably by William Huckvale for Lord Rothschild and the Ashton Estate.
MATERIALS: This is a timber built structure on a coursed rock-faced limestone plinth, with a hipped reed thatched roof.
PLAN: It is a single storey seven bay rectangular building.
EXTERIOR: The building has full length verandahs to east and west, the oversailing eaves of the roof supported on brackets placed either side of regularly spaced posts. Also between the posts are wooden railings in a pattern of diagonal crosses, except for the central bay which is open, with two stone steps to the ground. Access to the inside is through five glazed double doors with overlights to both east and west; at either end of both these elevations is a single window, and there are two windows to north and south elevations. The windows light the changing rooms at either end.
INTERIOR: Inside the rooms are lined with vertical plank panelling. The largest central communal room has been fitted with new serving areas, and the Members' end has been modified slightly. Doors at either end, to north and south, lead into changing rooms identified by signs over reading 'Members' and 'Visitors'. These rooms have narrow benches around the walls with hooks above, and are subdivided to provide washing facilities. All doors, door furniture, and other fixtures appear to be original.
HISTORY: The Ashton Estate, stretching from the River Nene near Oundle in the west to Ashton Wold in the east, has been occupied since Roman times. In the C18 it was a well-known sporting estate, with avenues of chestnut trees planted in a cross as rides, and a number of fox coverts. In the early C19 the estate was owned by William Walcot and was largely farmed by tenants, with Ashton Wold continuing as a sporting ground. However, there is no evidence that it had ever contained a manor house, and when in 1860 it was purchased by Lionel Rothschild the sale particulars described it as 'a very valuable and important landed estate', with sporting advantages, but no house adapted for the occupation of a gentleman. Both Lionel Rothschild and his son Nathaniel Mayer, 1st Lord Rothschild (1840-1915), showed little interest in estate, and the only structural work undertaken in the C19 was the building of a hunting lodge at Ashton Wold. However, when Lord Rothschild's second son, Nathaniel Charles (1877-1923) - known as Charles - discovered Ashton by accident, he was so impressed by the rich fauna and flora of Ashton Wold that he persuaded his father to build him a house on the site of the hunting lodge. In 1900 Lord Rothschild commissioned William Huckvale to design not only a house, but a model farm, an entire complement of estate buildings which included the Steward's house, stables, gardeners' accommodation, a building to house a fire engine, a petrol store, kennels (now derelict) and a dog hospital. Most of the cottages at nearby Ashton were rebuilt to create a model village. High quality design and workmanship were consistent themes throughout the estate, employing traditional vernacular building traditions, with simple working buildings afforded the same care as were the dwellings, farmsteads and garden structures.
The Cricket Pavilion is a relatively late structure on the Ashton Estate. It is not shown on the estate map of 1901, nor on the OS map of 1926. The cricket ground seems therefore to have been a later, possibly late 1920s or early 1930s addition, presumably providing recreation for the young men who lived and worked on the estate. The pitch and pavilion are still in use, with a local team drawn from Ashton and the surrounding villages.
William Huckvale (1847-1936) worked mainly for the Rothschilds and designed a number of buildings for them on the Tring Park estate, undertook considerable work at the Rothschild bank in New Court in the City of London, and was the architect for the Royal Mint Refinery. He also carried out work on the Rothschild estate at Aston Clinton.
SOURCES: Enclosure map of Lordship of Oundle with Ashton (1810), Northamptonshire Record Office 2858.
Map of estates belonging to William Walcot (1811), Northamptonshire Record Office 3703.
Map of Ashton Estate by Messrs Hayward, Surveyors (1853), Northamptonshire Record Office 1728a.
Catalogue of sale of Ashton Estate (1858), Northamptonshire Record Office ZB 706/24.
Map accompanying Conveyance of Ashton Estate to Lionel Rothschild (1860), Northamptonshire Record Office 5173.
Map of Ashton Wold (c1901), in Ashton Wold House.
Ordnance Survey maps 1886, 1900, 1926.
REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: The Cricket Pavilion erected in 1920-1940 is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Group Value: It forms an integral part of an important and unusually intact Edwardian model estate, and has group value both with its immediate neighbours and with the estate as a whole.
* Architecture: It has special architectural interest as an example of a vernacular style of timber-built cricket pavilion built careful craftsmanship from local materials.
* History: It has special historic interest as part of an estate developed by members of the internationally important Rothschild family, built for the tenants and workers of the estate.
* Intactness: It is an intact example of a cricket pavilion, the interior space and detail of which survives.
