Thorpeness Meare

Summary

A recreational boating lake with islands, designed in 1910 by Glencairn Stuart Ogilvie as the focal point to his innovative family holiday village of Thorpeness.

Reasons for Designation

Thorpeness Meare, a shallow boating lake created by Glencairn Stuart Ogilvie in 1910-13, is registered at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Historic interest:

* The Meare is a major feature of Ogivlie’s innovative holiday village of Thorpeness: the first purpose-built holiday village in Britain, designed to appeal to children and families.

Design interest:

* it forms a visually attractive centrepiece to the designed village;
* it makes use of ornamental islands, serpentine channels of water and areas of open water to create an attractive and adventurous landscape for children to play in,whilst the water throughout is shallower than one metre in order to create a safe environment;
* it uses literary allusions to add to the romantic experience for the visitor and encourage imaginative and adventurous play.

Group value:

* with the fantasy building “House in the Clouds” (listed at Grade II) 180m to the north.

History

Glencairn Stuart Ogilvie (1858-1932), landowner, lawyer, playwright and amateur architect, was the owner, originator and developer of The Meare and Thorpeness village. Ogilvie inherited Thorpe and Sizewell Hall in 1908 from his parents (his father Alexander was a successful railway engineer). Thorpe existed as a small fishing village, but in 1909 Ogilvie conceived the innovative idea of developing it as a family holiday village, aimed at upper middle class holidaymakers. The concept included a golf course and tennis courts for adults. He soon developed his idea that the focal point of the village would be a boating lake.

The original mere was an area of land that regularly flooded from the Hundred River at times of high rainfall. Ogilvie decided to create a permanent feature from it, calling it “The Meare”. It was dug out by hand by estate workers, and formed between 1910 and 1913 as a centrepiece to the holiday village, designed as an adventure area for children, with a layout inspired by popular children’s literature, especially Peter Pan, published in 1904, written by Ogilvie’s good friend J M Barrie. The original concept map shows that the lake would originally reference numerous literary works, some of which did not make it into the eventual, simpler design that was realised (for example the original design referenced Edward Lear’s Lake Pipple Popple from his work of 1865, and Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp, published by the American author Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1856. The eventual design was simplified but contained references to Peter Pan, Robinson Crusoe (by Daniel Defoe, first published in 1719) Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (first published by the Brothers Grimm in 1812), David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, published in 1849 and “Puck of Pooks Hill” by Rudyard Kipling, published in 1906. The boathouse was designed and built in 1911. Early photos show that the islands were originally grass-covered with very few young trees planted.

Ogilvie employed two architects for his resort village, William Gilmour Wilson and Frederick Forbes Glennie. The concept was that the village should not appear designed, and no two buildings should be the same. Some buildings were not what they seemed: especially the “House in the Clouds” (listed at Grade II which originally concealed a water tower. The “Guide to Thorpeness” dated 1912 described Thorpeness as “the home of Peter Pan”, boasting a “children’s paradise” of “sixty acres of safe and shallow water and ornamental islands”. This was a new concept in an era when it was not usual to give any weight to the needs of children and families. The idea of a holiday village was new: Thorpeness is the earlier of only two complete planned resort villages in Britain built before the advent of holiday camps such as Butlins. The other is Portmeirion in North Wales, designed by Clough Williams-Ellis between 1925 and 1975.

The village of Thorpeness was officially opened by Lord Huntingfield on 11 June 1913. Ogilvie continued to develop the village in accordance with his concept, until his death in 1932, and the last buildings were completed in 1938.

Many of the buildings in Thorpeness village, including the House in the Clouds, were listed in the 1990s. Thorpeness village including the Meare was designated by the local authority as a conservation area in 1976, and the most recent Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Plan was prepared in 2022. The Meare continues to be well-used by visitors and many of the boats are original to its opening in 1913.

Details

LOCATION, SETTING, LANDFORM, BOUNDARIES AND AREA: The Meare is located just 250m inland, and forms the southern boundary of the holiday village of Thorpeness. It lies immediately south of Lakeside Avenue (a street of holiday homes with gardens bordering the Meare), with the golf course bordering it towards the north-west. It lies west of Thorpe Road and The Boathouse, and borders a section of the Hundred River on its southern edge.

It comprises a lake of approximately 27 hectares, less than 1m deep at any point. The water edges on the south, west and part of the north side consist of dense reed growth. The eastern end is the area from which the boats are hired, and the edges are formed from stright-edged concrete. There is a concrete jetty in front of the boathouse, with a small kiosk for the boatman.

There are numerous small Islands with a dense cover of a variety of mature, mostly self-seeded, deciduous trees. To the eastern end, nearest to where the boats are hired, is open water. As the visitor rows southwards or westwards there is an increasing density of islands, with the western end having a different character with very close islands between serpentine channels of water. Many of the islands have dense reed growth around them.

Throughout the lake some of the islands have small jetties for mooring and small buildings on them with adventurous literary references including Wendy’s house (referencing Peter Pan) a small single-roomed, gabled, whitewashed concrete structure with a pantiled roof. Another island has a small black concrete building, with a roof representing an upturned boat (likely to be a late-C20 rebuild), labelled Pegotty’s House (referencing David Copperfield). In the dense area of islands and reeds at the western extremity lurks a concrete crocodile, again referencing Peter Pan. To the eastern end on the grass by the shore is a larger, late-C20 crocodile. There is a white-washed concrete, crenelated “fort” towards the south-west.

Much of the romance and adventure of the experience for the visitor is derived from the well-published concept map of the Meare (originally published around 1912), which labels different parts of the lake with romantic names including “the Blue Lagoon”, “Crusoe’s Island”, “Pook’s Hill”, “Dragon’s Den”, “House of the Seven Dwarfs” and “the Pirates’ Lair”.

Sources

Websites
Villages by the Sea- Thorpeness presented by Ben Robinson available on BBC iplayer, accessed 29 August 2023 from https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/m000c78q/villages-by-the-sea
Thorpeness and Aldringham Heritage Group Website, accessed 29 August 2023 from http://www.thorpenessandaldringhamheritagegroup.co.uk/
Thorpeness Meare website, accessed 29 August 2023 from https://thorpenessmeare.com/about/
Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Plan by East Suffolk Council, 2022, accessed 29 August 2023 from https://www.eastsuffolk.gov.uk/assets/Planning/Design-and-Conservation/Conservation-Area-Appraisals/Thorpeness-Conservation-Area-Appraisal.pdf

End of official list entry

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