Summary
Kitchen garden wall. Built in around 1765-1768 for Reverend John Tattersall, or possibly slightly earlier, with alterations and repairs in the C20. A potting shed was added in the early C19. The former gardeners’ cottage (Garden Cottage) is not included in the listing.
Reasons for Designation
The kitchen garden wall at Upper Gatton Park is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as a mid-C18 kitchen garden wall with good quality brickwork and surviving features such as an arched opening, triangular coping, corner piers, buttresses, as well as an early-C19 potting shed.
Historic interest:
* as a mid-C18 walled kitchen garden to the house at Upper Gatton and its landscaped park, the latter of which is associated with the renowned landscape architect Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown.
Group value:
* with the Grade II-listed house at Upper Gatton which it served, as well as the gardener’s cottage and landscaped park.
History
During the C18, landscaped parks developed as a setting around country houses and were purposely designed in an idealised ‘natural’ manner. These landscapes evolved rapidly from the mid-C18, most notably under the influence of the landscape architect Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown (1716-1783). They were typically designed to have pasture running uninterrupted from the house into gently undulating grounds studded with clumps of trees and with the world beyond screened by plantation belts around the park edge.
Walled kitchen gardens were often built in association with gardens, landscaped parks and the country houses that they served. They were used to grow vegetables, fruit and flowers to supply the needs of the household. These gardens were generally enclosed within tall brick, or brick-lined walls (although local variants of stone or cob can be found), creating their own secure micro-climate. From the mid-C18 they were usually placed away from the main house, and sometimes concealed by a shrubbery or plantation belt. South-facing slopes were favoured and sometimes the south wall was omitted to allow frost to ‘roll off’. Exceptionally walls were made strongly sinuous to improve the micro-climate for fruit. The number and range of glasshouses expanded enormously from the 1840s as glass became cheap. The gardener often lived ‘on site’ in a relatively commodious house set alongside the walls.
Upper Gatton was under the ownership of Samuel Owfield MP in the mid-C17 and also served as the seat of the manor of Chipstead. In the mid-C18 it came into the ownership of Reverend John Tattersall and a landscaped park was developed around the country house. Capability Brown may have advised on the informal woodland planting from 1765. It is noted that he made a ‘general plan of the place’ with some sketches for lodges, and visits in 1765, 1766 and 1774 for which his bill was £52 10s (Stroud 1975, 226).
A walled kitchen garden appears to have been built at around this time and is shown on an estate map of 1768, although it is possible that it could be slightly earlier. This map depicts the walled kitchen garden with a rectangular plan, except for a curved wall at the north-east corner, with a gardeners’ cottage (Garden Cottage) at the centre of the north side flanked by two small enclosed gardens. The main garden area appears to have been divided into four horticultural parterres, possibly with a well at the centre and a garden feature in the middle of each parterre. By 1869, the parterres appear to have been in use as orchards and small buildings, including glasshouses, are shown to the small enclosed gardens at the north.
The estate passed out of the ownership of the Tattersall family in 1784 when the manor of Chipstead was sold to William Joliffe and Upper Gatton to Lord Newhaven, owner of Lower Gatton Park. After passing through the hands of several owners, Upper Gatton Park became the residence of the Duke of St Albans in the early C19. The main house at that time was used by the Canadian Army during the Second World War as a training centre but was sold in 1942 and demolished in 1948. The adjacent early-C18 house is Grade II-listed (National Heritage List for England entry 1029116).
The kitchen garden wall suffered damage, particularly during storms, prior to 1984, and in 1987, 1990 and 2023, and has been partially rebuilt in several places, including to half its original height along the eastern half of the south side.
Details
Kitchen garden wall. Built in around 1765-1768 for Reverend John Tattersall, or possibly slightly earlier, with alterations and repairs in the C20. A potting shed was added in the early C19. The former gardeners’ cottage (Garden Cottage) is not included in the listing.
MATERIALS: red brick in Flemish bond with a brick coping.
PLAN: rectangular, except for a curved wall at the north-east corner. At the north-west and north-east corner are two small garden enclosures (the north-west enclosure only partially surviving) whilst the main former kitchen garden area is to the south.
DESCRIPTION: the kitchen garden wall is constructed of red brick laid in Flemish bond and enclosing a broadly rectangular area of 2.26 acres, except for a curved section of wall at the north-east corner accommodating the access road to an adjacent former coach yard. It has square piers at each corner and a brick triangular coping. The kitchen garden wall is truncated and/or has openings near the centre of the north, west and south sides, as well as a brick-arched opening through the wall at the south end of the east side. The wall has been reduced in height at both the south end of the west side, where it has been partially rebuilt in 2023, and along the eastern half of the south side where it is now half its original height. Several buildings have been built into the external face of the eastern and western side of the wall. There are also some brick buttresses supporting the external face of the wall in places.
At the centre of the north side of the kitchen garden wall is a former gardeners’ cottage (excluded), which is flanked by two small garden enclosures at the north-east and north-west corner. The enclosure wall only partially survives at the north-west and forms the rear wall of some late C20 lean-to buildings. The enclosed garden at the north-east corner has an approximately early-C19 lean-to potting shed built against its south side, which has an eight-pane window, a boarded door, and a slate roof.
