Tudor Grange House And Stable Block

A large suburban house with attached stable block, designed and built in 1887 in a loosely Jacobean style by Thomas Henry Mansell of Birmingham for the industrialist Alfred Lovekin. The panelling was supplied by Plunketts of Smith Street, Warwick. The house is constructed of red stretcher bond brick with ashlar dressings and a tiled roof, and has two storeys with attics and a basement. The stable block is T-shaped in plan and attached to the west side of the house.

Exterior

The northern entrance front has a near-symmetrical centrepiece which is recessed at first floor level and above, but which has a projecting three-bay porch to the ground floor with a door to the right. At either side are projecting, gabled wings. These wings and the central bay all have shaped outlines to their gables. The windows to the ground and first floors are mullioned and transomed, and there are projecting bay windows to the ground floor at either side. Panels of carved stonework feature strapwork and grotesque masks, particularly around the porch. A further bay to the east joins to the low wall screening a service court, which in turn joins to the stable block. Extending to the west is a single-storey range of two bays added by Sir Alfred Bird, with a square bay window and a small, elaborately-carved oriel capped by a battlemented parapet.

The garden front is composed with deliberate asymmetry, having five bays with shaped gables to the left of centre and far right, and a canted and square bay, each of two storeys, as well as a single-storey bay to the far right. At the west end is a low screen wall which connects to the stable block. To the far east is a portion of walling, the southern side of which was formerly inside the conservatory. Attached to this are concrete containers moulded in imitation of rock.

The skyline on both principal fronts has a very full array of clustered octagonal chimneys with moulded caps. The balustrade at the top of the wall has moulded balusters, and the balustrade piers are surmounted by statues personifying a variety of figures including Hercules, Brutus and William the Conqueror, some of which were carved by White's. George Noszlopy has identified the overall scheme as based on late 16th-century and early 17th-century English engravings of heroes from Greek mythology, Roman Emperors and characters from English legend. Some of these statues were added by Sir Alfred Bird, who employed Robert Bridgeman.

Interior

The ground floor plan approximates to a double-pile plan with a large central staircase and entrance hall, at either side of which are corridors leading to the former conservatory and the kitchens and service court. The ground floor has a series of lavishly decorated rooms, including the Dining Room, Morning Room, Drawing Room and Music Room. The Jacobean and Elizabethan styles are freely mixed, and there are also elements of Georgian joinery, particularly in the Music Room.

Each room has an elaborate fireplace with a carved oak surround and overmantel, and panelling to dado height. Many of the fireplaces have tiled cheeks by the De Morgan or Ruskin potteries. The plaster ceilings are decorated with strapwork, fruit and flowers in high relief. Many of the windows contain panels of stained glass of good quality showing coats of arms or mottoes. Several also have panels of Flemish or German 16th-century or 17th-century glass.

The Study and Music Room are particularly sumptuous, with richly carved woodwork. The Study, which was added to the earlier house by Sir Alfred Bird in the same style, has a screen of free-standing columns behind which is a small, richly-modelled, barrel-vaulted ceiling. In the Music Room, there is panelling to the full height of the walls, divided by Ionic pilasters with panels of bay leaves to their lower bodies and strapwork and masks above. To the western end of the room are fitted cabinets with glazed doors and a smaller, central fireplace with flambeau glazing to the tiled surround. Above is an inset tapestry panel running the width of the wall showing a Tudor hunting scene.

Sir Alfred Bird was a collector of Old Master paintings, and several of the panels in the Music Room and Hallway have buttons to their lower rims which allow the panels to be removed. It is possible that pictures were incorporated into the panelling with a mechanism to release them in the event of a fire, as is the case with the heavy frames at the Wallace Collection and other 19th-century collections. The panelling is recorded as being fitted by Plunkett's of Warwick, and it seems likely that they were responsible for fitting out the rooms in their entirety.

The staircase hall contains further panelling, and the window has nine panels of Flemish or German glass. On the first floor, one bedroom has a fireplace with richly figured wood and ivory inlay. There is a first floor corridor with housekeepers' panelled cupboards to either side and Lyncrusta wallpaper, and the former bedrooms contain a series of fireplaces with wood or cast metal surrounds.

Stable Block

The stables, with coach houses and, possibly, garaging, are attached to the west side of the house. They have a T-shaped plan. The cross-stroke is oriented north-south and has a partially-glazed roof. The stables were arranged at either side of the central passageway of the downstroke, which runs east-west, but these have now been re-arranged to form teaching rooms. This part of the building is also richly decorated, with statuary and a louvered octagonal bellcote to the skyline and ball and sceptre finials. Several of the original windows have been replaced with uPVC windows and the openings appear to have been enlarged.

Subsidiary Features: Terrace Balustrade and Stone Bench

Immediately to the south of the house is a terrace which is bounded to its south and east sides by a stone balustrade with oval and diamond motifs and a moulded handrail. The balustrade connects at its east end to the foundations of the former conservatory. On the terrace is a stone bench with shaped ends which include lions masks, and to its back it has a cresting incorporating carved acanthus leaves.

History

The opening of the Birmingham-Oxford Railway in 1852 caused the initial expansion of Solihull's urban area, and throughout the later 19th century and much of the 20th century, the borough has expanded to become an affluent commuter suburb of Birmingham.

Tudor Grange was built for Alfred Lovekin of Adie & Lovekin, jewellers and silversmiths, in 1887. The company manufactured a wide range of silver fancy goods at the end of the 19th century and had a factory in Regent Street, Hockley. In 1894 they commissioned Mansell & Mansell to design a new factory for them at 23, Frederick Street, Birmingham, which became known as 'Trafalgar Works' (Grade II).

Lovekin's wife died in 1900, and in 1901 the house was sold to Alfred Bird, son of the founder of Bird's Custard Company. He enlarged the house, adding the library and a sizeable conservatory to the east, and had Blossomfield Road moved northwards, away from the entrance front, and built a new entrance lodge at the end of the re-configured drive. He also employed Robert Bridgeman to ornament the house with statuary and furnished it with an extensive art collection which included paintings and also panels of 16th-century and 17th-century Flemish stained glass, which survive in situ.

Alfred Bird became Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton West in 1910. In 1920 he was knighted and in 1922, the year of his death, he was made a baronet. His widow lived on at Tudor Grange until her death in 1943, and the house is believed to have been used as a Red Cross auxiliary hospital during and after the Second World War. In 1946 the house was bought by Warwickshire County Council and became a school for children with special needs until 1976 when it became part of Solihull Technical College.