Tring Zoological Museum (British Museum Natural History)

The Tring Zoological Museum, now part of the British Museum (Natural History), was initially built in 1889 by William Huckvale for the 1st Baron Rothschild as a 21st birthday present for Lionel Walter Rothschild (1868-1937), later 2nd Baron. J. Honour and Sons was the builder. A museum block on the west wing was completed and opened to the public in 1892. A library addition was added to the east side of the west wing in 1908, followed by an L-shaped extension of the north and east wings in 1910. An etymological gallery to the northeast, constructed between 1912 and 1913, was demolished in 1969 to make way for a subsequent building that is not of special architectural interest.

The museum is constructed of red brick with mullioned stone windows, cusped red tile hanging, half timbering, and steep red tiled roofs. The oldest section, located at the southwest, is in the form of two houses facing south. The tall, L-shaped western house includes a projecting front gable with a two-story rectangular bay window topped with a gabled half-timbered section. Half timbering appears on the upper part of the gable, while the east return is tile hung. A pilastered, glazed wooden porch with a door, and a full entablature, is positioned on the right-hand return. A date stone “1889” sits above a transomed stone window on the first floor. Projecting gable chimneys are visible. Lord Rothschild's study has been preserved on the first floor. A lower, two-story caretaker's house is set back on the east, with two half-timbered gables above two and three-light flat oriel windows set within a tile-hung, jettied first floor. The ground floor features two three-light flush casement windows with segmental arches, and a gabled open timber porch between them. The east gable is half-timbered and features a Rothschild plaque set into the brickwork of the ground floor, along with a tall projecting chimney.

The rear wing, a taller Dutch-gabled red brick museum building, has blind arcading on the west side. Inside, there is a two-story, windowless galleried hall with bow-string steel trusses, a cantilevered stone gallery, and an ornamental iron handrail. Some small display cases are cantilevered from the handrail and fitted with wooden closing shutters. The north and east wings, arranged around a courtyard, feature three and five half-timbered gables. A high basement has small, two-light, segmental arched windows, while the high ground floor features tall stone transomed and mullioned stone windows, with broken pediments in the north range framing two windows. An entrance porch of semi-octagonal, battlemented design with four stone steps leads to a four-centred arched stone doorway with a label and panelled double doors. A similar porch exists in the south section of the east range. A two-story, stone-framed, rectangular, gabled bay window is situated on the south end of the east range.