Gaddesden Place

Gaddesden Place is a country house, now partly residential and partly in commercial use, set on a hillslope commanding views over the Gade Valley to the west.

The house was built in July 1768 for Thomas Halsey Esquire, as recorded in an inscription on plaster in the north-east ground floor room, and was occupied from 1774. It is traditionally attributed to James Wyatt, and if so represents his earliest dated work. The original design was a large Palladian symmetrical villa comprising a main block with pavilions linked by quadrant corridors. The north pavilion and quadrant link were demolished in 1955, when the clock was moved to the parish church and two fireplaces were transferred to The Golden Parsonage. The south pavilion and east wall of the quadrant link were demolished around 1963 due to dry rot. A conservatory was added in 1881. The house was gutted by fire in February 1905 and was rebuilt in 1908 by architect Cole A. Adams for the Halsey family, retaining the old external shell. The balustrade on the main front is said to have replaced the original blocking course during this 1908 restoration.

The external walls are constructed of Totternhoe stone ashlar with dressings renewed in the 20th century in Bath stone. The podium is finished in Roman Cement lined as ashlar on red brick, with a hipped slate roof behind a parapet. The building is five windows wide on its main fronts, four windows at the ends, and comprises two storeys, an attic, and basement. A terastyle Ionic portico of full height fronts the three middle bays of the west front, with a triangular pediment and 16 stone steps. The dentilled cornice runs around the entire block with parapet and balustraded panels above the windows. The ground floor windows on the east and west fronts have moulded stone shouldered architraves with trusses and cornices emphasising those at ground level. The windows are plate glass sashes. The pavilions, now demolished, were originally two storeys and basement, facing east, three windows wide, with projecting central bays on east and west fronts featuring Venetian windows and pediments.

The 1881 conservatory against the convex west face of the surviving south-east quadrant corridor has a dentilled entablature breaking forward over Composite order columns with urns above. It contains transomed tall two-light windows.

The interior retains the original symmetrical disposition of spaces, though the classical interiors are substantially of 1908 reconstruction. Notable survivals include an original six-panel mahogany door in the drawing room east wall with enriched mouldings and a commemorative brass plate. A fire surround with Wedgewood plaques, similar to one at The Golden Parsonage, bears an inscribed plate dating its installation to after the 1905 fire.

The entrance from the east leads through double doors in a stone doorcase into a square outer hall with black and white marble chequered floor and fan-design plaster ceiling. Three doors open from this hall: the left leads to a panelled library with dark wood bookcases and a fireplace on the west wall; the right gives access to service rooms and a nursery at the north-east corner; and the central door opens to the inner hall. The central inner hall features panelling to the lower walls, an oval open centre to the ceiling in a double-height space, and fluted Ionic columns supporting a domed oval rooflight. A wide balustraded wooden staircase rises beside the south and west walls to an arcaded first floor in an asymmetrical form; the original staircase presumably occupied a compartment south of the central hall, which was appropriated for bathrooms and plumbing in 1908. A service stair is located to the north of the hall.

A large saloon occupies the middle three bays of the west front behind the portico, with a drawing room to the south and dining room to the north. Throughout the principal rooms there are six-panel mahogany moulded doors, moulded cornices, skirtings, doorcases, and appropriate fire surrounds. A columned screen was introduced at the west end of the drawing room. In the basement there is a groin-vaulted servants' hall.