The Manor Of Groves

The Manor of Groves

Country house. Originally a house from an earlier period, substantially remodelled in the early 19th century, probably for Thomas Nathaniel Williams who owned it in 1823. The site sits at the manorial centre of lands that belonged to Reading Abbey until the Dissolution. The building is set in a small park facing south.

The house is constructed in stucco in the neo-classical style with hipped slate roofs. Large two-storey pavilions appear to have been added to either end of a lower, earlier three-storey central section. The entire composition is fronted by a continuous projecting stone loggia or colonnade, designed in the manner of Henry Holland's remodelling of Southill House, Bedfordshire (1796-1800). The Doric colonnade has eight bays with fine Portland stone columns said to come from London Bridge. The entablature and balustrade with die over each column are executed in yellow stone. The loggia is paved in grey and white marble, with column spacing adjusted next to the east pavilion to accommodate a glazed timber screen. Channelled plaster pilasters in the central section are differently spaced, suggesting an earlier loggia that was confined to this part.

The west pavilion contains a high kitchen with a bedroom above. The east pavilion formerly contained the dining room, entrance hall and staircase, with the drawing room probably on the first floor. This wing was altered and sympathetically extended northwards around 1904, possibly by Alfred Burr FRIBA (a signed survey plan of the house documents this). A semicircular Ionic east porch, visible in old photographs of around 1914, no longer exists.

The long south front features three casement windows along the central section and two sash windows to each pavilion. The hipped roofs of the pavilions have broad eaves overhang with paired brackets to the painted soffit. Recessed sash windows with 6/6 panes appear on each floor. The lower centre has three hipped dormers breaking through the eaves, and three-light wooden casement windows with small panes on the first floor.

The entrance front faces east and displays channelled rustication to the lower floor with round-headed windows, each recessed within an arch and with a sunk panel below. Two-light wooden casements with margin lights and heavy central meeting rails are used throughout. An elliptical-coved head to the doorway diminishes to a semicircular inner doorway between slender fluted Greek Doric columns in the angles. Flanking tapered pilasters and a semicircular step remain from an earlier external stone porch. The smooth stucco upper part has projecting moulded window surrounds to tall sash windows with 6/6 panes. Originally this facade had three widely spaced windows with the entrance door below the righthand window. The extension to the north produced a six-window elevation with the original door remaining in the centre but with new matching windows, more closely spaced, to the right on each floor.

At the west end of the loggia stands a small single-storey billiard room in slate and stucco with a very large three-sided canted wooden bay window on the south containing sashes. A 19th-century building at the west end rises higher with a serrated northlight roof. Shallow additions in painted brick form a service court to the rear (north).

The interior features an elaborate and unusual cantilevered stair in hardwood set in a sub-rectangular stairwell lit by a tall sash window with margin lights. Moulded panelled doors curved on plan are positioned at the angles of the ground floor, with round-headed niches at the half-landing flanking the door to the older part of the house. Modillioned plaster cornices with paterae decorate the principal rooms. Carved white marble fire surrounds appear in the drawing room and bedroom above (the south rooms of the east pavilion). Glazed double doors with semicircular fanlight and an elaborate arrangement of folding shutters are located on the inside of the entrance.

A fine neo-classical small country house.