Pulhamite Fernery, Bromley Palace Park

The Pulhamite fernery, located in Bromley Palace Park, was constructed around 1865 by the firm of Pulhams, specialist garden contractors. It is a notable example of artificial rockwork created using Pulhamite, a technique developed by James Pulham (c.1820-98).

The fernery consists of a curving mass of linear, layered Pulhamite rockwork, roughly 15 meters across and 5 meters deep. Several individual rocks exceed a cubic meter in volume. The structure is set into a bank at the northern end of the lake. A central cleft allows water to flow into a basin at the base, then a further 5 meters to St Blaise's Well, which in turn feeds directly into the lake. The rockwork’s exterior has a brown, sandy finish, although one layer reveals a bluish rock, possibly natural. In places, the exterior skin has detached, exposing the core of scrap brickwork and cement.

Pulhamite rockwork was created by assembling scrap brickwork, covering it in cement, and molding it into boulder-like forms to simulate natural rock. The surface finishes were varied to create convincing imitations of different rock types. Following boundary changes to the bishopric in 1845, Bromley Palace became the private residence of Coles Child, a coal merchant. In 1863, Child engaged Richard Norman Shaw as architect to extend the house and employed James Pulham for five years to create a fernery and waterfall within the grounds. The fernery is situated at the north end of the lake, with the waterfall located to the south.

The fernery is designated a building of group value due to its significance as a well-preserved example of 19th-century artificial rockwork by James Pulham's firm and its setting within an altered mid-19th century landscape, situated at the edge of a lake, surrounded by trees.