Park Place And Terraced Garden On West Side

Park Place is a large country house, now a special school, situated within a landscaped park. It was built in 1870 by Thomas Cundy in a French Renaissance style. The house is constructed of rendered brick with string courses at ground and first floor levels, and an impost level on the second floor. It has a slate mansard roof. The building is two storeys high, with a partial basement and attics.

The front of the house features a slightly projecting, symmetrical three-bay frontispiece with a pavilion roof, adorned with two levels of dormer windows. The upper lucarnes have finials, and the double centre dormer has a central segmental pediment. A projecting porte cochere has antae and columns, leading to double entrance doors with a half-glazed surround in a semi-circular shape. To the left of the frontispiece are two bays with a pavilioned roof and three dormers, with the central dormer featuring a stone pediment. A similar bay is positioned to the right of the frontispiece. Further along the west front, there is a three-storey tower with an attic, topped with a steep truncated pyramidal roof and a parapet featuring moulded stone brackets above the third storey. This tower has stone balconies supported by moulded stone brackets with decorative wrought iron balustrades, and three coupled round-headed sash windows within moulded surrounds on the third storey. A single sash window is present on the first floor, and a square-headed sash with a pedimented surround on the ground floor.

The west front mirrors the style, incorporating two two-storey angular bays with a heavy moulded cornice and sash windows in moulded surrounds. Beyond this front lies a terraced garden, now grassed, accessed from an upper terrace by a forked flight of stone steps. The steps have moulded stone balusters, a moulded handrail, plain dies, and stone urns at intervals, continuing as a balustrade to a high ashlar retaining wall. This wall contains two segmental arched niches with vermiculated voissoirs and moulded keystones, positioned on either side of the steps. The garden is further bounded by a low stone wall with raised, moulded corner panels and urns at intervals.

Inside, the vestibule leads to a large entrance hall with a central, decorated opening through a three-arched arcade to an elegant two-storey stair hall. The stair hall contains a three-flight forked staircase with turned wooden balusters, elaborate wrought iron decoration between the balusters, a moulded handrail, and newels; an oval, domed ceiling tops the hall. Facing the stairs is a six-panelled door within a moulded surround, accompanied by niches on either side with wooden, Jacobean-style moulded surrounds. Various similar panelled doors are found in the hall, complemented by a matching dado. The principal rooms on the ground floor feature decorated plaster ceilings, some of which are quite elaborate.

The site of the present house was previously occupied by an 18th-century house built by Lord Archibald Hamilton, who later sold the estate to Frederick, Prince of Wales, father of George III. In 1752, the estate was purchased by General (later Field Marshal) The Hon. Henry Seymour Conway, who laid out the grounds, built the Grotto at the head of Happy Valley, the bridge at the foot of that valley, and created the Braid Temple—all of which are listed separately.