Kiddington Hall And Adjoining Orangery

Kiddington Hall and adjoining orangery is a country house dating from circa 1850, designed by Charles Barry, although it incorporates a core dating from 1673. The building is constructed of squared and coursed limestone with ashlar dressings and has a hipped slate roof.

The main house follows a square plan with a service range adjoining to the north and an orangery adjoining to the north-west. It was remodelled in an Italianate style and consists of two storeys with an attic. The building features a chamfered plinth, first-floor cill string, quoin strips at the angles, deep bracketed eaves and a balustraded parapet with horizontally-symmetrical turned balusters, panelled square dies and large urn finials. The ashlar chimney stacks have bracketed cornices, though some were removed at the time of survey in April 1987.

The east entrance front is arranged in a 1:3:1 bay pattern with a recessed centre. The openings have plate-glass sashes with moulded architraves and bracketed cills to the first floor. A central three-bay stone porch features a plinth, impost band, paired three-quarter Tuscan columns on pedestals supporting sections of architrave, a continuous frieze and cornice, and a balustraded parapet with drop balusters. The porch has round-arched plate-glass windows with moulded architraves and raised keystones, and a central pair of half-glazed doors with fanlight and moulded architrave. The stone walls feature vermiculated rustication and lions.

The south garden front has plate-glass sashes, tripartite in the end bays, with moulded architraves. The ground floor features pulvinated friezes with moulded cornices, and the first floor has bracketed cills. Pairs of low double doors stand beneath the central sashes of the end bays.

The west garden front is arranged in a 1:6:1 bay pattern with a recessed centre, containing plate-glass sashes with moulded architraves, pulvinated friezes with moulded cornices to the ground floor and bracketed cills to the first floor.

The service range to the north is two storeys high with cill bands and two ashlar ridge stacks. It comprises five bays with glazing bar sashes having plain architraves.

The orangery to the north-west, also dated to circa 1850 and designed by Barry in an Italianate style, is constructed of ashlar. It is arranged in a 1:8:1 bay pattern featuring a round-arched arcade with square piers, pilasters with pedestals and carved foliate capitals. The arcade has moulded architraves and carved spandrels depicting flowers and small animals. The imposts have moulded architraves and raised keystones with flanking Tuscan pilasters. A continuous entablature with dentil cornice and balustraded parapet with square dies and urn finials runs the length of the front. Three-bay arcaded returns flank the main section; the left return has a walled arch to the right and blind arches to the left, whilst the right return has a balustraded arch to the left, a central blind arch and a window to the right with margin lights. The interior of the orangery features an arched recess in the left-hand end, and end bays that are arcaded on each side with margin-light glazing in the inner arches, tiled floors and moulded plaster cornices to flat ceilings. The orangery formerly had a cast-iron roof construction, evidence of which survives as rebates in the front piers, but this has been replaced by a late twentieth-century sloping roof.

A two-bay link block connects the orangery to the house, featuring round-arched margin-light windows, moulded imposts, moulded architraves, raised keystones, Tuscan pilasters, entablature and blocking course. A small vestibule between the orangery and link block has an apse to the rear and a moulded cornice. It contains a pair of glazed doors and steps down to the interior of the link, which has a glazed-tile floor, pilasters and niches in the rear wall, with a pair of three-panelled doors opening into the house, featuring a cornice and semi-circular tympanum.

The interior of the main house includes a principal staircase hall with a polection-moulded fireplace and an eighteenth-century-style three-flight staircase with closed string, turned balusters and square newel posts. A drawing room is decorated in Rococo style with painted scrolls on canvas, an enriched cornice and ceiling medallion. The dining room has a carved marble fireplace and a ceiling with shallow plaster enrichment. A small drawing room, also in Rococo style, features doorcases, a fireplace with lugged architrave and a ceiling with shallow plaster enrichment. The library contains neo-Classical friezes and a marble fireplace. The billiard room has dado panelling and a fireplace.

Although not easily visible, the house appears to incorporate a seventeenth-century core, probably in the entrance range, evidenced by the masonry in the front wall and the irregular roof line.

The Hall stands within a small landscaped park laid out by Capability Brown circa 1740, or possibly in the 1760s. The park incorporates a serpentine lake formed by the damming of the River Glyme. Brown worked here circa 1740 before being engaged as gardener at Stowe. The park also contains formal gardens and terraces, a dovecote, the church of Saint Nicholas and other park structures. The park and gardens are registered by Historic England as Grade II.