Wakehurst Place

ARDINGLY TURNERS HILL ROAD 1. 5405 Wakehurst Place TQ 33 SW 6/437 28.10.57 I

2. The property of the National Trust. Administered by Kew Gardens. This house was built by Sir Edward Culpeper in 1590. It originally formed a complete court-yard, but the south side of this was demolished before 1697. The east and west sides were shortened by two-thirds in 1848 and refaced on their south front with old stone. The house is therefore E-shaped today. It was restored by Sir Aston Webb for Sir William Boord in 1890. The whole of the south front was taken down, the stones numbered and replaced after careful restoration in 1938. The house is built of Sussex sandstone ashlar with a Horsham slab roof. 3-storeys. 7 windows. The wings have gables with kneelers, coping and ball finials at the apex and above the kneelers. In the centre is a smaller projection of 3-storeys surmounted by a similar scrolled gable. On its ground floor is the porch having a round headed doorway with Doric columns on pedestals with a cornice over, and the initials E. C. The first floor window above is flanked by similar Ionic pilasters with a triangular pediment over having a statue on each side of this. Between the porch and the wings are 2 gabled dormers on each side, the outer ones projecting slightly with a bay below them on ground and first floors. The inner face of the wings have similar dormers. Four-light casement windows with stone mullions and transoms. The north-east wing and the 1-storey wing on the east were added by the Marchioness of Downshire in 1869-70; and the north porch by Sir Aston Webb for lord Wakehurst in 1903. The interior has its contemporary staircase; also panelling, fireplaces and over-mantels, but the position of these has been moved in several cases. Manners Sutton, Speaker of the House of Commons, later Viscount Canterbury, and Sir Alexander Cockburn, Lord Chief Justice, were tenants of the house in the eighteen thirties.

Listing NGR: TQ3395031418