Walls, Steps And Sphinxes To Garden South Of Oldway Mansion

PAIGNTON

SX8861 TORQUAY ROAD 1947-1/4/105 (West side) Walls, steps and sphinxes to garden south of Oldway Mansion

GV II

Walls to garden S of Oldway Mansion, including flights of steps and sphinxes. c1907-1907, contemporary with the remodelling of Oldway Mansion (qv) for Paris Singer. Grounds laid out by A Duchesne, the leading French formal landscape architect. Concrete walls; paved terrace; white Italian marble sphinxes. Plain, low, coped concrete wall to paved terrace immediately in front of the house, with flights of steps up from the south garden. Central flight of steps is flanked by fine C18 style sphinxes, described in Pevsner as "delightfully haughty", with elaborate hairstyles, earrings and fichus. Low, coped concrete walls to W and E of the garden return at the N end with a flight of steps up to the lawn. Part of the setting of Oldway Mansion, the sphinxes setting off the erotic scuplture in the pediment of the south front. (Buildings of England: Pevsner N: Devon: London: 1952-1989: 839-40).

Listing NGR: SX8877661504