The Temple of Flora

The Temple of Flora is a Grade I listed temple located in Stourton with Gasper, built between 1744 and 1746 by Henry Flitcroft for Henry Hoare. It is constructed of limestone ashlar and stucco, topped with a hipped slate roof. The temple features a tetrastyle Doric portico with an entablature that includes triglyphs and bucrania, as well as a moulded pediment. The central double doors are made up of six fielded panels within a moulded architrave topped by a broken pediment, and there is a Latin inscription from the Aeneid above the door, flanked by large 12-pane sash windows. The side walls are blind and rendered.

Inside, the rectangular space has a semi-circular niche on the back wall that houses a Coade stone copy of the Borghese Vase, created by Daniel Pincot around 1772. Circular niches on the side walls contain marble female busts. The Temple also includes a significant contemporary group of altars and seats, or pulvinaria, which are copies of those found in Montfaucon's Supplement to Antiquity Explained from 1725. The Temple was one of the first features added to the gardens by Henry Hoare, predating the lake, and the mason responsible for its construction was William Privet of Chilmark. The Borghese Vase was originally located in the Venetian Seat but was dismantled in the 1790s by Colt Hoare.