The Wakes (including Museum Flat and the Flat)

The Wakes is a house of considerable historical significance, famously the home of the naturalist Gilbert White (1720-1793), and now serving as a museum. The building’s origins lie in the 16th century with a timber-framed hall, reflecting local building styles. It has undergone extensive extensions and alterations over the centuries, evolving into the irregular group seen today. Its development from the early 18th century is documented visually within various editions of ‘The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne’.

The front wall is predominantly 19th century brickwork, with a Flemish bond pattern visible in the dining room. A service wing features local malmstone ashlar with brick dressings. The roof is complex, comprised mainly of hips to the east front and gables to the rear, with a variety of Tudor chimneys.

A service range to the south end, altered from smaller original buildings, dates to 1910. The house has two storeys and irregular fenestration, with sash windows in the central, 18th-century section and casements elsewhere. A gabled porch provides the main entrance, featuring open decorative timber framing on a base wall. The rear of the house displays malmstone walls with brick quoins, a first-floor band, some cambered arches, and a plinth, alongside casements and traditional doors. The north side exhibits brickwork with tile-hung upper floors and casements, including two large two-storeyed bays.

Internally, the central hall features a low ceiling with 17th-century stop-chamfered spine beams with run-out stops and a fireplace with insertions into the original open structure. A 17th-century room (study) is associated with an altered staircase tower on the southwest side, while a room (dining room) of 1794 occupies the southeast side. North of the hall is the Great Parlour, built by White in 1777 as a single-storeyed, large room, connected to a library constructed around 1850. An upper floor was added to the parlour and library around 1880, followed by a two-storeyed billiard room at the north end in the early 20th century. A passageway links the billiard room to the hall along the front of the house, with a porch added to the front facade at that time.