East And West Lodges, Little Horwood Manor

East and West Lodges, Little Horwood Manor

A semi-detached pair of gate lodges built in 1938-39 to designs by the architect ASG Butler. They were commissioned as part of a wider hunting box complex including Little Horwood Manor itself, built for George Gee, an industrialist and partner in the engineering and building firm Gee Walker Slater. Gee reportedly undertook to complete the entire project within a year, a challenge allegedly issued by a Rothschild in the hunting field.

The lodges stand north of the house, separated from it by lawns and trees. They form a symmetrical two-storey range running parallel with the road. The buildings are constructed from the same materials as the house and stables: dark buff brick (mainly in Flemish bond), ashlar for detailing, and red tile roofs. The overall style reflects the Lutyenesque character of the main house, described as "a kind of watered-down Lutyens in the manner of Nuffield College, Oxford", incorporating the broad architectural themes of the estate.

The frontage is U-plan, with a central arched stone entrance in ashlar surmounted by an open segmental pediment and three tall pylons. This archway, which flanked by narrow slit-like windows, originally served as the main entrance to the estate until the drive was realigned away from the lodges around 1984. Each lodge has a broad end range projecting slightly forward, finished with a deep Dutch gable. Set in the inner angles to the rear, flanking the stone entrance archway which carries a false balcony above with stone balustrade, are tower-like projections with hipped roofs and oculi to the first floor. Oak casement windows throughout echo those of the house and stables. The well-detailed flanking walls enclose small courtyard gardens and are of special interest. The West Lodge has a modern conservatory attached to its side and a brick garage of circa 1990, neither of special interest.

The East Lodge contains three bedrooms and the West Lodge four, with the additional bedroom in the West Lodge situated above the archway. The East Lodge retains a simple staircase with plain stick balusters, though the interior has undergone much modernisation within the original plan form. The West Lodge interior was not inspected. The principal architectural interest lies in the exterior elevations rather than the interiors.

The integrated arch form of gate lodge was commonly used from the early 18th century onwards to announce the main entrance to a park, as great houses increasingly retreated to private settings beyond public view. The form traces its ancestry through Elizabethan and Jacobean gatehouse towers back to medieval castle and manor gatehouses, and ultimately to the triumphal arches of the classical world. At Little Horwood, the lodges further develop the varied Arts and Crafts themes of the main house, notably through the Dutch gables on the main elevation, while echoing other features used in the house and stables such as the towers and fine ashlar work for the entrance, with references to 17th-century precedent. The composition is highly successful as an integral part of the carefully designed 1938-39 hunting box complex.

The house was apparently never used by Gee. During the Second World War it was requisitioned by the government. After the war the complex was sold and remained largely mothballed until 1984, when the house was subdivided, the stables converted to residential use, and the main approach reconfigured, removing the arch from active use.

ASG Butler, today best known as Lutyenesque biographer, was principally an architect with a country house practice who also designed libraries and churches. During the 1920s and 1930s he worked on new buildings and refurbishments of older country houses, and a number of his commissions are listed.