Water Garden, Rock Garden And Former Rose Garden Structures To East Of Ashton Wold House, Including Dovecote, Swimming Pool And Sundial

This collection of garden structures and formal gardens dates to around 1900, with the swimming pool added in the mid-20th century. They were probably designed by William Huckvale for Lord Rothschild and his son Nathaniel Charles Rothschild.

Materials and Construction

The dovecote is built of coursed rock-faced limestone, occasionally snecked, with a thatched roof. Balustrades flanking the steps between gardens are of similar construction, with ashlar limestone coping. These balustrades also edge the pond in the water garden. Other walls and features use random rubble construction. The wall between the third terrace and water garden, and the low wall between the rock garden and water garden, are skilfully built in random polygonal stone with random upright stone coping.

Layout

Together with the terraces to the east and south of the house, the water garden, rock garden and former rose garden form the formal component of the designed landscape around Ashton Wold House. They create a series of three quadrangles below the east terrace, bounded by a wall to the south and merging into woodland to the east. Only the hard landscaping survives; no planting schemes remain.

Water Garden

The water garden contains a lily pond surrounded by a low wall with ashlar limestone coping. This wall rises to form curved walls at both east and west ends, constructed in a rustic version of the coursed limestone seen in the dovecote, house and many other estate buildings. Each curved wall has four low piers, with both walls and piers capped with ashlar limestone coping.

The south boundary is formed by a separately listed wall. To the west stands the wall retaining the third terrace south of the house. This wall exceeds two metres in height and its construction allows for small niches for plants. A full-height opening in the wall, with ashlar limestone surround and Tudor arch, gives access to an enclosed stone stair rising to the terrace above. The east boundary consists of a tumble of stone containing only a series of niches as coherent features.

Rock Garden and Dovecote

This tumble of stone also forms the eastern boundary of the rock garden to the north. A low wall divides the water garden and rock garden. At the centre of this dividing wall, two sets of hemispherical steps connect the gardens—one convex, the other concave. These hemispheres meet at low piers to form a circle.

At the centre of the rock garden stands a dovecote, surrounded by a now-dry pond, with ponds or damp areas at each corner. Causeways to north and south provide access to the dovecote. This square structure has a thatched roof rising to form a domed cap surmounted by a weather vane. Its eaves lift to form eyebrows over dove holes on all four sides. Below the dove holes are three-light mullioned windows with small leaded panes.

Former Rose Garden, Swimming Pool and Sundial

Steps with flanking low balustrades rise from the rock garden to a wrought iron gate. This gate gives access to the former rose garden through an overgrown hedge forming the boundary between the two gardens. The pool that replaced the rose garden is rectangular with apsidal ends to east and west.

Steps to the terrace lie on the west side of the garden, and the terrace wall forms the garden's western boundary. The garden also contains a sundial with a circular top (the gnomon is missing) supported on a vase-shaped base. The bowl of the vase is clasped between leaves, and the neck is wreathed in floral swags. The tiered circular base stands on a two-tier octagonal plinth. Surrounding woodland encroaches onto the garden.

Historical Background

The Ashton Estate, stretching from the River Nene near Oundle in the west to Ashton Wold in the east, has been occupied since Roman times. In the 18th century it was a well-known sporting estate, with avenues of chestnut trees planted in a cross as rides and a number of fox coverts. In the early 19th century the estate was owned by William Walcot and largely farmed by tenants, with Ashton Wold continuing as sporting ground. However, there is no evidence it ever contained a manor house. When Lionel Rothschild purchased it in 1860, the sale particulars described it as "a very valuable and important landed estate" with sporting advantages, but no house adapted for a gentleman's occupation.

Both Lionel Rothschild and his son Nathaniel Mayer, 1st Lord Rothschild (1840-1915), showed little interest in the estate. The only 19th-century structural work was the building of a hunting lodge at Ashton Wold. However, when Lord Rothschild's second son, Nathaniel Charles (1877-1923)—known as Charles—discovered Ashton by accident whilst on a butterfly-collecting expedition with the vicar of Polebrook, he was so impressed by the rich fauna and flora of Ashton Wold that he persuaded his father to build him a house on the site of the hunting lodge.

In 1900 Lord Rothschild commissioned William Huckvale to design not only a house but a model farm and an entire complement of estate buildings. These included the Steward's house, stables, gardeners' accommodation, a building to house a fire engine, a petrol store, kennels (now derelict) and a dog hospital. Most of the cottages at nearby Ashton were rebuilt to create a model village. The Rothschilds also became the first landowners in the country to provide their tenants with the luxury of both running filtered water and electricity. Electricity was generated by turbines housed in an old mill below the village on the River Nene, from where water was pumped to a water tower and distributed to estate buildings. Each cottage had a bath house and was placed in a large garden planted with a lilac, a laburnum and fruit trees.

High-quality design and workmanship were consistent themes throughout the estate, where traditional vernacular building traditions were faithfully referenced. Simple working and garden buildings and features were consciously afforded the same care as the dwellings, farmsteads and garden structures.

The Architect

Little is known about William Huckvale (1847-1936), who worked mainly for the Rothschilds and therefore had no need to publicise his work in architectural journals. He was not a member of the RIBA. After setting up his own practice in London, he came into contact with Alexander Parks, agent to Lord Rothschild. He designed a number of buildings for the Rothschilds on the Tring Park estate, undertook considerable work at the Rothschild bank in New Court in the City of London, and was the architect for the Royal Mint Refinery. He also carried out work on the Rothschild estate at Aston Clinton. The quality of his work is reflected in the 42 listed buildings he already has to his name: 13 in Tring and 29 on the Ashton Estate.

The Gardens and Their Evolution

Charles Rothschild not only worked full time for the family banking firm but was also a renowned naturalist, becoming the leading expert on fleas in the country. He published around 150 scientific papers and was also interested in other fields, including the cultivation of rare orchids, irises and water lilies. The formal gardens at Ashton Wold were the creation of Rothschild and his wife and are contemporary with the house. The walled rock garden and dovecote are shown on the estate map of 1901, but the other formal gardens—the water garden and formally laid out rose garden with sundial—seem to have been a slightly later addition. They appear on the 1926 Ordnance Survey map and in photographs dated around 1906.

The rose garden was Mrs Rozsika Rothschild's and seems to have survived until her death in 1940. The roses were later replaced by a swimming pool, shown on the Ordnance Survey map of 1952. Charles Rothschild's collection of water lilies was nurtured in the water garden and in tanks in a specially built greenhouse. However, he was primarily a naturalist and pioneer conservationist rather than a horticulturalist, arguing that the whole natural habitat needed to be protected, not just rare species. He bought part of Wicken Fen in 1899, donating it to the National Trust two years later, and formed the Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves in 1912 (now the Royal Society for Nature Conservation). Although the terraces and walled gardens around Ashton Wold House took a conventional Edwardian form, he took care to ensure that the planting attracted butterflies and other wildlife, while new habitats were formed in the wider designed landscape, much of which remained as woodland.

Following his death in 1923 and that of his wife Rozsika in 1940, their daughter Miriam (1908-2005) inherited the estate. The house was commandeered for use as a hospital during the Second World War and the gardens and estate suffered much damage and neglect. Dispersed accommodation blocks were built in Ashton Wold woods for the RAF and the American Eighth Air Force billeted at nearby Polebrook Airfield. On Miriam's return to live permanently at Ashton Wold in 1971, she commissioned Claude Phillimore (1911-1994) to reduce the size of the house.

Like her father, Miriam Rothschild was deeply involved in conservation, and her approach to gardening developed into a preference for wildness over formality. She transformed the Edwardian garden at Ashton Wold by planting trees on the terraces and sowing wildflower meadows on the lawns, while the house was concealed under a cover of climbing plants (removed since her death). Her advocacy of wildflowers became highly influential in the gardening world. Her father had taught her to be a naturalist, and she continued his work with fleas to become an international expert in her own right. She was a fellow of the Royal Society, was awarded eight honorary degrees and was appointed DBE for her services to the study of natural history.