Patshull Hall is a substantial Georgian mansion house situated near Pattingham in

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

, England. It is a

Grade I listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

and by repute is one of the largest listed buildings in the county.

History

The Hall was built to designs by architect

James Gibbs James Gibbs (23 December 1682 – 5 August 1754) was a Scottish architect. Born in Aberdeen, he trained as an architect in Rome, and practised mainly in England. He is an important figure whose work spanned the transition between English Ba ...

for Sir John Astley in about 1730. The main façade is of three storeys with seven bays, three of which are pedimented, and tower wings. The west wing, of monolithic proportions, has four storeys. The house was set in a park of some created by

Capability Brown Lancelot "Capability" Brown (born c. 1715–16, baptised 30 August 1716 – 6 February 1783) was an English gardener and landscape architect, a notable figure in the history of the English landscape garden style. Unlike other architects ...

and including a large serpentine lake. The estate was acquired for £100,000 in 1765 by Sir George Pigot, ( Baron Pigot from 1766), on his retirement as

Governor of Madras This is a list of the governors, agents, and presidents of colonial Madras, initially of the English East India Company, up to the end of British colonial rule in 1947. English Agents In 1639, the grant of Madras to the English was finalized ...

. The Pigot family sold the property to William Legge, 5th Earl of Dartmouth in 1848, whose son and heir Viscount Lewisham took residence. Substantial extensions and improvements were carried out for him by architect

William Burn William Burn (20 December 1789 – 15 February 1870) was a Scottish architect. He received major commissions from the age of 20 until his death at 81. He built in many styles and was a pioneer of the Scottish Baronial Revival, often referred ...

in the 1880s. The Legges later moved their seat to Plas Newydd on

Anglesey Anglesey ( ; ) is an island off the north-west coast of Wales. It forms the bulk of the Principal areas of Wales, county known as the Isle of Anglesey, which also includes Holy Island, Anglesey, Holy Island () and some islets and Skerry, sker ...

. During the 20th century the house served as a rehabilitation centre in the 1940s and then until the 1980s as an orthopaedic hospital. In 1990 the estate was broken up and many acres were sold for the creation of a golf course; a classical temple created by

was converted to become the clubhouse. During the 1990s the house fell into disrepair and was briefly used as a school. In 1996 the house had suffered extensive decay and had deteriorated so badly that it appeared on the

English heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, a battlefield, medieval castles, Roman forts, historic industrial sites, Lis ...

list of Buildings at Risk. Patshull Hall was bought in 1997 by Neil Avery, a renovation specialist and

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value in ways that generally entail beyond the minimal amount of risk (assumed by a traditional business), and potentially involving values besides simply economic ones. An entreprene ...

, as a restoration project and the house was subsequently removed from the Buildings at Risk register. The Hall was later purchased in 2015. The house is being further renovated and is now used as a private family home.

References

Classical Ruin Rescue

English Heritage; Images of England, photograph and architectural description of listed building

Patshull Hall entry from The DiCamillo Companion to British & Irish Country Houses

English Heritage; Images of England, photograph

English Heritage; Images of England, photograph South front

Staffordshire Past TrackEvolution History : Patshull Hall
{{Staffordshire Grade I listed houses in Staffordshire James Gibbs buildings Houses completed in 1730 Country houses in Staffordshire South Staffordshire District

History

See also

References