Speke Hall is a wood-framed

wattle-and-daub Wattle and daub is a composite building method in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called " wattle" is "daubed" with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, and straw. Wattle and daub has been used for ...

Tudor manor house in

Speke Speke () is a suburb of Liverpool, Merseyside, England. It is southeast of the city centre. Located near the widest part of the River Mersey, it is bordered by the suburbs of Garston and Hunts Cross, and nearby to Halewood, Hale Village, ...

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. It is one of the finest surviving examples of its kind. It is owned by the

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

and 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 ...

History

Construction of the current building began under Sir William Norris in 1530, though earlier buildings had been on the site, parts of which are incorporated into today's structure. The

Great Hall A great hall is the main room of a royal palace, castle or a large manor house or hall house in the Middle Ages. It continued to be built in the country houses of the 16th and early 17th centuries, although by then the family used the great cha ...

was the first part of the house to be built, in 1530. The Great (or Oak) Parlour wing was added in 1531. Around this time the North Bay was also added to the house. Between 1540 and 1570 the south wing was altered and extended. The west wing was added between 1546 and 1547. The last significant change to the building was in 1598, when the north range was added by Edward Norris. Since then there have only been minor changes to the Hall and gardens. The oak frame, typical of the period, rests on a base of red

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

surrounded by a now dry moat. The main beams of the house are stiffened with smaller timbers and filled with

wattle and daub Wattle and daub is a composite material, composite building method in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called "wattle (construction), wattle" is "daubed" with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, and ...

. During the turmoil of the

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

the Norrises were Roman Catholics so the house incorporated a

priest hole A priest hole is a hiding place for a priest built in England or Wales during the period when Catholics were persecuted by law. Following the accession of Queen Elizabeth I to the throne in 1558, there were several Catholic plots designed to remo ...

and a special observation hole built into a chimney in a bedroom to allow the occupant to see the approach to the house to warn the priest that people were coming. There is also an eavesdrop (a small open hole under the eaves of the house) which allowed a servant to listen in on the conversations of people awaiting admission at the original front door. In 1612 a porch was added to the Great Parlour. A laundry and dairy were founded in 1860; the laundry was altered in the 1950s. The house was owned by the Norris family for many generations until 1736 when Mary Norris, the heiress, married Lord Sidney Beauclerk. After Mary's death in 1766 the house was leased to various tenants. Richard Watt, a Liverpool merchant, purchased the house and estate from the Beauclerks in 1795. The last surviving heir of the Watt family was Miss Adelaide Watt, who inherited the house and returned to it in 1878 at the age of 21 years. She died in 1921, leaving the house and estate in trust for 21 years, during which time it was looked after by the staff under the supervision of Thomas Whatmore, who had been butler to Miss Watt. At the end of this period, in 1943, the house passed into the ownership of the

. The house was administered by Liverpool City Corporation from 1946 until 1974 when it passed to

Merseyside County Council Merseyside County Council (MCC) was, from 1974 to 1986, the upper-tier administrative body for Merseyside, a metropolitan county in North West England. MCC existed for a total of twelve years. It was established on 1 April 1974 by the Local Gov ...

who carried out a seven-year programme of major structural repairs and restoration which was completed in 1983. The National Trust took over full responsibility in 1986. The gardens date from the 1850s. In the courtyard of the main building are two ancient

yew Yew is a common name given to various species of trees. It is most prominently given to any of various coniferous trees and shrubs in the genus '' Taxus'': * European yew or common yew (''Taxus baccata'') * Pacific yew or western yew ('' Taxus ...

trees, male and female, called 'Adam' and 'Eve'. First recorded in correspondence dating to 1712, they are estimated to be at least 500 years old.

21st century

The Home Farm building has been renovated and now houses the shop, restaurant and reception. The

laundry Laundry is the washing of clothing and other textiles, and, more broadly, their drying and ironing as well. Laundry has been part of history since humans began to wear clothes, so the methods by which different cultures have dealt with this u ...

has been converted into the education room and the

dairy A dairy is a place where milk is stored and where butter, cheese, and other dairy products are made, or a place where those products are sold. It may be a room, a building, or a larger establishment. In the United States, the word may also des ...

contains interpretation material. Furthermore, rooms such as a gun room have been changed over the years and then changed back by the National Trust in order to show more of the History of Speke Hall. Walks in the grounds give panoramic views over the

Mersey The River Mersey () is a major river in North West England. Its name derives from Old English and means "boundary river", possibly referring to its having been a border between the ancient kingdoms of Mercia and Northumbria. For centuries it ...

estuary towards the

Wirral Peninsula The Wirral Peninsula (), known locally as the Wirral, is a peninsula in North West England. The roughly rectangular peninsula is about long and wide, and is bounded by the Dee Estuary to the west, the Mersey Estuary to the east, and Liverpo ...

Liverpool John Lennon Airport Liverpool John Lennon Airport is an international airport serving Liverpool, England, on the estuary of the River Mersey south-east of Liverpool city centre. Scheduled domestic, European, North African and Middle Eastern services are oper ...

is adjacent to Speke Hall. The house received 224,913 visitors in 2019.

In Art and Literature

An engraving of a painting of the great hall by

Thomas Allom Thomas Allom (13 March 1804 – 21 October 1872) was an English architect, artist, and topographical view, topographical illustrator. He was a founding member of what became the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). He designed many bui ...

was published in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1835, with a poetical illustration by

Letitia Elizabeth Landon Letitia Elizabeth Landon (14 August 1802 – 15 October 1838) was an English poet and novelist, better known by her initials L.E.L. Landon's writings are emblematic of the transition from Romanticism to Victorian literature. Her first major b ...

Images

Speke Hall, Liverpool.jpg, Speke Hall from the rear Speke Hall courtyard 5.jpg, Courtyard at the centre of the hall Great Hall, Speke Hall 1.jpg, The Great Hall Oak parlour, Speke Hall 5.jpg, The Oak Parlour Tapestry Bedroom, Speke Hall 2.jpg, Tapestry bedroom Visitor centre, Speke Hall 05.jpg, Visitor centre, the former home farm of the estate Maze at Speke Hall 1.jpg, Maze behind the visitor centre

References

External links

Speke Hall information at the National Trust
{{Liverpool B&S Country houses in Merseyside National Trust properties in Merseyside Grade I listed buildings in Liverpool Grade I listed houses Museums in Liverpool Historic house museums in Merseyside Timber framed buildings in England Hall houses 1530 establishments in England