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Only a few parts of the monastic buildings at Combe are now visible, but from those that do survive, and from the results of limited archaeological investigations, it is possible to get some idea of the layout of the medieval abbey.
When the moat was being dug in the 1860's foundations of the abbey church were found on the south side of the main courtyard, together with patches of tiled flooring. A few inches below this, many human skeletons were found, some in lead or stone coffins. Some of these were re-buried in an area to the south of the moat and were re-discovered during archaeological investigation in the mid 1960s. Nesfield made a plan of the foundations from the west front of the church up to the crossing, over which there was presumably a central tower, and showed that the church was an aisled building of massive construction. The foundations of the north and south transepts and of the presbytery at the east end of the church are unfortunately not depicted in the surviving documents. Archaeological investigations carried out both before and during the 1990s hotel development, however, suggest that that the southern end of Nesfield's building, known as the Watergate Building, was constructed over the foundations of the north transept of the church. It appears that in the design of his entire building, Nesfield had respected both the layout and much of the surviving fabric of the medieval buildings, even placing his structures upon monastic foundations when this was possible. It is therefore believed that much of the foundation work of the monastic east claustral range lay preserved with little damage beneath the Nesfield building. The 1990s hotel was constructed largely upon the structure of Nesfield's ground floor and great care was taken to minimise disturbance to buried archaeological features and deposits which now survive into the twenty-first century.
Plan showing the recorded
walls of the Cistercian abbey, in relation to the present building
The present buildings are arranged around three sides of a courtyard that originally formed the cloister garth or garden yard. Including a path around the edge, which was enclosed by traceried screens to form the cloister alley and now forms part of the house, the cloister garth was approximately 101 feet (31 metres) square. The south side of the cloister, where the abbey church once stood, is now occupied by Nesfield's moat. Most Cistercian abbeys had the cloister on the south side of the church, but the Smite Brook runs to the north and west of the site, and it is the convenience of drainage which would have dictated the choice of this "reverse Cistercian" plan. It is likely that water from the brook was diverted through culverts to supply the rere dorter, or latrines, and other domestic buildings lying to the north of the cloister. Location of these outlying buildings awaits further archaeological survey, but it is possible that much of the evidence for them may have been erased by post-medieval landscaping activities.
There is now little surviving evidence for the church, but parts of its north wall may be embedded within the south end of Harington's west wing. According to Rodwell's drawing, which was based on Nesfield's records, the church had an internal width, including the side aisles, of about 57 feet (17 metres) and the nave pillars, which were spaced at 13 feet (4 metres) intervals, left a clear width of about 30 feet (9 metres) in the body of the nave. The internal length was about 123 feet (37 metres) from the west end of the church to the west side of the crossing. Combe seems to have been a medium sized Cistercian abbey, being similar in dimensions to Quarr Abbey, Isle of Wight, which also used the reverse Cistercian plan. It was larger than Vale Crucis Abbey in Clwyd but smaller than Strata Florida Abbey in Dyfed.
Buildings on the west side of the cloister, which later formed the core of the west wing of Harington's house, would have provided accommodation for the lay brothers, probably with a refectory on the ground floor and a dormitory above. Substantial sections of the walls of this range survive embedded within the existing house.
The north side of the cloister would have been occupied by domestic buildings, notably the monk's frater, or refectory. During the restoration at the beginning of the twentieth century, some thirteenth century arcading was uncovered on the inside wall of the north cloister alley, outside the North Parlour. This wall is another remnant of the monastic buildings and formed the southern wall of the frater, facing into the cloister. Similar arcading may also survive beneath the plaster of the massive wall inside the west cloister alley, fronting the lay brothers' accommodation. The timber cloister ceiling in the arcaded section, with its oak beams, is believed to have survived from Harington's original Elizabethan build. By 1960 the stone arcading had been covered by a thick layer of institutional gloss paint. Careful conservation work during the 1990s has removed this damaging paint and the wall is now protected by a more stone-friendly emulsion. The delicately carved heads of the arcading columns have been picked out in colour, as they may also have been during the medieval period.
SACRISTY DOORWAY, WITH CHAPTER HOUSE DOORWAY BEYOND :
Dec-2003
Note: photo taken as two wide angle portrait views, then stitced
together. This wall survived the Dissolution, and all the many rebuilding
projects over the centuries. The roof seen in the picture was constructed
c.1994 as part of the No Ordinary Hotel project, and serves to protect the 12c
fabric for many more centuries.
The eastern wall of the cloister is the principal visual reminder of the early monastic structures. Now largely reconstructed by Nesfield, this ground-floor wall formed the front of the Chapter House range, which, in Cistercian abbeys, always occupied this position. Built in red sandstone, it contains three arched doorways, the northern one being of early transition style, the other two rounded. The centre doorway, a decorated Norman style arch of four orders providing the entrance to the Chapter House, is flanked by two elaborate round-headed windows, each of two orders. The present doorway, with its detailed carving, is believed to be a Victorian reproduction. The flanking windows and the other two doorways are more certainly so. The doorway to the north of the Chapter House led to the Parlour, a narrow room in which monks were permitted to hold necessary conversation; study and silent contemplation were the only permitted activities within the cloister. The Chapter House was a much larger room from which the business of the abbey was conducted and in which the brethren held daily meetings to receive instruction in monastic life. The narrow room to the south of the Chapter house was the Sacristy or Vestry in which the sacred vessels and the vestments were kept. Books might also have been kept in the Sacristy or in the adjacent cloister alley. There would probably have been a door connecting the Sacristy to the north transept of the church, which lay behind the wall to the south of the Sacristy door. The arches and vaulting now behind the eastern wall were constructed by Nesfield and formed the undercroft of the ground floor to his 1860s building. They appear to have been constructed upon the medieval foundations and to reflect the scale and layout of the monastic rooms. These structures have been preserved within the 1990s hotel block, for which the Chapter House provides the reception area and the Parlour, a bar. The first floor, above the chapter house range, would have accommodated the dorter or monk's dormitory, from which night stairs would probably have led directly into the north transept of the church, thus permitting the monks easy access to attend the offices of the night. There would also have been easy access from the north end or perhaps the east side of the dorter into the rere dorter, and also via day stairs, into the cloister.
Nesfield constructed the south west corner of his building upon massive load bearing stone arches spanning south east corner of the original cloister alley. This corner structure, with vaulted ceiling, now supports part of the 1990s hotel. The 1860s architect's illustration of the Watergate building, taken from the bridge over the moat, shows this corner of the building clearly. In its south face is shown a decorated Norman doorway apparently hanging in space over the moat. This is where the doorway from the church into the corner of the cloister would have been. If a doorway had indeed been discovered in this location it must previously have been concealed behind the plaster at the south end of Harington's east wing. The depiction of the doorway seems to suggest that the portion of the south wall within this corner of the cloister alley was the original north wall of the church and that Nesfield intended to retain it. In the event, Nesfield modified his design and the church door was not exposed in the south wall although its position was clearly outlined by the lay of the facing stones, and remains so today. Inside the corner structure, however, the other side of a doorway can be seen in this position, surviving, though apparently restored, with the opening blocked off. This north side of the doorway is less elaborate than the architect's depiction of the south side, which would have been within the church. It seems unlikely that this presumed south side of the doorway exists behind Nesfield's stone facing, as the present wall would appear to be of insufficient thickness and is probably a nineteenth century construction upon medieval foundations. If the decorated opening did originally exist, it is possible that Nesfield removed it for re-use in his reconstruction of the Chapter House façade.
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Directly in front of the blocked doorway, several well-decorated medieval floor tiles set into the floor are presumably some of those which Nesfield discovered whilst he was demolishing the church. The vaulted stone ceiling, above, is Nesfield's work and is decorated with two rather poorly executed stone "pineapple" bosses. The long stone bench set against the transept wall in this cloister area appears to be a reconstruction, although benches and bookshelves might originally have existed in this part of the cloister.
It is likely that the cloister alley, corridor running round all four sides of the cloister garth, was originally built as a wooden structure. Towards the end of the fifteenth century it was re-built in stone on the west, north and east sides of the cloister, with glazed traceried windows in late Gothic style. This work was extended to the southern side, along the north wall of the church, following the bequest in 1509 of £30 for this purpose in the will of Sir Edward Raleigh.
The southern and eastern alleys, together with the eastern-most three of the original six bays along the northern side, were demolished by Nesfield during the 1860s. During Mr Gray's alterations of the late 1920s, one of the seven windows in the western cloister was removed to make way for an entrance porch. This window was replaced during the hotel construction of the 1990s.
Nesfield had replaced a section of the east cloister alley with a wooden structure, perhaps reminiscent of the earlier medieval cloister. This was positioned to protect the restored and reconstructed chapter house doorway from the weather.
However, in the 1920s, Mr Gray demolished this structure and left the carved stone doorways and walling unprotected. Being built from soft sandstone, they were vulnerable to erosion and so, in order to prolong the life of these attractive features, the 1990s hotel design included an overhung slate roof above this area.
MONASTIC FISHPONDS FROM THE NORTH-EAST : 1962
Photo by David Motkin
When Harington came to build his house out of the ruins of the monastery, he retained three sides of the cloister, with their traceried outer windows and solidly built inner walls probably reaching second storey height. Above the cloister windows he built a timber and plaster facade with bay windows, presumably considering that the wall was not strong enough to bear the weight of stone. The west and east wings were symmetrical, two bays deep and of two stories. The south walls of these were of stone and each contained, in the outer bay at first floor level, a huge seven light window with three transoms. The north wing was originally of two stories with attics whose dormer windows faced south from a steeply sloping roof. The nature of the outwards facing walls on the west, north and east cannot now be ascertained, but it is known that an ornamental porch projected at first floor level from the eastern wall, overlooking the early ornamental gardens, while another, smaller, wing appears to have projected from the western wall. Little is known of the inside of the house, but it seems that a long gallery ran the whole length of the eastern wing, over the cloister alley. An oak ceiling from this period is still to be seen in part of the north alley. The only parts of this house remaining substantially unaltered are the facade of the west wing which overlooks the courtyard, and the southern face of the west wing, which had an extra ground floor window added on the end of the cloister alley at the beginning of the twentieth century.
The earliest known illustration of Combe Abbey was drawn by Daniel King in about 1656. It was dedicated to Sir Anthony Craven, one of Lord Craven's sons, who died about 1670. This engraving shows a long narrow walled garden or enclosure lying across the front of the abbey almost exactly in the position formerly occupied by the nave of the abbey church.
SOUTHERN ASPECT : MID SEVENTEENTH
CENTURY
Drawn and engraved by Daniel King and published in 1656
The exterior of Gibson's wing of 1667, in contrast to that of Harington, has changed but little since it was built, the only known alteration being the provision of a modern glazed doorway in the centre of the west front. This wing is built entirely of stone and is of two stories. It has three gables to its western front, with attics which are approached from the first floor by a very narrow staircase known in the 1960s as the "Monks' Staircase" (but earlier, "Cat's Staircase"). The wing extends westwards for one further bay from Harington's original two-bay south wall. Although most of the interior of this wing has been altered, the beautifully panelled smoke room known as the Oak Room is still in its original state, with the coat of arms of the Queen of Bohemia displayed above the mantelpiece.
To the north of Gibson's wing is the Palladian west front of the 1680 building, which was designed by Captain William Winde who was also responsible for Buckingham House, later converted into Buckingham Palace. This front is of two stories, but until John Gray's alterations of the late 1920s, it also had attics. To the north of this front, Winde built a block projecting westwards by one bay to balance Gibson's wing on the south, but this library block was demolished in the late 1920s. The c.1700 perspective view of Combe by L. Knyff and J. Kip shows another Palladian block, similar to the library, on the site of the Gibson wing, thus making the western front entirely symmetrical. There is evidence that this was part of Winde's original grand design, which was never completed. Winde's work continued round to the north wing where he built the great North Parlour, which is the only one of his rooms still surviving in anything like its original form. It is difficult to say whether Winde's greatest gift to Combe lies in the sheer magnificence of his Palladian front, or in the exquisite plasterwork with which he decorated his interiors. The plasterwork was executed by Edward Gouge, and can be seen to advantage in the North Parlour. Parts of the ceiling of other rooms still exist in the roof space, and the ornate ceiling above Winde's main staircase, of which almost half remained in 1961, is of particular note. Records and plans of both Gibson's and Winde's work at Combe are preserved in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.
PERSPECTIVE VIEW
OF COMBE FROM THE NORTH WEST BY L. KNYFF AND J. KIP : c.1700
Comb Abby in
Warwickshire one of the Seats of the Rt Hon William Lord Craven Barron Craven of
Hampstead Marshall in the County of Berks
The next major work at Combe took place between 1771 and 1776 when the Lady Elizabeth Craven, wife of the sixth Lord Craven, paid Lancelot "Capability" Brown the sum of £7,650 9s (not £12,000 as she writes in her memoirs) to landscape the park. Brown removed the old formal gardens shown in the view by Knyff and Kip, and replaced them by rolling parkland, the dominant feature of which was groups or small plantations of trees. Examples of these can be seen to the south west of the house. It is most probable that Brown was also responsible for the lake, known as Combe Pool, which has an area of ninety acres and was formed by damming the Smite Brook. The lake is situated to the west of the house, runs east west and is fed from its eastern end, the outlet being controlled by a system of sluices at the western end. Here the lake bends round to the south, and an arm runs off to the south east. The level of the surrounding countryside here is below that of the water, which is held in by a huge earth dam. The pool is teeming with fish and is a popular haunt of anglers. Bird life abounds around the pool, and duck, coot and moorhens are always to be seen on the water, while in the trees nearby and on a small island, colonies of herons nest. To the north of the house is an area of woodland through which the Smite Brook flows in a system of channels, with another small lake known as "Top Pool", and a decoy pond for the trapping of duck. Much of this area was probably engineered by Brown. Decoy men employed on the estate are recorded in the 1851 census.
During the same period, from 1771-73, Lord Craven built a new church at Binley as a chapel for the family and the estate workers. This was dedicated to St. Bartholomew and replaced an earlier one dedicated to St. Swithin. It is built in the style of Robert Adam, as also is the west gatehouse, which was also built at this time. There is no record of Adam having been employed at Combe, and it is likely that they were the work of Lancelot Brown who was also responsible for other buildings within the park. Just to the east of the present main gate stood two pillars in the Adam style, being known as the Griffin gate. These marked the carriage entrance to the abbey, which was along the drive running parallel and to the east of the main tree lined one, which served only as an "eye-catcher." This gate may also be due to Brown although a Griffin Gate is known to have been amongst Winde's designs. In the mid 1960s the wrought iron gates were removed to Coventry for safekeeping and the pillars were moved to flank the present main entrance.
SOUTHERN
ASPECT : 18th CENTURY
Drawn from Nature & on Stone by Brandard
source John Delaney photo No 1 in Coventry City Council leaflet
c.1966
During the late eighteenth century the upper parts of Harington's north wing overlooking the cloister garth were remodelled. A new roof was constructed and a third storey was added to the south face in place of the attics whose dormer windows are to be seen in all prints previous to this period. The new build was probably complete by the end of the eighteenth century and is shown on the Davis engraving published in 1810. It is best seen, however, on the lithograph by Brandard, the date of which is yet be confirmed but is currently considered to be between 1780 and 1839. It is clear from this illustration that the north cloister had six traceried windows while the upper stories each had only five windows across the width of the cloister. These, therefore, were not aligned with the windows below them.
About 1810, or soon thereafter, further works were undertaken. These included a refurbishing of the North Parlour and the construction of large indoor real-tennis court, which lay to the north east of the main buildings, on the north west side of the eastern garden.
In 1860 the second Earl of Craven engaged William Eden Nesfield to rebuild the house. Nesfield demolished the eastern half of Harington's north wing and the whole of the east wing, leaving only the twelfth century wall with the Chapter House doorway discussed earlier. In its place he erected a house in a style, which has been referred to as "Anglo-Franco-Victorian medievalism." It seems to have been his intention to treat the whole house similarly, but since Lord Craven died in 1866, this ambition was never accomplished. It does seem, however, that Nesfield did not ignore the earlier work and he seems to have actively tried to preserve monastic structures where he found them. Having discovered the entrance to the Chapter House he incorporated this into his design and built his main house over a vaulted undercroft, which, though a pastiche, was an attempt to replicate the earlier buildings. Archaeological investigation of the 1990s has shown that he also sought to avoid destroying medieval foundations and made use of these beneath his new buildings wherever he could.
One of the most attractive parts of his main building was at its southern end, in the basement of which he built a boathouse having access to the moat via an archway fitted with an imitation portcullis. This was known as The Watergate. Archaeological investigation suggests that this part of the building was constructed upon, and perhaps followed, the foundations of the north transept of the abbey church.
Nesfield also built new servant's quarters and kitchens, coach houses, a block of buildings for the accommodation of under-gardeners and a house for the head gardener. He altered the stables and laid water and gas on. The gas, which was mainly used in the kitchens, came from a private gas works which had been built some twenty years earlier in the woods to the north of the Abbey.
The most attractive feature surviving from the period was the work of Nesfield's father, William Andrews Nesfield, who designed the terraced gardens. The dominant feature of his western gardens is the moat, which passes through them in the form of a canal. Water, brought by a system of channels and pipes from a dam on the Smite Brook, flows down a shaded waterfall at the east of the house to join the moat which passes the south walls of the house and winds round through the ornamental gardens to join Combe Pool, where it is spanned by an balustrade. The entrance drive crosses the moat on a stone bridge, which provides fine views of the house and the Watergate. The secluded eastern garden, laid out the Earl's gardener William Miller on the site of an earlier Elizabethan garden, was equally renowned, but was destroyed during the demolition of the 1920s.
NESFIELD'S WESTERN GARDENS AND MOAT : 1961
In 1875, Mr C. Chamberlain of Kenilworth was engaged to engrave the exquisitely beautiful hunting scenes on the glass in the windows of the hunting parlour overlooking the moat at the southern end of the main west cloister building. According to an inscription on one of the panels, this was done in honour of Evelyn Laura, wife of the third Earl of Craven.
During the renovations at the beginning of the twentieth century, new roofs were substituted in many parts of the house, and a new ground-floor window, matching those in the cloister, was added overlooking the moat at the south end of the west cloister alley. Alterations made in the library, which was the northern block of Winde's west front, resulted in the discovery of three large fireplaces suggesting that this, or a former building in the same location, was once a kitchen. A similar fireplace was discovered in the ground floor room at the south west corner of the house, within the Gibson wing. The arcading in the north cloister alley, which has already been described, was also discovered at this time.
By the early twentieth century, visitors to Coombe Abbey could admire fabulous art treasures, beautiful gardens and a magnificent deer park.
During Gray's alterations of the late 1920s, Nesfield's house was demolished, leaving only the ground floor standing as a ruin. Winde's great library block was also demolished, as was one further upper storey bay of Harington's north wing, leaving only the two westernmost bays surviving from the original five. Behind the house, the extensive ranges of kitchens, domestic offices and servant accommodation, which had been built by Nesfield, were also demolished. Mr. Gray also lowered the roof over Winde's remaining buildings, including the north parlour, by removing attics and installing flat roofs. Most of the stone from the demolition was dumped in William Miller's famous eastern garden, which became lost beneath piles of stone and rubble.
After many of the fixtures and fittings in the surviving parts of the house had been sold, Mr. Gray concentrated his attention on the western wing, which he proceeded to turn into his gentleman's residence. He constructed a lounge and a bedroom within the space formerly occupied by the hall containing the magnificent Grand Staircase. He then built a new hall and staircase in an area known as the dark cloisters just to the south of this. The panelled small dining room with its twin Ionic columns was moved one room to the south, into the space originally occupied by the ornate Gilt Parlour, and the space previously occupied by the dining room was converted into kitchens. Upstairs, all the rooms were altered and new, lower, ceilings were put in. Communication was improved by the provision of a corridor running the length of the house.
SOUTHERN ASPECT : 1961
When the G.E.C. came to Coombe in 1952, the first necessity was the installation of a mains electricity supply to replace the private generating set used until then. Access to the house had to be improved, and so a new tarmacadam main drive about 660 metres long was laid down between the avenue of trees which runs from the Binley-Brinklow Road. At first only about ten residents moved in, but this number was gradually increased as more and more bedrooms were brought into use. The remaining attics, including a space above the North Parlour, which was said not to have been entered for many years, were cleared out and turned into bedrooms and dormitories. Attention was now given to the ground floor ruins of Nesfield's Watergate building, which were roofed and made habitable, accommodating twenty-one residents in modern well-heated rooms. Initially, the only piped water supply came from a private reservoir near the main road and was not considered fit for drinking. Drinking water was carried in buckets from a well, but after about three years the house was connected to the main Coventry supply and drinking water became available from all taps.
A do-it-yourself attitude was encouraged amongst the apprentices, and projects undertaken included the construction of a hard tennis court in the gardens and the conversion of the cellars of the Watergate building into a bar. The most involved project, however, was the construction of an open-air swimming pool. This was completed in 1959 and in the early 1960s it was in use almost continuously during summer evenings and weekends.
By late 1963, it was clear that the main structure of the house was deteriorating rapidly and that major repair work to the walls and roofs was urgently required to ensure the continued safety of the residents. As the owners of the abbey, the executors of J.G. Gray, were unable to confirm that these works would be carried out, the G.E.C. gave notice, on 2nd January 1964, that they were to terminate their lease of the abbey and would vacate the premises by 31 March that year. Four days later, the decision to sell Coombe was made, and on 8th April 1964 a meeting of Coventry City Council approved the purchase.
By November 1964, surveys had been carried out and emergency repair and conservation work was already well under way. One of the major projects undertaken at this time was on the upper cloister facade of Harington's building. Here the timber framework had been attacked and weakened by deathwatch beetle, woodworm and wet rot. The exterior plaster covering was carefully removed and the Elizabethan and late eighteenth century timbers were treated, repaired and chemically consolidated before re-plastering. This process took several months and, at the same time, work was in hand to prepare the grounds and surrounding land as a regional park. Car parks would be required and would require surfaced access drives in the archaeologically sensitive area to the south of the moat. An archaeological investigation carried out in the area immediately south of the south transept by C.T.P. Woodfield and R.G. (Bob) Thompson for Coventry and District Archaeological Society found the whole area to be covered by decayed sandstone containing floor- and roof-tiles and painted glass, presumably from the demolition of the church. Six inches [150 mm] below the turf, a row of stone coffins containing skeletal material was found. These coffins had been placed heads to the south, which would not have been their original orientation. Beneath the coffins was nineteenth century pottery, suggesting that Nesfield had reburied the coffins in that location after having discovered them within the church during the excavation of the moat.
During the summer of 1965 "Top Pool" in the woods to the north of the abbey was dredged to form a boating pool, and a small boathouse was built. Reeds and silt were also dredged from the eastern end of Coombe Pool in order prevent backed up water from the Smite Brook from raising the level of the moat and flooding the lower gardens during rainy seasons.
Closer to the house, youth work camps organised by International Voluntary Service worked in the Eastern Garden where much of the piled-up stone from Gray's demolitions was moved aside and a large children's play area was constructed, with paddling pool, children's fort, slide and other amusements. A cafe and public conveniences were constructed at the rear of the chapter house wing.
Following its public opening in May 1966, the park immediately became a popular visitor attraction, but the house remained sadly neglected and mostly unused. Major repairs to the structure were necessary, and as the house was a Grade I Listed Building they had to be done to the highest standards and with the approval of the appropriate government bodies. During the 1970s major repairs were made to the south end of the west wing and in the 1980s to the western facade of Gibson's and Winde's buildings. The great chimney to Winde's north parlour was dismantled as it had become unsafe.
Following the agreement with the "No Ordinary" hotel group, Coventry City Council put in hand the construction of a new modern visitor centre for the park, which in 1970 had been designated a Countryside Park. This visitor centre, which was opened in 1993, is a disgracefully hideous building placed in a quite inappropriate and conspicuous location beneath the trees on the west side of the main drive and immediately adjacent to an earthen mound which has previously been considered to be a Bronze Age round barrow but which may be a "mount" - an early garden feature. A children's adventure playground lies close to the mound.
The hotel development released funds permitting further repair to the main building, including constructing excellent facsimiles of the first and second floor centre bays of the north cloister, which had survived Nesfield but had been demolished by Gray. The newly demolished great chimney was also rebuilt using, where possible, the original components.
The main part of the hotel development, however, was the construction of a new hotel wing upon the surviving ground floor of Nesfield's east wing. The new build continues around the corner into the eastern end of the north cloister wing, where Gray had demolished most of Nesfield's work and had cut an archway. The archway has been removed, thus making it possible to walk once more from the east wing to the west wing through the north cloister alley. The east wing is of two new storeys, reflecting in style and scale, though not in detail, Nesfield's building. The section on the north of the cloister is in the more functional style of its period, but does not look out of place alongside the other. The whole has a pale stone finish which looks almost white, but is already beginning to mellow with time. This first phase of the hotel was opened on 17th February 1995.
Planning consent for the work required it to have regard for the fabric of the structures already present and for buried archaeological features. The design and construction was guided by detailed architectural and archaeological surveys carried out before the commencement of work, and as "watching briefs" during the work itself. As the new buildings were largely constructed upon the remains of Nesfield's works, there was extremely little interference with earlier fabric or features. Similarly, alterations to the interior of the original buildings have been non-damaging in character, being largely limited to the addition of partitioning which can easily be removed.
The hotel development encompassed the eastern garden, from which the remains of Gray's stock of demolition stone was cleared and the 1960s children's playground was removed. A twenty-bedroom extension to the new hotel, built in the north west corner of the garden, was opened in 1999. This is attached to the north east part of the main east wing. The remainder of the garden has been laid to lawn, but perhaps at some future time an attempt will be made to recreate Miller's 1860s garden.
To north of the garden was the real tennis court, and adjoining this to the north were the stable yard and coach houses. In the late 1990s the tennis court was converted into a modern conference centre while the stable yard complex was converted to provide banqueting facilities and associated services.
SOUTHERN ASPECT - Oct-2003, SHOWING NO ORDINARY HOTEL
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