Biddick Hall is a small privately owned 18th-century country mansion at Bournmoor, County Durham, near the

City of Sunderland The City of Sunderland () is a metropolitan borough with city status in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, North East England. It is named after its largest settlement, Sunderland, spanning a far larger area, including nearby towns incl ...

and

Chester-le-Street Chester-le-Street (), also known as Chester, is a market town and civil parish in County Durham, England, around north of Durham and also close to Sunderland and Newcastle upon Tyne. It is located on the River Wear, which runs out to sea at ...

. It is a

Grade I listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

and the home of the

Lambton family Lambton is the name of several places and people: People * Viscount Lambton, a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom associated with the Earls of Durham *Anne Lambton (born 1954), an actress *Antony Lambton (1922–2006), formerly 6th Earl of ...

History

The Lambtons purchased the manor house and estate at South Biddick then comprising about from the Bowes family in about 1594. In the early 18th century the old manor was replaced with the present red brick and stone, two-storeyed, five-bay mansion in a Queen Anne

Baroque style The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

. The central entrance bay has Ionic order pilasters carrying entablature and

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedim ...

. In about 1820 John George Lambton built

Lambton Castle Lambton Castle stands above Chester-le-Street, County Durham and is a stately home, the ancestral seat of the Lambton family, the Earls of Durham. It is listed in the mid-category of listed building, Grade II*. History Largely constructed a ...

to the west on the adjoining Harraton Hall estate. He was created Baron Lambton in 1828 and

Earl of Durham Earl of Durham is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1833 for the Whig politician and colonial official John Lambton, 1st Baron Durham. Known as "Radical Jack", he played a leading role in the passing of the Gr ...

in 1833. The Hall was extended by the creation of a fifth but blind bay in 1859 and the addition of a north wing in 1954. Following the family's move to Lambton Castle, Biddick was occupied by junior members of the family or was let out. One of the tenants was Frank Stobart, Agent to the Earl, and Deputy Lieutenant and High Sheriff of Durham in 1906. In 1932, the Castle being uninhabitable, the family once more made Biddick their home. It was remodelled by Trenwith Wills and Lord Gerald Wellesley. In September 2012, Biddick Hall was used as part of the set of the new BBC One drama '' The Paradise''. Biddick Hall was used as a filming location for the 2015 movie ''Estranged''. Shots of the exterior of Biddick Hall are frequently used throughout the fil

References

* – architectural description * ''An Historic Topographical and Descriptive View of the County of Durham'' Vol 1. McKenzie and Ross (1834) p361 Google Books

External links

Official website
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Biddick Hall (House) Grade I listed buildings in County Durham