Catmose House is a municipal facility in Catmose Street in

Oakham Oakham is the county town of Rutland in the East Midlands of England, east of Leicester, south-east of Nottingham and west of Peterborough. It had a population of 10,922 in the 2011 census, estimated at 11,191 in 2019. Oakham is to the west o ...

, Rutland, England. The house, which is the headquarters of Rutland County Council, is a Grade II

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 ...

History

The house was designed as a hunting lodge known as Catmose Lodge and was completed in 1781. It became the home of Sir Gerard Noel Edwards, MP for Rutland in the early 19th century. It passed to Edwards' son

Charles Noel, 1st Earl of Gainsborough Charles Noel Noel, 1st Earl of Gainsborough (2 October 1781 – 10 June 1866), known as Charles Edwardes until 1798, as Charles Noel between 1798 and 1823 and as the Lord Barham between 1823 and 1841, was a British peer and Whig politician. Ear ...

in 1838 and then to Edwards' grandson, the Rt Hon Gerard James Noel, also MP for Rutland, in 1866. Gerard Noel substantially rebuilt the house laid out the gardens as well, in the 1870s. The design of the building, following the rebuilding, involved a main frontage of eight bays facing north east; there were round-headed windows on the ground floor and square windows on the first floor with a

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 ...

containing a clock above. In 1936, following a debate,

Rutland County Council Rutland County Council is the local authority for the unitary authority of Rutland in the East Midlands of England. The current council was created in April 1997. The population of the council's area at the 2011 census was 37,369. As a unitar ...

chose by 18 votes to 6 votes to leave their previous facilities at

Oakham Castle Oakham Castle is a historic building in Oakham, Rutland. The Castle is known for its collection of massive horseshoes and is also recognised as one of the best examples of domestic Norman architecture in England. It is a Grade I listed building ...

and to acquire Catmose House for use as their new headquarters. Changes were made to the property including the installation of a council chamber in a room with a marble fireplace and the conversion of part of the garden into a car park. Following changes to the layout of the building, the main access was from the south east, through a stone porch with an arched entrance; there was a balustrade above the porch and a window on the first floor. After implementation of the Local Government Act 1972, when Rutland was reconstituted as a district of Leicestershire, it became the local district headquarters. Then, following the re-incarnation of Rutland County Council in April 1997, it became the headquarters of the new

unitary authority A unitary authority is a local authority responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed by a higher level of sub-national government or the national governmen ...

. A large extension was built to the north west of the house. When the police station in Station Road was closed, a local police enquiry desk opened in January 2015 in the reception area but this closed in 2020 during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

. The old police station was sold in 2016. Works of art in the building include a painting by Dorothy Snowdon (1921–2014) depicting an

osprey The osprey (''Pandion haliaetus''), , also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk, is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor reaching more than in length and across the wings. It is brown o ...

Notes

References

{{reflist Grade II listed buildings in Rutland County halls in England Government buildings completed in 1781 Oakham