Hazelbury Manor is a Grade I listed

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals w ...

, parts of which date back to the 15th century, in the

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...

of Hazelbury in the parish of

Box, Wiltshire Box is a large village and civil parish within the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Wiltshire, England, about west of Corsham and northeast of Bath. Box also falls in the easternmost part of the Avon Green Belt. Besides the vill ...

, England.

House

The house has two storeys, with attics, and is built around four sides of a courtyard. The oldest part is the great hall, c. 1500, which may incorporate an earlier hall; the four sides were completed in stages during the 16th century. In 1920–1925 the west and north sides were rebuilt, and additions made which include a two-story south porch and a service range which links the house to a formerly detached 17th-century

dower house A dower house is usually a moderately large house available for use by the widow of the previous owner of an English, Scottish or Welsh estate. The widow, often known as the "dowager", usually moves into the dower house from the larger family ...

. The manor was purchased by the Speke family in the early 17th century and passed to the Northey family in the early 18th century. In the early 20th century, George Jardine Kidston (1873–1954) bought it and restored it with the help of the architect

Harold Brakspear Sir Harold Brakspear KCVO (10 March 1870 – 20 November 1934) was an English restoration architect and archaeologist. He restored a number of ancient and notable buildings, including Bath Abbey, Windsor Castle, Brownston House in Devizes and ...

. They enlarged the house considerably, completing the rear courtyard, in an architecturally sensitive fashion with reference to excavated foundations. Kidston wrote a book on its history, published in 1936. Julian Orbach calls the house "another early C20 re-creation of the manorial dream", like those nearby at Great Chalfield and Westwood. The house was recorded as Grade I listed in 1960. From 1943 to 1971 the buildings were used by a girls' school, then in 1973 returned to private ownership. The house is approached down a straight tree-lined drive, some 600m in length, and is not open to the public. A separate building to the south-east, known as the Granary, was built as a granary and cart-shed in the 17th century. It was converted into a garage, cottages and workshop by Brakspear in 1922–1925, and is now a private house. The coach house and stable block are also from the 17th century.

Gardens

The house is set in of land, 8 of which are landscaped gardens. The gardens are

Edwardian The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...

-style and were laid out by George Kidston in the 1920s. They contain

topiary Topiary is the horticultural practice of training perennial plants by clipping the foliage and twigs of trees, shrubs and subshrubs to develop and maintain clearly defined shapes, whether geometric or fanciful. The term also refers to plants w ...

, and colourful

herbaceous border A herbaceous border is a collection of perennial herbaceous plants (plants that live for more than two years and are soft-stemmed and non-woody) arranged closely together, usually to create a dramatic effect through colour, shape or large scale. ...

s. Later (1980s) additions include a circle of

menhir A menhir (from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large human-made upright stone, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. They can be found ...

s and a

laburnum ''Laburnum'', sometimes called golden chain or golden rain, is a genus of two species of small trees in the subfamily Faboideae of the pea family Fabaceae. The species are '' Laburnum anagyroides''—common laburnum and '' Laburnum alpinum''� ...

walk. In 1990, the gardens were recorded as Grade II on the

Register of Historic Parks and Gardens The Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England provides a listing and classification system for historic parks and gardens similar to that used for listed buildings. The register is managed by Historic England ...

. Between 1993 and 2010, the gardens were an annual summer venue for plays by Shakespeare Live, a regional theatre company which raises money for charity.

House

Gardens

References

Further reading