| Summary : Country house constructed after 1561, incorporating the remains of a Cistercian Abbey. Alterations date to 1710-26, 1770 and the 19th century. The present building comprises a sandstone ashlar house built on four sides of an open space, roughly coincident with the original abbey cloister garth. The northern wing and the east wing date from the 1570s (although the northern wing was largely reconstructed, by Charles S Smith, when the Gothic porch was built in 1836). The east wing is of three storeys and attic, with nine gables. The narrow south wing was built in 1770. The west wing was designed by Francis Smith between 1714-1726 and consists of a rectangle 170ft x 45ft. The west facade consists of a heavily rusticated ground storey, a main storey approached by an exterior staircase, and two upper storeys, surrmounted by a projecting cornice and balustrade. There are giant fluted Ionic angle pilasters and the doorway has a curved pediment and fluted pilasters. |
More information : (SP31797134) Stoneleigh Abbey [NAT].(1)
Stoneleigh Abbey, country house built on the site of, and
incorporating the remains of, Stoneleigh Cistercian Abbey. On its
Dissolution, ca.1535, the site and demesnes were granted to Charles
Brandon, Duke of Suffolk.(2)
The abbey lay a roofless ruin until 1561, and had to be cleared before the house could be built. The Elizabethan building lay substantially unaltered until 1710, and consisted of the East wing, built on the site of the abbey South transept and dormitory undercroft, and a corresponding West wing, the two linked by the Long Gallery at first floor level on the site of the abbey South aisle. This gallery remained unaltered until 1836. In 1714, work commenced on the new building on the West side, and was completed in 1726.(3)
Stoneleigh Abbey. Built on four sides of a central open space roughly
coincident with the cloister garth of the abbey. The three-storeyed
East wing is the oldest part. The West wing was designed and built
by Francis Smith of Warwick between 1714 and 1726, the South wing was built in 1770, and the North wing was largely reconstructed by Charles Smith of Warwick in the C19th. Grade I.(4)
(Associated Grade II* monuments include The Conservatory, SP37SW54, the iron gate and screen, SP37SW53, the bridge, SP37SW48, and the Riding School and Stables, SP37SW51.) |