Greenhill Lane B6016
Derbyshire- Lost Houses the Classicising treatment meted out to the south front at Longford by Derby ’ s Joseph Pickford in 1762-63 . Indeed , it is not impossible that Pickford undertook the job , although a rainwater head dated 1723 may suggest earlier work too , possibly to the interior . Also , the park was landscaped to a very high standard , with a fine avenue running NW with another to the SE , interspersed with rides , which look from the maps as if they were mainly landscaped out in favour of boundary planting before 1793 , probably the work of Humphrey Repton .
The family seem to have laid out considerable sums almost every generation in improving the house . In 1806 drawings for a rebuilding survive signed by John Westmacott , son of the eminent sculptor . He seems to have died shortly afterwards and the alterations , probably with some modifications were carried out into the 1820s , perhaps to his basic design by Samuel Brown of Derby , then active at Calke . A very early photograph by Richard Keene – from a little before 1860 judging from its catalogue number – and an engraving by Henry Moore , of Derby from the 1820s gives us some idea of what was done .
There had been a conscious effort to return a flavour of its Tudor origin to the house : tall paired chimney stacks in decorated moulded brick decorated the new cranked parapet , the sash windows were replaced by mullioned and transomed ones , with the end bays done as oriels on the first floor and the centre had a canted two storey bay with a crow-stepped gable above . This now overlooked an impressive series of terraces with classical garden structures descending to the river , acting effectively as a lake .
The narrower entrance front was treated similarly , the door flanked by octagonal colonettes topped by carved knights carrying metal pennons in a reference to the family ’ s descent from Nigel de Stafford a companion of the Conqueror . To the right of this was built an orangery ( possibly a rebuild of an 18th century classical one ) of 5 bays . Inside , the hall was given a ribbed ceiling , bronze colza oil lamps , a gothic doorcase and a Jacobethan style stone chimneypiece .
Yet much of the interior remained classical , including the dining room , which seems to have been rebuilt to suit the conventions of the 1760s , with a recessed buffet at one end . Sometime prior to 1794 , when Erasmus Darwin ’ s friend Anna Seward described it , this room was spectacularly decorated in trompe-l ’ oeuil by the Nottinghamborn artist Paul Sandby ( 1731-1809 ), with a distant scene of picnickers al fresco before a romantic castle in a lake with hills beyond , in the buffet behind a tromp-l ’ oeuil paling , the surrounding part of the room being painted
with flowers , leaves , sky and trellis work , so that diners could feel that they were looking out from a bower .
Again in the 1870s , the house was further rebuilt , more to add some visual unity than anything else . A surviving Georgian chimney on the NW end of the garden front was rebuilt to match the others and the conservatory was replaced by a two storey extension , although the name of the architect who oversaw it is not known – possibly Robert Grace of Burton .
The last changes were wrought by High Society country house architect Sir Reginald Blomfield in 1901-1904 . He removed the fussy archaising parapet , returning to a balustrade , and rebuilt the entrance with a grand baroque entrance porch
Bathroom Images of Leabrooks .
44a Charles Street , Leabrooks , Derbyshire DE55 1LZ with an armorial in the arched pediment , altered the existing oriel window over it and provided an oeuil-de-boeuf set in a trophy under a Dutch gable above . The flanking turrets lost their rather Disney-esque knights and were replaced by ogeeform cupolas . No expense was spared either , with carving ( including a new , Wren-style hall ) by W . Aumonier , plasterwork by George Jackson and re-decoration by Gregory & Co . Fresh work on the terraces and gardens was done for Francis Inigo Thomas ( 1866-1950 ), a pal of Blomfield ’ s , by William Barron & Son of Borrowash in 1900- 1902 .
Yet all this was soon to go . The Gresleys , one of the first batch of families to receive a baronetcy from James I in 1611 , were hit by repeated death duties and declining agricultural rents ; the estate
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