Old Warden Park, photographed by Jayembee69 and posted on Flickr, kindly made available for reuse on the CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 Deed Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic licence.
Old Warden Park, Bedfordshire, now usually known as Shuttleworth House, by Henry Clutton (1819-1893). Built 1875-76 for the wealthy idustrialist Joseph Shuttleworth, of the Lincolnshire engineering firm of Clayton and Shuttleworth, the house was to be designed along the same lines as the traditional seat of the Lancashire Shuttleworths, Gawthorpe Hall, a Jacobethan pile which dated from the very beginning of the seventeenth century — and indeed the resemblance is clear. According to Simon Jenkins, Joseph Shuttleworth was not related to the Lincolnshire Shuttleworths, so this was an obvious bid to boost his status. The house was also much bigger than the original, another indication of self-aggrandisement.
Gawthorpe House. Source: frontispiece to The House and Farm Accounts....
The house is Grade II* listed. The listing text has the following notes:
Mainly ashlar, with service wing partly in yellow brick. Jacobean style. 3-storeyed rectangular block with single-storeyed roof-lit central hall. 4-stage tower and lower wing to E. Rooms arranged in balanced, although not always symmetrical, plan. S elevation: 5-bay facade, central and outer bays with 3- storeyed canted bay windows.... Central bay, approached by flight of steps, forms porch at ground floor. This has round-headed stilted archway with moulded surround and label, flanked by clustered columns with bases at various heights.
Mention is also made of several distinctive features: the parapet, the many chimney stacks, and the clock on its tall tower. Clutton was obviously fond of such clock-towers: see also the one at Cliveden.
As with other country houses. there were later additions and alterations. The east wing was added in 1883, and the interiors, in which Clutton had had a large hand, were adapted in 1896 by R. Weir Schultz. According to Jenkins, again, the most remarkable thing about them is their art collection, because this was another way in which the owners sought to raise their status. Here can be seen some of the work of Victorian artists such as George Vicat Cole and Frank Dicksee.The house is now a wedding venue.
Bibliography
The House and Farm Accounts of the Shuttleworths of Gawthorpe Hall, in the County of Lancaster, at Smithils and Gawthorpe, from September 1582 to October 1621. [Manchester]: printed for the Chetham society, 1856. Internet Archive, contributed by the University of Florida, George A. Smathers Libraries. Web. 21 May 2023.
Hunting, Penelope. “Henry Clutton’s Country Houses.” Architectural History 26 (1983): 96–180. https://doi.org/10.2307/1568439.
Jenkins, Simon. Discover Britain's Historic Houses: Middle England. London: Reader's Digest, 2005.
"Old Warden Park." Historic England. Web. 21 May 2024.
Vowles, Gordon. Henry Clutton: Victorian Architect of Gothic Revival Churches and Country Houses. Willington: Gostwick Press, 2022. [Review]
Created 21 May 2024