Burford Bridge Hotel | |
---|---|
Former names | Fox and Hounds (1254-1882) Hare and Hounds (1882-1905) |
General information | |
Location | foot of Box Hill near Dorking, Surrey |
Address | Old London Road, Mickleham |
Town or city | Dorking |
Country | England |
Coordinates | 51°15′15″N0°19′19″W / 51.2542°N 0.3219°W |
Current tenants | Mercure Hotels, Accor |
Opened | 1254 |
Renovated | 2014 |
Owner | Moorfield Group (since 2007) |
Renovating team | |
Other designers | Trevillion Interiors |
Other information | |
Number of rooms | 57 |
Listed Building – Grade II | |
Official name | Burford Bridge Hotel |
Designated | 11 June 1973 |
Reference no. | 1028876 |
Burford Bridge Hotel is a historic hotel at the edge of the village of Mickleham, Surrey, England. It is to the south of Leatherhead and north of Dorking at the foot of Box Hill on the River Mole.
The hotel has been owned by Moorfield Group (a UK private equity firm) since 2007 and is operated by Accor Hotels under their mid-market Mercure brand. [1]
The hotel was founded in 1254 as the 'Fox and Hounds', and parts of the present buildings date back to the 16th century. The land on which the hotel stands was a detached part of the medieval Manor of Thorncroft (in Leatherhead) [2] and was held in the mid-thirteenth century by Walter de Merton, the founder of Merton College, Oxford University. [3]
The main building, adjoining Old London Road, dates from the early nineteenth century. [4] In 1882 the hotel became the 'Hare & Hounds', and was commonly known as the Burford Bridge. In 1905, Surrey Public Trust purchased it from Sir Trevor Lawrence, and it changed permanently to the Burford Bridge Hotel, [5] later merging with Trusthouses in 1948.
A 16th century mediaeval tithe barn from the nearby village of Abinger Hammer was re-erected adjoining the hotel in 1934 and now forms the core of the banqueting suite. [4] The barn is alleged to include beams from ships of the Spanish Armada. [4] [1] An outdoor swimming pool was added in the same decade and the changing rooms have been restored to their original 1930s appearance. [1] The Garden Bedrooms were built in 1973 and adjoin the main hotel.
The hotel was flooded on 24 December 2013 when the River Mole burst its banks after heavy rainfall. Nine members of staff and 27 guests were evacuated by boat. [1] The hotel was reopened on 1 September 2014 following renovation. [6]
After leaving London, John Keats took a room overlooking the gardens, and completed his epic poem Endymion there in 1817. [7] [4] (Keats is said to have been recommended the hotel by the essayist and literary critic William Hazlitt. [8] ) Robert Louis Stevenson was a guest in March 1878, [9] during which time he wrote two short stories: Story of the Young Man with the Cream Tarts and Story of the Physician and the Saratoga Trunk . [10] Other prominent visitors included Queen Victoria, Jane Austen, William Wordsworth and Sheridan. It was here too that Lord Nelson spent secret hours with his love Emma Hamilton, before going to vanquish Napoleon's fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar. [4]
The American businessman, Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, visited the hotel frequently in the 1890s, stopping to take lunch and to collect telegrams. [11] [12] He and a number of other millionaires, including James Hazen Hyde, practised the old English coaching techniques of the early 19th century for sport. Vanderbilt would frequently drive the coach, perfectly apparelled as a coachman or groom. His party would take a one-day, two-day, or longer trip along chosen routes through several counties, going to prearranged inns and hotels along the routes, [13] of which the Burford Bridge was one. [11] A memorial to Alfred still stands at Holmwood a few miles south of the hotel.
Dorking is a market town in Surrey in South East England, about 21 mi (34 km) south of London. It is in Mole Valley District and the council headquarters are to the east of the centre. The High Street runs roughly east–west, parallel to the Pipp Brook and along the northern face of an outcrop of Lower Greensand. The town is surrounded on three sides by the Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and is close to Box Hill and Leith Hill.
Leatherhead is a town in the Mole Valley district of Surrey, England, about 17 mi (27 km) south of Central London. The settlement grew up beside a ford on the River Mole, from which its name is thought to derive. During the late Anglo-Saxon period, Leatherhead was a royal vill and is first mentioned in the will of Alfred the Great in 880 AD. The first bridge across the Mole may have been constructed in around 1200 and this may have coincided with the expansion of the town and the enlargement of the parish church.
Great Bookham is a village in the Mole Valley district, in Surrey, England, one of six semi-urban spring line settlements between the towns of Leatherhead and Guildford. With the narrow strip parish of Little Bookham, it forms part of the Saxon settlement of Bocham. The Bookhams are surrounded by common land, and Bookham railway station in Church Road, Great Bookham, serves both settlements.
The River Mole is a tributary of the River Thames in southern England. It rises in West Sussex near Gatwick Airport and flows northwest through Surrey for 80 km to the Thames at Hampton Court Palace. The river gives its name to the Surrey district of Mole Valley.
Mole Valley is a local government district in Surrey, England. Its council is based in Dorking, and the district's other town is Leatherhead. The largest villages are Ashtead, Fetcham and Great Bookham, in the northern third of the district.
Box Hill is a summit of the North Downs in Surrey, approximately 31 km (19 mi) south-west of London. The hill gets its name from the ancient box woodland found on the steepest west-facing chalk slopes overlooking the River Mole. The western part of the hill is owned and managed by the National Trust, whilst the village of Box Hill lies on higher ground to the east. The highest point is Betchworth Clump at 224 m (735 ft) above OD, although the Salomons Memorial overlooking the town of Dorking is the most popular viewpoint.
The A24 is a major road in England that runs for 53.2 miles (85.6 km) from Clapham in south-west London to Worthing on the English Channel in West Sussex via the suburbs of south-west London, as well as through the counties of Surrey and West Sussex.
Mickleham is a village in south east England, between the towns of Dorking and Leatherhead in Surrey. The civil parish covers 7.31 square kilometres and includes the hamlet of Fredley. The larger ecclesiastical parish includes the majority of the neighbouring village of Westhumble, from which Mickleham is separated by the River Mole.
Stane Street is the modern name of the 91 km-long (57 mi) Roman road in southern England that linked Londinium (London) to Noviomagus Reginorum (Chichester). The exact date of construction is uncertain; however, on the basis of archaeological artefacts discovered along the route, it was in use by 70 AD and may have been built in the first decade of the Roman occupation of Britain.
The Sutton and Mole Valley lines were constructed between 1847 and 1868 by the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway, the London and South Western Railway and the LBSCR-sponsored Horsham, Dorking and Leatherhead Railway.
Mole Valley is a constituency in Surrey represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 1997 by Sir Paul Beresford, a Conservative.
Westhumble is a village in south east England, approximately 2 km (1.2 mi) north of Dorking, Surrey. The village is not part of a civil parish, however the majority of the settlement is in the ecclesiastical Parish of Mickleham.
Headley is a village and civil parish in the North Downs in Surrey, England. The nearest settlements are, to the west, Mickleham and Leatherhead; to the north, Ashtead and Langley Vale; to the east, Walton-on-the-Hill; and to the south, Box Hill. It is just outside the M25 motorway encircling London.
Box Hill & Westhumble is a railway station in the village of Westhumble in Surrey, England, approximately 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Dorking town centre. Box Hill is located approximately 1⁄2 mile (800 m) to the east. It is 21 miles 14 chains (34.1 km) down the line from London Waterloo. Train services are operated by Southern who manage the station, and South Western Railway.
Cherkley Court, at the extreme southeast of Leatherhead, Surrey, in England, is a late Victorian neo-classical mansion and estate of 370 acres (1.5 km2), once the home of Canadian-born press baron Lord Beaverbrook. The main house is listed Grade II on the National Heritage List for England.
Norbury Park is an area of mixed wooded and agricultural land surrounding a privately owned its Georgian manor house near Leatherhead and Dorking, Surrey. On the west bank of the River Mole, it is close to the village of Mickleham.
Pixham is a chapelry within the parish of Dorking, Surrey on the near side of the confluence of the River Mole and the Pipp Brook to its town, Dorking, which is centred 1 km (0.6 mi) southwest. The town as a whole, uniquely in Surrey, has three railway stations; Pixham adjoins or is the location of two of the three; and is near the junction of the A24 and A25 main roads.
The Portsmouth line is a secondary main line originally built by the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway and the London and South Western Railway between 1847 and 1868. It leaves the South London Line at Peckham Rye, with connections to the Victoria branch of the Brighton Main Line at Streatham, and continues via Sutton, Epsom and Dorking to join the Mid-Sussex Line at Horsham.
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