Nostell Priory | |
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Coordinates | 53°39′10″N1°23′24″W / 53.652706°N 1.390044°W |
Area | 121 hectares (300 acres) |
Architect | James Paine |
Architectural style(s) | Palladian |
Listed Building – Grade I |
Nostell Priory is a Palladian house in Nostell, West Yorkshire, in England, near Crofton and on the road to Doncaster from Wakefield. It dates from 1733 and was built for the Winn family on the site of a medieval priory. [1] The Priory and its contents were given to the National Trust in 1953 by the trustees of the estate and Rowland Winn, 3rd Baron St Oswald.
The priory was a 12th-century Augustinian foundation, dedicated to St Oswald, supported initially by Robert de Lacy of Pontefract and Thurstan of York. [2] By about 1114, Aldulf, confessor to Henry I of England, was prior of a group of regular canons at Nostell. [3] It is probable that Scone Abbey in Scotland was founded by monks from Nostell. [4]
Sir John Field, the first Copernican astronomer of note in England, is believed to have studied at Nostell in his youth under the tutelage of Prior Alured Comwn. [5]
As part of the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the priory was seized and depredated in 1540 and granted to Dr. Thomas Leigh. [6] [7] Nostell was purchased in 1567 by Sir Thomas Gargrave, a High Sheriff of Yorkshire, Speaker of the House of Commons and President of the Council of the North, [8] from the 6th Baron Mountjoy for £3,560. [9] In 1613 it was purchased by William Ireland who, in 1629, sold the estate to Sir John Wolstenholme, 1st Baronet, for £10,000. Nostell was then bought by the Winns from Wolstenholme [10] after the Wolstenholme family were bankrupted by debts they incurred to provide finance for the Royalist cause.
The estate was purchased in 1654 by the London alderman, Sir Rowland Winn, after its last owner, Sir John Wolstenholme, was declared bankrupt in 1650. Construction of the present house started in 1733 and the furniture, furnishings, and decorations made for the house remain in situ. The Winns were textile merchants in London; George Wynne of Gwydir was appointed as Draper to Elizabeth I, his grandson, Sir George Winn was created 1st Baronet of Nostell in 1660. In the nineteenth century the family prospered from the exploitation of coal under the Nostell estate, and later from leasing land at Scunthorpe in Lincolnshire after iron ore deposits were found by Rowland Winn, 1st Baron St Oswald, in 1858; Lord St Oswald later played an important role in the construction of the Trent, Ancholme and Grimsby Railway and the development of the Lincolnshire iron industry (from 1864) and steel industry (from 1891). [11]
The house was built by James Paine for Sir Rowland Winn, 4th Bt., on the site of a 12th-century priory dedicated to Saint Oswald. Robert Adam was commissioned to design additional wings, only one of which was completed, and complete the staterooms. Adam added a double staircase to the front of the house, and designed buildings on the estate, including the stable block. Nostell Priory is home to a large collection of Chippendale furniture, all made for the house and commissioned by Sir Rowland Winn 5th Bart and his wife Sabine Winn. [12] Thomas Chippendale was born in Otley in West Yorkshire in 1718 and had workshops in St Martin’s Lane, London. The Nostell Priory art collection includes The Procession to Calvary by Pieter Brueghel the Younger, William Hogarth's Scene from Shakespeare's The Tempest –the first depiction in a painting of any scene from Shakespeare's plays–and a self-portrait by Angelica Kauffman, as well as Rowland Lockey's copy of the painting by Hans Holbein (c. 1527 but now lost in a fire) of Sir Thomas More and Family ; this copy was commissioned in 1592 by the More family and came to Nostell in the 18th century, and is said to be the most faithful to the destroyed original. [13]
A longcase clock, with an almost completely wooden internal mechanism, made by John Harrison in 1717, is housed in the billiard room. Harrison, whose father Henry is thought to have been an estate carpenter, was born within half a mile of the estate. He was referred to as John "Longitude" Harrison, after devoting his life to solving the problem of finding longitude at sea by creating an accurate marine timekeeper. Known as H4, this chronometer can be seen at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich in London. In August 1982 a music festival was held there, sponsored and organized by Theakston's Brewery which was a great success. Two years later in 1984, there was another festival organized by a different group of people. Although the event was a commercial festival, the "Convoy" was involved in organising a free festival next to it. Riot police were mobilised to deal with element who joined the event and made many arrests. [14]
In May 2007, a set of Gillows furniture returned to the house after refurbishment. These pieces furnish the tapestry room, as do a pair of large Venetian vases made of wood inlaid with ivory and semi-precious stones.
The Adam stable block has undergone a major renovation and is now open as a visitor centre for the house and parkland. In June 2009 a suite of bedrooms on the second floor was handed to the National Trust. The bedrooms used by the Winns, had never been on public view before. They contain the original contents, including a regency four-poster bed and suite of Victorian bedroom furniture. Another room open to visitors is the butler's pantry, with a display of Winn family silver, in the adjacent strongroom cabinets.
Nostell Priory occupies 121 hectares (300 acres) of parkland. [15] Within the grounds and gardens are lakeside walks. The main façade of the house faces east towards a grass vista. Leading to the lake on the west side of the house is the west lawn. The parkland has lakeside and woodland walks, views of the druid's bridge and walks to the restored Obelisk Lodge, a parkland gatehouse, through wildflower meadows. The park was purchased from Lord St Oswald by the National Trust with funding from the Heritage Lottery fund. The grant enabled the trust to acquire pictures, books, and furniture from the family.
To the west of the Middle Lake lies the Menagerie Gardens, completed around 1760 along with a Gothic arch entrance. Built on the site of a medieval quarry, the Menagerie included a lioness, monkeys, bats and a cock pit, as well as a keeper's lodge and ice house. [16] The Obelisk Lodge was built in the 17th century and inhabited until the late 1950s. [17] The main lawn and the lower fields to the east of the Priory have been used for various large and small events over the years, however, it was "Central Yorkshire Scout County" in 2000 which provided a fundamental change to how the grounds could be used. The organisation chose Nostell Priory as the site for its year 2000 "Millennium Camp", which was to attract around 2,500 people from across the Yorkshire Scouting movement. During the 12-month preparation project to create temporary facilities and infrastructure, Yorkshire Water employee Jon Potter [18] persuaded his employers to donate/install subterranean high-pressure water mains and stand-pipe points around the entire eastern grounds. This was unprecedented both in terms of a corporate donation and in its benefit to the Priory, which up to that point had been considering how they could self-fund exactly this improvement.
In 2012 the BBC reported that planning permission had been granted for a new operating base for the Yorkshire Air Ambulance. The new site, including a hangar and aircrew accommodation, was operational by summer 2013. It replaced the previous facility at Leeds Bradford Airport which is north of Leeds. [19]
Thomas Chippendale was an English woodworker in London, designing furniture in the mid-Georgian, English Rococo, and Neoclassical styles. In 1754 he published a book of his designs in a trade catalogue titled The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director—the most important collection of furniture designs published in England to that point which created a mass market for furniture—upon which success he became renowned. According to the Victoria and Albert Museum, "so influential were his designs, in Britain and throughout Europe and America, that 'Chippendale' became a shorthand description for any furniture similar to his Director designs".
Nostell is a village in the City of Wakefield in West Yorkshire, England, near Hemsworth. It is in the civil parish of Huntwick with Foulby and Nostell, which had a population of 90 in 2001, and 164 at the 2011 census.
Baron St Oswald, of Nostell in the West Riding of the County of York, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1885 for the industrialist and Conservative politician Rowland Winn, a former Member of Parliament for North Lincolnshire. His son, the second Baron, represented Pontefract in the House of Commons. His grandson, the fourth Baron, held junior ministerial positions in the Conservative administrations of Harold Macmillan and Alec Douglas-Home and also sat as a Member of the European Parliament. As of 2017 the title is held by the latter's nephew, the sixth Baron, who succeeded his father in 1999.
Lord Headley, Baron Allanson and Winn, of Aghadoe in the County of Kerry, was a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1797 for Sir George Allanson-Winn, 1st Baronet, a former Baron of the Court of the Exchequer and Member of Parliament for Ripon. He had already been created a Baronet, of Little Warley in the County of Essex, in the Baronetage of Great Britain on 14 September 1776. His son, Charles Winn-Allanson, 2nd Baron Headley, represented Ripon, Malton and Ludgershall in Parliament. In 1833 he succeeded a distant relative as 8th Baronet, of Nostel. His nephew, the third Baron, sat in the House of Lords as an Irish representative peer from 1868 to 1877. His son, the fourth Baron, was an Irish Representative Peer from 1883 to 1913. His cousin, Rowland Allanson-Winn, 5th Baron Headley, was a prominent convert to Islam. On the death in 1994 of the latter's younger son, Charles Allanson-Winn, 7th Baron Headley, the titles became extinct.
Rowland Winn, 1st Baron St Oswald was an English industrialist and Conservative Party politician.
Scene from Shakespeare's The Tempest, also known as Ferdinand courting Miranda is an oil painting by the English painter William Hogarth. It has been displayed at Nostell Priory since 1766, and was acquired by the National Trust in 2002. The National Trust claims that it is "the first known painting of a scene from Shakespeare".
Crofton is a village in West Yorkshire, England, about 4 miles (6 km) south-east of Wakefield, some 6 miles (10 km) to the west of the town of Pontefract, and 4 miles (6 km) from the town of Featherstone. The population of the civil parish at the 2011 census was 5,781.
Rowland Lockey was an English painter and goldsmith, and was the son of Leonard Lockey, a crossbow maker of the parish of St Bride's, Fleet Street, London. Lockey was apprenticed to Queen Elizabeth's miniaturist and goldsmith Nicholas Hilliard for eight years beginning Michaelmas 1581 and was made a freeman or master of the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths by 1600.
Sir Thomas Gargrave (1495–1579) was an English Knight who served as High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1565 and 1569. His principal residence was at Nostell Priory, one of many grants of land that Gargrave secured during his lifetime. He was Speaker of the House of Commons and vice president of the Council of the North.
Sir Cotton Gargrave (1540–1588) was an English landowner and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1571 and 1572.
Manor House, 21 Soho Square is a Grade II listed building in the West End of London. It has 17th-century origins but the existing structure dates from 1838. It was originally built in 1678 as a townhouse but through its history has also been a notorious brothel, the headquarters of Crosse & Blackwell and is now an office building.
Olive, Lady Baillie was an Anglo-American heiress, landowner and hostess. She is best known as the owner of Leeds Castle, near Maidstone, Kent, England. On her death the castle was bequeathed to a charitable trust to enable it to be open to the public.
Portrait of Sir Thomas More is an oak panel painting created in 1527 by the German artist and printmaker Hans Holbein the Younger, now in the Frick Collection in New York.
George Allanson-Winn, 1st Baron Headley, known as Sir George Allanson-Winn, Bt, between 1776 and 1797, was a British barrister, judge and politician.
Hirst Priory is an 18th-century country house in Belton on the Isle of Axholme, North Lincolnshire, United Kingdom. The current house was built on the site of a 12th-century Augustinian priory.
Sir Thomas More and His Family is a lost painting by Hans Holbein the Younger, created circa 1527 during Holbein’s first visit to England. The work depicted the noted statesman and scholar Sir Thomas More, his immediate family, and other members of his household. While the original painting was destroyed in a fire in 1752, at Schloss Kremsier, the Moravian residence of Carl von Liechtenstein, Archbishop of Olmutz, its composition is known through a number of surviving copies and studies.
Nathaniel Cholmley was a British Member of Parliament.
Huntwick with Foulby and Nostell is a civil parish in the metropolitan borough of the City of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. In the parish were 34 listed buildings that are recorded in the National Heritage List for England. Of these, three are listed at Grade I, the highest of the three grades, three are at Grade II*, the middle grade, and the others are at Grade II, the lowest grade. The most important building is Nostell Priory, which is listed, together with associated buildings, and structures in the surrounding park. The other major building is the Church of St. Michael and Our Lady, which is also listed, together with monuments in its churchyard. The other listed buildings are houses, cottages, farmhouses and farm buildings, and a bridge.
The Bridgewater Madonna is a religious painting by Raphael, dated 1507. Originally on oil and wood, but later transferred to canvas, it measures 81 by 55 cm. The picture is part of the permanent collection of the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh, on loan from the Duke of Sutherland Collection.
Sabine Louise Winn (1734–1798) was a Swiss patron of the arts and a pioneering textile artist.
Media related to Nostell Priory at Wikimedia Commons