Kelston Park, Bath, England

The following is from the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.  

 HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT

By the 13th century Kelston was part of the possessions of Shaftesbury Abbey, Dorset. The Manor Farm barn and Old Park, formerly conygear, may date from this period. At the Dissolution the estate passed to Henry VIII's natural daughter, Ethelreda, through whom it passed by marriage to the Harrington family. Early maps of Somerset (Saxton, 1575; Speede, 1610) show the village of Kelweston but no manor house or park. Nevertheless, some time between 1567 and 1574, John Harrington began building a house close to the church. The house was finished by his son, Sir John, a courtier, poet, and godson of the Queen, and was intended to be one of the grandest houses in the county. Of the formerly numerous outbuildings, two remain, one of which has become the village hall.

During the late 17th and early 18th century the Harrington family became progressively impoverished, and the Kelston estate was sold in 1759 to Sir Caesar Hawkins, a leading surgeon, for £1600. Hawkins created a new mansion (1765-70) and landscape (1767-8), locating the house on the site of a summerhouse on the lip of the southern scarp to exploit the views, and demolished the old manor house. Lancelot Brown (1716-83) was employed by Hawkins to landscape the park around the mansion, for which he was paid £500 (Pearson Assocs 1994).

The Hawkins family continued to live at Kelston until 1828 when it was sold to Joseph Neeld who began a programme of building works around the house. In 1844, the estate passed to the Inigo-Jones family, relatives of the Neelds, who erected an entrance lodge and the porch over the main entrance to the house. In 1967 the Neeld Family Trust leased Kelston Park to the Methodist Church for use as a training centre. In 1993 the estate was purchased, in poor condition, by the Andrew Brownsward Collection to be developed into corporate headquarters. Since then the house and lodge have been restored and the restoration of the parkland has begun.

The estate is currently (2002) unoccupied.