Melbury Park, West Dorset, England

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

A deer park, with woodland and agricultural land of about 300 hectares, with central landscape and gardens of about 15 hectares. There is 18th century landscaping, with extensive 19th and 20th century planting of rare trees and shrubs.

DESCRIPTION

Melbury House stands on an eminence with slightly falling ground on all sides, and the valleys of 2 streams about 1 kilometre to east and west. A lesser valley lies about 200 metres east and south-east of the house. Beyond these streams, to east, south and west, the land rises again, with considerable areas of woodland to the north-west (Great High Wood), south-west (Stutcombe Bottom, with Lewcombe Woods beyond) and south-east (Banger's Moor, with Evershot Hill Plantation beyond). There are two main lakes, both artificial: Melbury Lake, about 150 metres south of house, and Lucerne Lake, about 600 metres to the east. There are numerous streams and smaller ponds.

Notable specimen trees include mature Lebanon cedar, Atlantic cedar, Lucombe oak, cut-leave beech, redwood, Wellingtonia, Abies cephalonica, and Pterocarya fraxinifolia.

REFERENCES

Country Life, 19 Aug 1899, 208-213.

'Melbury House Gardens. Guide to Tree Planting' (leaflet), n.d.

Newman J, Pevsner N, Dorset, 1972, 273-278.

Oswald A, Country Houses of Dorset, 1959, 118-122, pl. 128-133.

Walpole H, ed. Toynbee P, 'Visits to Country Seats', Walpole Society, 16, 1927-1928, 47-48.

Registered: 1986