Wivenhoe House, (also known as Wivenhoe Park), Colchester, England

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

An old deer park, improved in 1776-1780 by Richard Woods to form a landscaped park of 34 hectares around a country house, with the remains of a garden designed by William Andrews Nesfield between 1847-1848.

DESCRIPTION

LOCATION, AREA, BOUNDARIES, LANDFORM, SETTING

Wivenhoe Park lies on the north side of Wivenhoe, in an increasingly developed area just to the south-east of Colchester. It covers about 34 hectares, bounded to the north by Elmstead Road, to the north-east by Colchester Road, to the south-west by the main University campus and to the south by Boundary Road. The relatively flat parkland is divided by a valley to the north-west of the House where three lakes cross the site from north-east to south-west.

REFERENCES used by English Heritage:

T Wright, History and Antiquities of Essex (1836), p 397

D W Coler, The people's history of Essex (1858)

E H Gombrich, Art and Illusion (1960)

R Feesey, History of Wivenhoe Park (1963) [copy on EH file]

Country Life, 142 (7 December 1967), p 1473

M Sommerlad, Wivenhoe Park and John Constable (1984)

Garden History 14, no 2 (1986); 15, no 1 (1987)

T R G Gray, Wivenhoe Park: history and natural history (Univ of Essex 2000)

J Clarkson and N Cox, Constable and Wivenhoe Park (Univ of Essex 2000)

Maps

Richard Woods, Design for the improvements of Wivenhoe Park, 1765 (copy in Essex Record Office, location of original unknown)

J Chapman and P Andre, A map of the county of Essex from an actual survey ..., 1777 (Essex Record Office)

Tithe map for Wivenhoe parish, 1838 (D/CT 152B), (Essex Record Office)

Estate map, c 1840 (T/M 275), (Essex Record Office)

OS Surveyor's drawings, 1799 (British Library Maps)

OS 6" to 1 mile: 1st edition published 1874

2nd edition published 1898

3rd edition published 1924

OS 25" to 1 mile: 1st edition published 1876

2nd edition published 1896

Illustrations

J Constable, painting, Wivenhoe Park, Essex, 1816 (National Gallery of Art, Washington DC) [reproduced in Clarkson and Cox 2000]

J Constable, pencil drawings of Wivenhoe Park, 1816 (Victoria and Albert Museum) [reproduced in Sommerlad 1984]

T Barber, print of Wivenhoe mansion and park, 1835 (Essex Record Office)

Description written: September 2000

Amended: April 2001

Edited: September 2001