Cadland House, Fawley, England

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

Originally a cottage orné on the banks of the Solent, Cadland House was enlarged as a private residence. It is set at the centre of a pleasure ground laid out by Lancelot Brown in the 1770s.

LOCATION, AREA, BOUNDARIES, LANDFORM, SETTING

Cadland House lies 3.5 kilometres south of Fawley and occupies a coastal site with fine views directly across the Solent to the Isle of Wight to the south-east. It is sited in a position where the deep navigable channel through the Solent swings close to the northern shore, bringing the movement of ships within close range as seen from the shore. The landscape gardens of 7 hectares sit directly on the seashore with the shingle banks of the foreshore included in the scheme. The soils are dry and acid and the site is exposed to fierce, salt-laden winds. The gardens are set against a wooded backdrop which, together with the woodland canopy of the garden itself, suffered extensive damage in the storms of 1987 and 1990, since when there has been a substantial programme of replanting to a plan prepared by Mark Laird.

REFERENCES Used by English Heritage

W Watts, The Seats of the nobility and gentry ... (1779), plate 24

J B Burke, A Visitation of the Seats ... 1, (2nd series 1855), p 56

Florist, (1859), pp 309-11

Architectural History 3, (1971), items 2778, 3585

D Stroud, Capability Brown (1975), pp 177, 219

Cadland House Restoration Plan, (Colvin and Moggridge 1982)

Landscape Design, (August 1983)

T Hinde, Capability Brown The Story of a Master Gardener (1985), pp 198-201

R Turner, Capability Brown and the Eighteenth Century English Landscape (1985), p 142

Professional Horticulture 1, (1987), pp 75-84

Country Life, 181 (1 October 1987), pp 140-5

Maps

Plan for the grounds of Boarn Hill Cottage, attributed to Lancelot Brown, around 1775 (private collection)

Illustrations

T Rowlandson, Copy of sketch of Cottage and foreshore, c 1790 (Mellon Collection, Yale University)

J Frey, Watercolour sketch of the Cottage looking south-west, 1792 (private collection)

C Fitter, The Cottage from the south, 1854 (private collection)

Watercolour of the Cottage from the east, 1858 (private collection)

Archival items

H Holland, Original plans and elevations of the Cottage, c 1775 (private collection)

Estimates for Building a Cottage at Bourne Hill on the old foundations, 1786 (private collection)

Plans with extensions of the second Cottage, 1803 (private collection) 

Description rewritten: October 1999

Amended: March 2001

Edited: January 2004