Crewe Hall, Crewe, Cheshire, England

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

HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT

The Crewe estate was purchased in the late 16th century by Sir Randulph Crewe (d 1646), a successful London lawyer who in 1625 was appointed Lord Chief Justice. It descended in his family until 1679 when it passed by marriage to John Offley of Madeley (Staffordshire), whose son and heir John (d 1749) reverted to the name Crewe. He was succeeded by his son John (d 1752), and he in turn by his son, also John (1742-1829), who served as MP for Stafford 1765-1768 and for Cheshire 1768-1806, and who in 1806 was created Baron Crewe of Crewe. It was he who commissioned Emes and Repton to improve the setting of his house, which itself he greatly enlarged in about 1800. In the 1860s Crewe Hall was surrounded by new gardens designed by W A Nesfield (1793-1881), and was then rebuilt after a serious fire by Hungerford Crewe, the third Baron, who had inherited in 1835. The third Baron never married. On his death in 1894 the estate passed to his nephew Lord Houghton, who in the 1930s sold the bulk of it to the Duchy of Lancaster. After the Second World War the Hall was leased as offices, from 1966 by the Wellcome Foundation. In 1997 the Hall and Stables stood empty as a commercial tenant was sought.