Monument record MDO32958 - Garden at Poxwell Manor, Poxwell

The gardens around Poxwell House or Manor which is thought to have been built around 1600, but with later extensions and additions. The house was restored and remodelled in 1934, and the greater part of the current garden appears to date from this period, though built around and adapting earlier features. A striking survival from the seventeenth-century gardens is a stylish gazebo.

The gardens around Poxwell House or Manor built around 1600, with considerable extensions and additions being made throughout the seventeenth century. The house was thoroughly restored and partly remodelled in 1934. Buildings around the house include a seventeenth-century tiled barn and thatched former stables. The adjacent church was demolished in 1868 and the new church of St John the Baptist built on a site to the east. The churchyard and surrounding walls survive. <1> Any surviving seventeenth-century gardens seem to have been removed or much altered by later changes. A key surviving element is the gazebo (often called the gatehouse), which Mowl commends for being the only ambitious and richly-crafted gazebo in the county. <2> Mowl takes the completion date from a date stone on the gatehouse. It should be noted that the formal area which now lies between the house and the road is not shown on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map <3>. The walls surrounding it, though, appear to be the same age as the gatehouse (seventeenth century) but gateways to the north and south are very probably later additions. The rectangular rose garden with a rectangular pond in the centre is not shown on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map; Its style suggests that it was constructed at the time of or shortly after the 1934 restoration of the house. A photograph of 1912 <4> shows a track with estate railings running from just north of the gatehouse to the road (A353), across the northern edge of what appears on the current (2007) digital map layers as a pond with ‘wavy’ edges and an island. The path can also be seen on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map. That the pond is a late twentieth century addition is confirmed by a photograph reproduced in the Dorset Year Book for 1983, showing a recently constructed pond <5>. Another slightly less irregular pond with island at the southern end of the garden is not shown on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map, and presumably it too is a late twentieth or twenty first-century addition. A smaller pond, in a more functional and casual style, and meandering water course appear on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map; the appearance of the area surrounding the older pond and water course on the 1902 map, and its present style suggest that there may have been a wilderness-type garden in this area. The water course appears rather ‘canal-ish’ on current (2007) digital maps, and it is tempting to ascribe an early date to this feature, but its meandering nature on the 1902 map makes it clear that this is a relatively recent development. Setting: Poxwell Manor is situated at the northern end of Poxwell village, next to and to the west of the A353 road. The house faces the road. The garden is enclosed behind a combination of a low brick wall and estate railings. Another, taller wall encloses an area of formal gardens immediately in front of the house; a less formal area of meadow with ponds lies between the two walls. The garden and surrounding area are relatively flat, though situated on generally higher ground with long views to the south. The garden appears not to have been created with external vistas in mind. The walled garden in front of the house can, presumably, be viewed from the gazebo and the upper floors of the house, and gates in the north and south walls create longer views both from within and into the walled garden. The area to the rear of the house served as a farmyard. Context: The gardens at Poxwell Manor seem to have been created as an embellishment of a relatively modest gentleman farmer’s establishment, which was acquired and improved in the seventeenth century by John Henning, a merchant from Poole. Though the gardens remain on a domestic scale, they are not pedestrian; the surviving gazebo is stylish and has considerable architectural value. Significance: It is generally presumed that the seventeenth-century manor house is built on the site of an earlier building. No traces of or direct evidence for the existence of this earlier building or any gardens associated with it have been identified. The seventeenth-century gardens were much altered by later changes, particularly a re-design of the gardens which appears to have occurred in the 1930s, following the remodelling and restoration of the house in 1934. A notable surviving element of the seventeenth-century garden is the hexagonal gazebo, sometimes called the gatehouse, set into the eastern side of the walled garden. The 1930s garden has no particularly outstanding features. Considerable alterations have taken place in recent years, notably the enlargement and creation of ponds in the informal area near the road. A swimming pool has been added. There is a tenuous connection with Gertrude Jekyll, in that she was aware of, and very probably visited the gardens at Poxwell, and refers to the walls and gatehouse as notable in an article on garden ornament published in Country Life in 1927 <6>.

Record last edited

Apr 13 2016 4:49PM