Once upon a time
I was visiting Pipewell Hall with a colleague from the southern entrance. We wandered past the Gate Lodge along its wild garlic bordered gravelled driveway. The gentle curve of the drive and a gluttony of mature specimen trees purposefully obscures the Hall from any public view. As the driveway straightens out the Hall finally reveals itself. My colleague stopped in her tracks “Oh my goodness, it’s like a house in a fairy tale”. One thing you can say about late-Jacobean & Georgian architecture, the era of Inigo Jones and Sir Christopher Wren, is the talent for the aesthetic. Introducing the classical architecture of Rome and the Italian Renaissance to Britain by comparison to the Tudor period which came before them, is indeed breath-taking. In the same year that Sir Christopher Wren was being commissioned to redesign St. Paul’s Cathedral, undoubtedly his greatest legacy, Pipwell Hall was being built from the stone of the Abbey that had fallen under Henry VIII’s ‘dissolution’. It is truly a great privilege to represent any property of such standing and quite remarkable to think that is has only been passed through five families since its construction. The Barons of Powis, The Le Bas & Harcourt, The Hambrough, The Lloyd and most recently The Baker family. Each family have enjoyed being the custodians of Pipewell Hall, each adding to its legacy during their tenure.

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