The story goes that Horace Walpole conceived of his most famous novel, The Castle of Otranto, while dreaming one night at his “little Gothic castle,” Strawberry Hill. It is not altogether surprising that the novel widely considered to be the initiator of the Gothic literary revival should germinate in the mind of man who created for himself an extravagant and eccentric edifice that would similarly become the initiator of the Gothic revival in architecture.
When Walpole purchased the land where he would erect his home, it contained only a small cottage built by a coachman to the Earl of Bradford. People had lived there throughout the years, including the Bishop of Durham. There was nothing “Gothic” about the building, but Walpole liked it, calling it the “prettiest bauble you ever saw,” and so he bought the lease from a woman named Mrs. Chenevis. At this time he felt pressure to establish a country seat, and this seemed like a perfect place for it. He did not like the name, which at the time was “Chopped Straw Hill,” and when he found it referred to as “Strawberry Hill” on an old lease he immediately changed its name accordingly.
Between the years 1753 and 1776 Walpole enlarged Strawberry Hill considerably. He altered the original building instead of tearing it down. Interestingly, he had no master plan and continued to make additions sporadically over the years. The Gothic types were mixed, with some influences stemming from England and France and others from Italy; also, some of the elements are medieval and castle-like while others are based on cathedrals, as with some of the chimneypieces that were inspired by those in Westminster and Canterbury.
The old entrance has a low, pointed arch with a narrow corridor, the passageway decorated with slender shafts and low relief tracery. The main walls are brick or rubble masonry, rough-cast with plaster. Most doors and windows have a pointed arch. On the first floor there are a few oriel and bay windows of wood with the upper portions filled with stained glass. That old part of the building faces the Thames and is strikingly reminiscent of Venetian Gothic. In the west wing, Walpole set up his printing press. In the south wing are many medieval touches, such as battlemented parapets, crocketted pinnacles, and Tudor-style chimneys. There is also a picture gallery, servants’ quarters, and thousands of antiques.
In the gardens is the “Chapel in the Woods,” a very small building (its greatest length no more than fifteen feet, and only eight feet wide). Walpole was as meticulous about his gardens as he was about his house, favoring natural groupings of plants and moving away from the assiduous order and regularity popular in English gardens during his day. When his friend Horace Mann asked about the Gothic style in the gardens, Walpole responded, “Gothic is merely architecture, and as one has a satisfaction in imprinting the gloomth of abbeys and cathedrals on one's house, so one's garden, on the contrary, is to be nothing but riant, and the gaiety of nature.” That word “gloomth,” interestingly enough, was coined by Walpole himself to describe what he was endeavoring to achieve in his architectural marvel.
In his 1872 work History of the Gothic Revival Charles Eastlake wrote, “Walpole's Gothic, in short, though far from reflecting the beauties of a former age, or anticipating those which were destined to proceed from a redevelopment of the style, still holds a position in the history of English art which commands our respect, for it served to sustain a cause which had otherwise been well-nigh forsaken.”
After Walpole died, the house passed to a cousin, then to a grandson of his illegitimate half-sister, Maria Walpole. In the 1800s it had two successive owners, the brothers John and George Waldegrave, who spent much of the family fortune and auctioned off many of the house’s contents. In 1923, St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, purchased it. In 2007 it was leased to the Strawberry Hill Trust and an extensive restoration began.
