Capheaton Hall

Capheaton Hall
Northumberland
West Lodge to Capheaton Hall
Location
Grid reference:	NZ038804
Location:	55°7’8"N, 1°56’28"W
History
	Country house
Information
Owned by:	Swinburne family

Capheaton Hall, near Wallington in Northumberland, is a country house which is the seat of the Swinburne Baronets: as such it was a childhood home of the poet Algernon Swinburne. It is counted among the principal gentry seats of Northumberland, and today it is a Grade I listed building.

The house, which was built for Sir John Swinburne, 1st Baronet in 1667-68 by Robert Trollope of Newcastle, is a provincial essay in Baroque, of local stone with giant pilasters on high bases supporting sections of entablature dividing the main front into a wide central bay and flanking bays, under a sloping roof with vernacular flat-footed dormers. The estate was improved with a model farm in Gothic taste, designed by Daniel Garrett for Sir John Swinburne, ca 1746, one of the earliest examples of the Gothic Revival. The north front was rebuilt for Sir John Swinburne, 6th Baronet in 1789-90 by a local architect, William Newton.

The house stands in rolling parkland in the manner of Capability Brown. The naturalistic setting of Sir Edward's Lake south of the house was designated a Site of Nature Conservation Importance in 1983 for the wintering and breeding wildfowl it harbours, as well as the fen and carr vegetation that has developed round its margins.

The linear estate village of Capheaton (population 50), built as a planned model village in the late eighteenth century, is sited on a ridge west of the Hall.

The Capheaton archives are at the Northumberland Record Office.

References

• Howard Colvin, A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600-1840, 3rd ed. 1995
• National Heritage List 1154285: Capheaton Hall
• The Swinburn family of Capheaton Hall
• Capheaton Estate Village
• Keys to the Past: Capeaton