Strawberry Hill House

As my recovery from the knee operation continued apace, I eased myself back into my Consort duties. A new Rotary year had commenced on July 1^st, so was I still a Consort?   Well I decided that I was.  After all I was now President Elect of Shepperton Aurora Rotary Club, so I appointed myself official Consort to the President, Karen Sutton.  Not only that, but the person formerly known as District Governor was now Chair of Rotaract in Great Britain and Ireland, so I continued as her Consort. My blog will therefore continue,  although  I won’t be strutting the world stage any more, and my activities will be more parochial.

Token male - With my Presidential predecessors Karen, Pauline and Doreen

On 12^th September Norma Kent celebrated her birthday in an unusual fashion. It was unusual for a couple of reasons:  Firstly it wasn’t actually her birthday, and secondly she decided to treat Rotary Club members to coffee and biscuits at Strawberry Hill House, followed by a guided tour of the building.

Strawberry Hill House

Although most of us had never even heard of Strawberry Hill House before , around 18 of us took up the invitation and duly arrived at the House by a variety of different routes, such is the capricious nature of Sat Nav systems. I trusted my map-reading skills in preference to Sat Nav and took a direct route there via Twickenham, Richmond, Twickenham again and Teddington, and was by no means last to arrive. Norma was already there to greet us, and we enjoyed refreshments in the café whilst waiting for our tour to begin.

We meet our guide

Sculpture in the grounds

Strawberry Hill House was built by Horace Walpole, son of Prime Minister Robert Walpole, during the mid-Eighteenth Century. It is an extraordinary Gothic building, completely white in colour, with pinnacles, battlements and a round tower set in several acres of landscaped grounds.  Originally the house enjoyed good views to the River Thames, but the river can no longer be seen due to subsequent building activity and the planting of tall trees along the boundary.  Horace Walpole filled the house with an eclectic mix of treasures and antiquities (some were subsequently found to be not as old as he said) obtained during his two Grand Tours. Most of the treasures with which the house was originally filled were either sold off by subsequent owners, or are now in various museums. Some remain however, including some delightful coloured windows, whilst replicas of others have been made.

Our tour commences

An extraordinary library

Norma had organised an excellent guide, who really brought the history of the building to life with his encyclopaedic knowledge of its history, and interspersing his talk with amusing quotes from the writings of Walpole himself (he was a prolific letter writer). Apparently Walpole allowed visitors to view the house even during his own occupation of it. Strict rules were laid down for visitors (entry by ticket only, groups of no more than four, and no children), and if visitors were deemed to be important he would conduct the tour himself, otherwise his housekeeper Margaret would guide them. Walpole once wrote that Margaret was being paid so much for showing visitors around the property that he was ‘minded to marry her’.

Ornate ceiling

Detail from a window

It was a very enjoyable visit to a building that many of us didn’t even know existed before Norma invited us to see it. We were all very grateful to her for arranging this visit for us, and from a personal point of view I would certainly like to return for another look at Strawberry Hill House in the future.