Chillington Hall
and
Bishton Hall
Staffordshire
Chillington Hall has been the home to the Giffard family since just after the Norman Conquest. The house has been through numerous guises; first a rambling Mediaeval courtyard mansion, then a strange Tudor/Baroque hybrid and finally the great Soane house we have today.
The Entrance Front of Chillington by Sir John Soane
The Soane work is on such a grand scale that the Saloon is considered the only surviving Soane interior that can evoke the gigantic vanished domed interiors of the Bank of England.
The dome of the Saloon, one of Soane's masterpieces
The SaloonThe present incumbents of Chillers (as people often affectionately refer to this friendly palace) are John and Crescent. The former is the retired Chief Constable of Staffordshire and the latter is a brilliant Texan-born interior designer. Mrs Giffard has been left undaunted by this huge house and has made it comfortable and unstarchy.
We started in the rooms in the Baroque wing by Smith of Warwick. These have wonderful plaster ceilings and are friendly and much lower than their lofty early nineteenth century neighbour, the Drawing Room. This and the rest of the rooms in the enfilade (Hall, Dining Room and Long Room) are from the era of Soane and just after, as they have been much modified since the latter was there.
The Drawing Room
The Hall is a monumental space with a screen of Ionic columns heralding the entrance to the Saloon, but more of that later. Next comes the dining room, huge striped and full of wonderful late Georgian fittings and one of Pompeo Batoni's masterpieces.
The Dining Room
The Long Room is another grand space but the Saloon, next on the tour, is the Tour de force. Huge, very tall and now a wonderful Tuscan orange it has a glass dome, a huge stone chimney piece incorporating much of the Giffard family history and a very fine group of paintings.
The staircase hall is magnificent and the great stained glass window contains the coats of arms of various Giffard alliances. Upstairs is a gargantuan State Bed with another dome and hand painted chintz in wonderful condition from the late Eighteenth Century.
A Young Georgian prepares to take off down the great Avenue at Chillington to lunch nearby
Chillington sits amidst one of Lancelot 'Capability' Brown's greatest landscape parks, which is full of follies, lakes and stately old trees.
I am lucky to know Chillington and the Giffards very well and the house is in very fine form and is also now one of the finest private wedding venues in the Midlands.
On to Bishton Hall, or St Bede's - it's other name as one of the Midland's best Preparatory Schools.
Bishton is a fine Georgian country house and was largely built by the well-known Stafford family, the Sparrows. It was at one time home to the formidable Sparrow sisters who built the mighty Temple at one end of the walled garden, which looks to all the World like the original Euston Station or a chillier version of the Parthenon...maybe the latter does more credit to its beauty and grandeur.
The house has been home to the Stafford Northcote family and their school, St Bede's, since the present owner's Parents came here in 1936. Charles Stafford Northcote is the present Headmaster and his sister, Helena, is Headmistress. Together they form a young and dynamic team. I can vouch for this as I have had no less than seven little cousins at school here in the last ten years!
Bishton's original seven bay Georgian and pedimented facade was given bow-fronted wings in the early Nineteenth Century, the one to the right being a 'Great Room'. Inside there is some fine mid-Georgian carving and plasterwork in the Hall, a marvellous staircase in a very stately style and a top-lit domed first floor landing. The house is alive and full of the pitter-patter of many little feet for most of the year.
The garden is crowned by the previously mentioned Temple, one of the secret treasures of Staffordshire. This is also now a marvellous venue for events and is probably the grandest outdoor prep school stage in the Country!
Chillinton and Bishton, only a few miles apart, are having another heyday and are well loved by those who live in them and by the many fortunate people who come to visit.
The Young Georgians departed in high spirits in various cars ranging from one friend's very smart sports car to my battered old Subaru, which was once white but is now very much mud brown!!
For more information of Chillington and Bishton please go to:
and The Georgian Group and Young Georgians:
