{"id":10809,"date":"2022-05-05T11:00:53","date_gmt":"2022-05-05T09:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homesandantiques.com\/?p=29532"},"modified":"2022-05-05T11:13:13","modified_gmt":"2022-05-05T09:13:13","slug":"explore-the-eclectic-interiors-of-wardington-manor","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/homesantiques\/rss_feed\/explore-the-eclectic-interiors-of-wardington-manor\/","title":{"rendered":"Explore the eclectic interiors of Wardington Manor"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Christianne Raymer\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Thursday, 05 May 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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Wardington Manor has always been a house filled with ideas, creativity and talented women<\/a>. Over the years, a succession of visionary ladies and their architects have left their mark on its gardens and architecture. Beginning life as a nunnery in the 15th century, the house was reworked in 1665.<\/p>\n

Again in the early 20th century, it went through considerable changes; initially by the celebrated British architect Sir Bertram Clough Williams-Ellis, and then later by Randall Wells. As an exponent of the Arts and Crafts movement of the time \u2013 a trend in the decorative and fine arts that began in Britain and flourished in Europe valuing craftsmanship and the romance of a medieval aesthetic over modern design \u2013 his additions to the house gave it a whole new meaning.<\/p>\n

Evidence of this is most clearly pronounced in the 1920s sugarcraft-like plasterwork, exquisitely executed by Molly Wells, Randall Wells\u2019 wife, which adorns the halls, stairways and landings. Her themes are joyous and uplifting: playful elephants, circus acts and acrobats, birds perched among a repeating pattern of chevrons, ears of corn and intricate patterns of fritillaries, primroses and violets, still grown in the garden today.<\/p>\n

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Under the auspices of its 21st-century owners, the house now has an intriguing eccentricity and infectious energy. Current owners Bridget and Forbes Elworthy have imbued it with a gracefulness and sense of nostalgia that captures the very core of the English manor house tradition of the past. Inside, the living spaces wander over different levels and floors and are decorated simply but tastefully, paying homage to the timeless and liveable English country house style<\/a>. It is a look that manages to be both grand and infinitely comfortable.<\/p>\n

Treasured art, ornaments, deep chintz sofas and chairs, lamps, side tables and piles of books<\/a> all give the feeling of a genuinely lived-in home. \u2018It\u2019s a relaxed style that embraces wear and tear, and doesn\u2019t take itself too seriously,\u2019 says Bridget. Dogs sleeping in baskets in the kitchen, chickens clucking about in the stable yard and ponies grazing in the paddocks all add to the ambience.<\/p>\n

As with the interior, the gardens ramble around the house like the English roses<\/a> that climb up the walls. There\u2019s an enviable maturity and faded romance that only centuries of cultivation and nurture and nature can create. Laid out as a series of formal and informal garden rooms enclosed by ancient ironstone walls and high yew hedges, it is quintessentially English in design \u2013 that delightful combination of manicured lawns and overflowing herbaceous borders watched over by trimmed topiary figures.<\/p>\n

Bridget and Forbes come from farming stock in far away New Zealand, where they developed their love and connection with the land. When searching for a home in the English countryside back in 2008, they were, in the course of time, inspired to take on the challenge of Wardington Manor by its predecessor, Lady Audrey Wardington. After they moved into the house they discovered that, 60 years earlier, the first Lady Wardington had been supplying London\u2019s florists with foliage and the garden\u2019s fragrant wild roses.<\/p>\n