CUMBRIA: Brockhole Info

Date:		22nd. September 2015
Blog Status:		Complete (not visited)
County:		CUMBRIA
Location:		Brockhole House and Gardens
Type:		Historical Building, Gardens
Sub-Type:		None
Viewed by:		Unseen. Research information for reference.
Car Park:		Pay 'n' Display
Scene Rating:		Not yet seen. Not rated.

Please note: all data and opinions presented on this site are offered in good faith, but they are advisory only and are utilised at the risk of the user. The authors can accept no blame or liability for any loss or accident or other negative effect resulting from errors, omissions or data that has changed over time.

Original photographs found on this website are Copyright © Richard Baskerville 2015, All Rights Reserved. If small versions of other photographs are found here, they act only as links to larger versions on their originating websites. Such images may be copyrighted by their original owners. Please see the linked websites for copyright details.]

Brockhole: Introduction

Brockhole is a historical mansion that is run today as the National Park Visitor Centre. It has a wide range of facilities that will appeal to everyone from small children to garden-and-scenery-loving pensioners.

For kids and families there are adventure and sports activities like the Treetop Trek, Treetop Nets, watersports, mini-golf, bike-hire, boat-hire, orienteering, exhibitions, indoor soft play and creativity space, adventure playground ... and so on.

For non-families there are walks around the house, the extensive gardens and the lakeshore ... and to other scenic viewpoints in the grounds, from which you can see the mountains across the waters of Windermere.

Brockhole: Information

Getting There and Parking

Brockhole is accessible either by road or from its own private jetty, which is served by some of the Windermere cruises and other launch ferries/taxis. The postcode for satnavs is LA23 1LJ.

Entry is free, although you can expect to shed some money for the car park, which has Pay on Exit parking: £2 for the first hour then 40p for every 20 minutes up to £8 for the whole day.)

There's a shop and restaurant/tea room (which has terraced seating outside) - and toilets of course...

The Attraction Today

Brockhole aims at being a cultural centre for local people as well as being a tourist attraction - so it provides a busy calendar of exhibitions, events and concerts (which are available at additional cost.)

Full details about Brockhole and "what's on" at the moment can be found on their own brockhole.co.uk website.

The House and Gardens

The house and gardens have strong historical interest. The house was built in 1895 by wealthy Manchester silk merchant William Henry Aldolphus Gaddum, who initially bought four plots of farm land and had the house constructed according to plans designed by architect Dan Gibson. Beatrix Potter was his wife's cousin and a frequent visitor (as she recorded in her journals.)

The remaining 30 acres were designed by the local and internationally famous landscape gardener Thomas Mawson. Five acres were made into impressive terraced gardens that step down to the Windermere foreshore, while the rest was adapted to allow spectacular views of the fells.

Thomas Mawson designed most of the gardens for the new, large houses around Windermere - including Rydal Hall and Langdale Chase. He was later revered as one of the key thinkers in the design of gardens according to the principles of the so-called Arts and Crafts Movement and gained fame internationally - designing gardens for the Peace Palace Gardens of the Hague and sites from Athens to North America.

Mawson was a teetotaller workaholic who had a passion for detail and firm opinions about garden landscaping. He recorded his design philosophies - with many examples of his work - in his book: The Art and Craft of Garden Making.

Modern landscape practitioners see Mawson as having promoted ideas about optimising existing space and terrain - and integrating nature with architecture - that are still relevant in the landscaping of greener cities today. Mawson designs contain a blend of architecture and planting that was recognised as a key feature of his work from early in his career.

Mawson took a keen interest in public space and was involved in the development of town planning and public parks. He became president of the Town and Planning Institute in 1923 and the first president of the newly formed Institute of Landscape Architects in 1929.

His landscape designs saw garden buildings and pavilions - and the garden itself - as inextricable from the style of the main building(s). This meant working closely with buildings' architects. Mawson worked with Dan Gibson (who is regarded as an Art and Crafts architect) on a number of projects.

There's more about the Arts and Crafts Movement in our article on Blackwell, which is commonly glossed as "The Arts and Crafts House." Blackwell is a 1900 mansion found a few kilometers South of Bowness-on-Windermere - and which also has a Mawson garden.

The Brockhole garden was built as a series of South and West facing terraces, sloping gently down to the shores of Lake Windermere. It develops from formal gardens near the house, through increasingly informal flowerbeds, to the meadows and woodland on the lakeshore - making it a good example of Mawson's principles of integration into the existing landscape.

The garden was also carefully planned to leave enhanced sight-lines towards the mountains at the Northern end of the grounds. There are views towards the Langdale Pikes, Crinkle Crags, the Pike of Stickle and Harrison Stickle.

Mawson also experimented with technology. A system of underground water tanks was designed to collect rainwater from gutters and provide self-sustaining irrigation for the terraced flower beds.

And of course the garden was designed to provide colour at almost all times of the year. Shrubs (including rhododendrons, wisteria and magnolias) and a wide but carefully selected variety of herbaceous plantings mean that there's something flowering, or sprouting colourful berries, in every season.


Enjoy!


- dikb