Hatfield House, Hertfordshire

[bixaorellana]

Hatfield House, a prime example of Jacobean architecture, is situated in a large park on the eastern edge of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, England. It was built in 1611 by Robert Cecil, First Earl of Salisbury and Chief Minister to King James I, partly on the site of the Royal Palace of Hatfield, only part of which still exists. Since its construction in 1611, the house has been the home of the Cecil family, and is currently the home of the 7th Marquess of Salisbury and open to the public.

Some elements I'll be showing might already be familiar to viewers, as the house has been the setting of quite a few movies. I highly recommend the Wikipedia entry for its overall history and for such remarkable facts as the origin of the phrase "Bob's your uncle". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatfield_House

A pleasant short train trip from London conveniently deposits you at the Hatfield train station, located across the street from the pedestrian entrance to the house ~





There is a wide, long causeway to the grounds ~



Peeping over the side to snoop someones garden below ~



Once across the causeway, there is still a hike through parkland, first passing the Stable Yard, which is not as ye olde as it looks, having been built in 1915.
In that year the Old Palace was restored as a banqueting hall, having rather shockingly been used for the previous 300 years as stables for Hatfield House. source



Finally the drive and the house come into view ~













Renaissance is a stainless steel kinetic water sculpture by Angela Conner, and set against the north front of Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, England.
The arms of the sculpture articulate up and down through the transference of water, and a golden globe rises and falls at its centre.
It was installed in this, its permanent public position, in 2015. source

[bixaorellana]

This giant hat, one of several scattered around the grounds, is at the foot of the steps to the house ~



You enter into a small foyer, which had several people in it. I was instantly distracted by the view of the great hall ~



Looking back into the foyer ~



So many details to catch the eye ~







The walls! The ceiling!









Pride of place is given to the "Rainbow Portrait" of Elizabeth I ~

[bixaorellana]

Light streams across this collection of blue and white porcelain on the upstairs landing ~

[questa]

Is the family motto "If you have it, flaunt it"?

Lovely pieces all around but a bit OTT for me. The simplicity of the light on the blue and white porcelain comes as a pleasant relief.

[bixaorellana]

Ha ha, Questa -- ya ain't seen nothin yet!

Looking at the history of the house and its family, standing there surrounded by more priceless stuff than I could take in, it was all too easy to understand popular uprisings. Still, the great inherited wealth meant that this place was preserved in all its historical, artistic, and architectural splendor. Truly, there is so much to marvel at in the beautifully proportioned house that I would gladly return to see it again.

Moving from the landing into the King James Drawing Room. You'll note the rolled edges of the rug and the odd placement of some of the chairs.
That is because this room is still in use as a family living room when there are no visitors in the house.

Looking into the room from the landing door ~



From the opposite wall, looking back toward the door through which I entered ~



Looking up ~



The statue of James I which gives the drawing room its name.
It was presented by the king himself. It is of stone painted to look like bronze ~







Through this window can be seen the East Garden, only accessible to the public on Wednesdays.
"Oh, but you can see it through the window", I said, moving in to get a picture. The docent practically threw himself in front of me to prevent that.

A few paintings. Before moving on, I'd like to draw attention to the painting of Adam and Eve, which may seem familiar to many of you. This painting is identified in a catalog of the collection as: Painted by Marcelius Coffermans, after the engraving by Albert Dürer. If you look up Coffermans, then take a good look at the Hatfield painting, you'll be forced to the conclusion that either Coffermans was having a really bad day or that the painting later suffered some awfully clunky restoration.

The "Ermine Portrait", by Nicholas Hilliard ~





Exiting this drawing room with a last look at the magnificent mantle and a closer look at the statue above it ~

[breeze]

Spectacular photos.

They must keep all those windows sparkling clean. I know I would. If I had staff.

No photo of the garden then, just a closeup of the docent's palm?

[bixaorellana]

Thanks, Breeze!

Well, my living room looks almost exactly like the one in the photos except that I've gotten rid of a bunch of knick-knacks since reducing the staff.

You can see what I saw of the East Garden by peering past the piano. Be of good cheer, though, as later I'll show the West Garden, which is rather gorgeous.

[mossie]

Wow! There is opulence, and there is OPULENCE

[bjd]

Declutter! Declutter!

I must say I agree with Questa. It just seems like overkill starting in the entry to have that carved wood everywhere and then add paintings and tapestries. I can't imagine the family actually using that room. Where do you rest your eyes? -- looking out the window occasionally, like the tourist in your picture?

[questa]

Jul 21, 2017 2:10:38 GMT bixaorellana said:

this room is still in use as a family living room

I can just see it. His Regalness and wife are signing copies of the coffee table books for sale in the souvenir shop.
Big sister is at the piano stumbling through "Fur Elise". She can never inherit due to a genetic condition...she was born with XX genes and only XY can inherit.
The twin 8 year old boys are racing their remote-controlled cars on the strip of timber floor. They are just losing their close twin relationship and recognizing that the 5 minutes between births has made James the heir to all of Hatfield and master of the family, while his twin will always be "the second son".
Nanny is sitting away from the family, knitting. She is the one who explained to the children about the naked people pictured on their walls and thus their sex education. She has taught them manners and respect for others, compassion for those less fortunate and how they can use their position in Society for good.

Interesting room.

BTW I made up the family, too lazy to Google them.

[cheerypeabrain]

Went there on a school trip in the 70s I think. I'm not a one for stately homes but I did like the Tudor portraits excellent pics as always Bixa dear.

[bixaorellana]

Thank you, Cheery! Last year in England I mostly avoided house interiors in order to see more gardens. This time I found it was enjoyable and educational to see the grand houses, not only because they're fairly mind-boggling, but also because it made it easier to visualize things I'd only read about.

Jul 21, 2017 5:55:31 GMT questa said:

I can just see it.

It's hard to look at this much inherited wealth of the kind that naturally increases itself and to feel any identification with the owners of that wealth. Certainly every time I saw evidence of the contemporary family of the house, I thought of the famous words of F. Scott Fitzgerald, "Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them ..." (complete quote here)
I don't know if I accept Fitzgerald's take, but it's hard not to agree about the different part.

Jul 21, 2017 5:40:44 GMT bjd said:

It just seems like overkill starting in the entry to have that carved wood everywhere and then add paintings and tapestries. I can't imagine the family actually using that room.

Well, the whole point of the place is to present it in its historical accuracy. I mean, no one is going to come pay to see our lovely uncluttered homes. The house was always meant to convey wealth and political power with all its trappings. As Mossie so succinctly said:

Jul 21, 2017 5:32:16 GMT mossie said:

Wow! There is opulence, and there is OPULENCE

As far as the room being used, probably the pictures don't give a full idea of how very big it is. I could easily envision the chairs and everything spread out in regular configurations and the room looking as much like a normal living room as anything that big and fancy could look.

[bixaorellana]

And now, after presenting my apologia for the house and its trappings, I take you to a room that I found repellent in its awfulness ~







Moving on from the mint-green headache, here is the ante-room to the Long Gallery, with its individual fancy ceiling ~

[bixaorellana]

This is the Winter Dining Room, with its tapestries from 1611 depicting the four seasons ~

The delightful and twinkly docent told me who this was, but I forgot. What I do remember is that it depicts the subject at a coronation, holding her coronet which, as a peer of the realm she would don when the monarch was crowned. He also explained to me about the stripes on the sleeve. For a woman, the more stripes the lower the rank. For a man (who might have his stripes elsewhere, as on a cloak), the more stripes the higher the rank.

The library, with its Nigerian goatskin upholstery, contains around 10,000 volumes, dating from the 16th century to the present day ~



The windows overlook the West Garden and the Old Palace ~



The marble mantelpiece is from the early 17th century and was was rebuilt in 1782 when the room was created.
The mosaic portrait is that of Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury. It was made in Venice in 1608 and presented to him as a gift.





After the library, I went downstairs and encountered this painting on the landing. How Downton Abbey is this?!

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 6th Marquess of Salisbury

[kerouac2]

I am shuddering at the thought of just the budget for feather dusters in a place like this. Otherwise, the house looks like it would be fun for children to play in, unhindered. As if that would ever happen!

[questa]

Surely the place must have a ghost or something?

[bixaorellana]

Jul 22, 2017 4:01:17 GMT kerouac2 said:

I am shuddering at the thought of just the budget for feather dusters in a place like this. Otherwise, the house looks like it would be fun for children to play in, unhindered. As if that would ever happen!

Hmmm. I wonder how they keep places like that clean in modern times. Surely they must use some kind of vacuum cleaner/blowers -- something less likely to damage items than dusters. I imagine there are roombas running all night long around the place.
Looking at the size of the place and comparing it to what the public can see, there must be even more long halls and rooms where children would be allowed to play. When I show the armory, you'll see there is a cordoned off area with children's toys. The armory is a room that makes you want to slide down it in your socks.

Jul 22, 2017 5:27:11 GMT questa said:

Surely the place must have a ghost or something?

I looked, so can offer you this misspelled but highly exclamatory article: eerieplace.com/haunted-hatfield-house/

[patricklondon]

I once saw a documentary about a National Trust property (Penshurst, I think), and it went into a lot of detail about how they dust. It isn't all done every day, different areas are done on different schedules (and it's a difficult balance to strike between keeping things clean and wearing them away), but one thing I do remember is that they use vacuum cleaners on a low speed with cloth stretched over the nozzle, likewise to prevent accidentally sucking up delicate bits of moulding and the like.

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"too literate to be spam"

[bixaorellana]

In thread time I am still at the downstairs landing, where I encountered this exquisite and adorable ivory confection ~

















At the entrance of the Armoury, there is an early 17th organ. Most of the armor came from the Tower of London in the mid-19th century. source









Looking at the placement of these pictures, it's hard to escape the idea that they have more than they know what to do with ~



A horse trough? Or a bathtub, as the little seat inside might indicate?





This end of the room is cordoned off. The screen hides a ping-pong table and other games and toys ~

[bixaorellana]

Jul 23, 2017 15:53:52 GMT patricklondon said:

I once saw a documentary about a National Trust property (Penshurst, I think), and it went into a lot of detail about how they dust. It isn't all done every day, different areas are done on different schedules (and it's a difficult balance to strike between keeping things clean and wearing them away), but one thing I do remember is that they use vacuum cleaners on a low speed with cloth stretched over the nozzle, likewise to prevent accidentally sucking up delicate bits of moulding and the like.

Ah, thanks for that, Patrick. Ever since I saw the lawn at Hever being loudly and obnoxiously mowed during the middle of the public's viewing day, I've wondered how museum-type sites manage to hide the workings of the enormous amount of maintenance they need.

Moving on, this window is at the end of the narrow passageway leading to the chapel ~

[bjd]

Interesting pics, as usual, Bixa but give me a house by Frank Lloyd Wright to live in.

[patricklondon]

Jul 23, 2017 16:41:31 GMT bixaorellana said:

I've wondered how museum-type sites manage to hide the workings of the enormous amount of maintenance they need.

That's why they have closed periods. Just as in the days when "the family" might leave a house like that dust-covered and shuttered up while they went off to London to run the country (especially in the Cecils' case).

it's hard to escape the idea that they have more than they know what to do with

Big problem for people who inherit heritage and history. There's been a bit of fun in the newspapers lately about the latest exhibition at Buckingham Palace, of international diplomatic gifts to the Queen, and you've never seen such a collection of oddities in your life. And the trouble is, someone has to be employed to catalogue and note it so that it comes out whenever some dignitary from the country concerned comes calling. It's like the problem of remembering to get out Aunt Ada's ghastly wedding present, multiplied a thousandfold. I'd imagine that's true for every head of state.

My blog | My photos | My video clips
"too literate to be spam"

[lagatta]

I could see Trump lusting after that Chinoiserie bedroom, but he'd have the bed changed for a larger one.

I loved the smaller house at the beginning of the thread.

No, I couldn't live there either, even if by some miracle I had the money and the staff. But I wouldn't want to live in a Frank Lloyd Wright house either. Another kind of pretension, and a harbinger of suburban sprawl. Much as I love greenery, my dreams are urban, and not large in scale.

[questa]

I could not live there either...I would be continually lost in all the corridors and rooms. Does GPS work if the roof is lead-lined?

[bixaorellana]

Bjd, I'd be right down the street from you. Maybe not in a Wright house, but in something small, modern, well-designed, & with excellent plumbing and electrical. I am fascinated by all this pomp and show of an earlier age and certainly the workmanship is dazzling, but I worship at the altar of efficient.

Jul 23, 2017 19:23:46 GMT patricklondon said:

There's been a bit of fun in the newspapers lately about the latest exhibition at Buckingham Palace, of international diplomatic gifts to the Queen, and you've never seen such a collection of oddities in your life.

In my Banqueting House thread there is a picture of something that looks like a purse on display at the Supreme Court. The caption over it in the case reads, "Raffia-style document case". Each member of the Judicial Committee got one when they sat in the Bahamas. I imagined them saying in unison, "Really -- you shouldn't have!"

Oh, LaGatta ~ I can't agree about an architect-designed house being a type of pretension. Also, there have to be suburbs for those who either don't wish to or who can't live in a city.

Questa, when the grand ancestral mansion comes to you, we will all get together and present you with little bags of different colored pebbles so you won't get lost. Maybe a roomba wouldn't be such a good idea for you, though.

Well, there is only one part of the inside of the house left to see, after which I'll be showing the grounds in their summer glory.
For now, let's visit ~















Recipes. You can read them in the full sized version here.



Butter churn ~







Even though this room was at a level just a few steps down from the main kitchen, it was significantly cooler ~

[bjd]

I said Frank Lloyd Wright not because I want to live in the countryside -- I just use his idea of a spacious, empty sort of house with lots of wood and windows as a place I would like to live in.

[lagatta]

That wasn't my point, and I most certainly am not against architects or architecture. That's like saying I don't like architects because I don't like Le Corbusier "barres". Don't forget that many prominent architects, including the Amsterdam School, Bauhaus and the Viennese architects of the "Hofs" were actually involved in building exemplary social housing. Oh dear, someone will now accuse me of being against privately-owned housing, which is allowed even in Cuba now, so that really is a red herring. Lots of Cubans are building their own houses now, and more than a few have added an extra flat, either for relatives or to rent to tourists, bringing in some much-needed extra earnings. My only objection to Wright is a certain propensity to sprawl, and a certain anti-urban orientation, though of course he also built many fine urban buildings and designed well-thought-out houses for ordinary people.

Looking over the literature,you will find several informed critics of Wright, who aren't arguing for neo-Victorian twee. There should be more, not less, input from architects and fine and applied artists in general. The bane of urbanism lies more in contractors who fancy themselves architects, and ill-thought out housing schemes, from sprawling suburbs with no services to the overbuilding of condo towers on Toronto's lakefront.

I confess to being very much against the current North American model of "suburbs", because they are car-dependent and hence ecocidal, but that doesn't mean that all suburbs are like that or that they have to be, nor do they have to be tower blocks (no desire to live in one of those, but some can actually be very pleasant with proper upkeep). Transit-(or transport)-oriented-development (TOD) actually goes back to so-called "streetcar suburbs" which have a density appropriate for public transport but certainly have greenery and often have back yards, and there are contemporary models in many countries.

[bjd]

We're getting far away from Hatfield House here, but I must say I agree totally with you, Lagatta, about current N American suburbs. When we go to see our son who lives 30 km outside Ottawa, as much as I find it far from the city, I understand that they didn't want to live in the suburbs. They are literally all the same, with identical houses on tiny plots of land. The same outside Toronto, with mile after mile of houses that all look the same.

One of the things that struck me in Vienna was that architects actually signed the social housing buildings they had designed. They were often extremely attractive buildings, far from le Corbusier's rabbit hutches.

Hatfield House is not twee, but I certainly would hate to live in such an overly-decorated, over-stuffed house, even on a smaller scale.

[breeze]

We visited a nearby museum where the owner collected all kinds of things. The collection fills five large metal buildings. Everything from old typewriters and computers to a complete ice cream parlor to a small former church. Also a few classic vehicles, old computers, radios, tools of all types--so much stuff I can't even remember. The place was fascinating. It sounds junky but it wasn't; the rooms were bright, everything was neatly arranged with space around each object, and every object sparkled.

I mentioned that it must take a lot of work to keep everything dusted and the guy said that all they do is once a year--once a year!--use a product called Kotton Kleen and it keeps things dust-free.

[bixaorellana]

Jul 24, 2017 10:27:47 GMT lagatta said:

Transit-(or transport)-oriented-development (TOD) actually goes back to so-called "streetcar suburbs" which have a density appropriate for public transport but certainly have greenery and often have back yards, and there are contemporary models in many countries.

Jul 24, 2017 11:44:37 GMT bjd said:

We're getting far away from Hatfield House here, but I must say I agree totally with you, Lagatta, about current N American suburbs.

Jul 24, 2017 7:33:21 GMT huckle said:

FLW with American System Built Homes was trying to do low cost housing just as Jean Prouve tried to do in France with prefabs.

In a sense the comments above are in fact in line with the thread, as the breaking up of giant estates in order to build affordable housing is a theme that runs through both fiction (a sub-plot in Downton Abbey, for instance, and addressed in Lady Chatterly's Lover) and real life. I have a thread waiting in the wings wherein such an estate was rescued from the developers, but for the benefit of the public. Certainly in London, huge swaths are set aside as green areas for public enjoyment. The areas in London where I've stayed fit into the category of residential areas with both private and public green spaces and with access to public transportation, something frustratingly absent in the US. Even Hatfield House has used some of its grounds for more housing -- see my link in #11 about that use.

Moving on ~

Jul 24, 2017 12:39:42 GMT breeze said:

We visited a nearby museum where the owner collected all kinds of things. .. the rooms were bright, everything was neatly arranged with space around each object, and every object sparkled.

Such collections are fascinating, giving us a look at things we'd never see otherwise with the added benefit of learning about them in historical context. These grand old houses give a similar look, as their collections are essentially the accumulation of things over the centuries, as witness the Victorian kitchen above.
pee ess ~ looked up that cleaner, & I think this is it: kottonklenser.com/)

And now to get back to this particular grand old house ~  ~
Exiting from the kitchens, you're channeled toward the gardens, with a tantalizing view of the Old Palace. 





What's this?



I came across this individual several times as he stomped scowlingly around the gardens ~



The Old Palace, childhood home of Elizabeth I ~







Right now I'm skirting the area above the formal garden, on my way to exploring other areas. So many places I'd love to poke into!



This is one of two stone friezes by J.G. Bubb. They were taken from the facade of the Royal Exchange after a fire and brought to Hatfield in 1855 ~