Rhymes with Rivers
At the Irish Georgian Society London: we do like our very private houses: the longer the laneway the better. Sprivers House in the Weald of Kent ticked both boxes and then some. We were the second visitors ever as guests of the owners who run a wedding business from the house. First box well ticked then. Ancient trees reach over the laneway so lavishly that our coach couldn’t fit down the drive. The Society discovered on foot how long the laneway is: very. Second box very well ticked then.
Local historian Andrew Wells has studied Sprivers House and its past owners: “Alexander Courthope encased the two storey hall house in pink Flemish bonded brick, adding hung tiles to the first floor of the gabled west front. He built the new east extension as the principle five bay elevation, one bay deep, with a pedimented doorcase with Doric pilasters, the three central bays more closely spaced with pedimented dormers in the hipped roof above, the middle one segmental.” This work is recorded by “AC 1756” on the keystone and imposts of the round headed stair window to the north. “AC 1746” on bricks above the stable house door prove it to be a decade earlier.
Andrew is on a roll: “Internally the impact of the outer hall is the heraldry of the Courthope and related families contained in excellent rococo plaster cartouches, beneath an enriched modillion cornice continued throughout the Georgian house. The panelled inner hall contains a restored Chinese Chippendale staircase with a ramped handrail, beneath a gadrooned cornice and deeply coved guilloche bordered ceiling. The panelled drawing room and dining room have wooden chimneypieces with scrolled friezes.”
Robert Courthope flogged the house at Christies in 1946. It is now owned by the National Trust who rent it to the current occupiers. Sprivers House has barely changed in a couple of hundred years, passing unscathed through Victorian times. A 15th century moat reveals it to be a truly historic site. The 21st century luxury of our coach: after a very long walk down the laneway: transported us back to London and back to life.
