Chiswick Grove Park


Post to the west Strand on the Green
Post to the south Chiswick Duke's Meadow
Post to the east Old Chiswick
Post to the north Chiswick Turnham Green and Acton Green


Bolton Road
St.Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church. In 1944 Bolton Cottage here was bought by the Catholics and the church was built next door in 1964 designed by Dr. Plaskett Marshall.
Presbytery. This was converted from an existing house in 1958.

Burlington Lane
Named for the Earl of Burlington who bought Chiswick House in the late 17th.  It was the main route to Strand on the Green from Old Chiswick.
Chiswick Station. This lies between Kew Bridge and Barnes Bridge Stations on South Western Trains. It lay on the  branch line of the London and South Western Railway Company’s line from Windsor to Waterloo and opened in 1849 on the Windsor, Staines and South Western Railway and was built on land and was a a requirement of the 1847 enabling Act.  The Station House was by William Tite like a classical villa. It was restored in 1989 and now let out as offices.  A mezzanine floor was added and a glazed entrance to open up spaces.
Goods yard closed 1958
Chiswick School. This opened as Chiswick County School for Girls in 1916 and a boys school opened next door in 1926. They became a co-educational grammar school in 1966 and in 1968 a comprehensive.
War  Memorial  homes 1922. The current cottages were originally built in 1940 and renovated in 2010 and are managed by the Stoll Foundation. They were Chiswick’s memorial of the Great War 1914 1918 and are for Homes of rest for Chiswick disabled men of His Majesty's forces and their families and for the dependants of those who fell in the war. A plaque says @ This memorial was re-dedicated by HRH The Countess of Wessex GCVO on 11th November 2010 following the redevelopment of The Chiswick War Memorial Homes.

Cedars Road
This is now part of the A4 with a complex past.  It originated as a suburban side road, built in the early 20th, and in the 1930s was a short road running west from Sutton Court Road, among other suburban roads.  By the early 1950s it had become a dual carriage way and joimed to what had become Ellesmere Road to the east and Great West Road to the west.  As a section of the A4 it is essentially a slip road onto the M4. It is sometimes known as "Great West Road" as part of the section rather than “Cedars Road”. A stretch of suburban road remains sectioned off from the dual carriageway.
Little Sutton Cottage. This stands facing the main road on the sectioned off suburban stretch of road. It is the only survival from what was  Sutton Village and may have been connected to almshouses in Sutton Lane. It is a 16th house in colour-washed brick
Chiswick Garage. This garage site has been in place since the 1930s and is on the site of what was Little Sutton House. It is now a Porsche Garage, recently remodelled following a Planning Inspectorate decision.
Dairy Crest Site. In the 19th this was a dairy run by a local cowkeeper in the village of Little Sutton. It was sold to United Dairies in 1921. This developed  into a large depot which was demolished in 2012.  It has since become a large extension to the adjacent Porsche garage

Chiswick House Gardens
About two thirds of the gardens are covered in this square. The remainder – including Chiswick House – are in the square to the east.
This is a a pioneering naturalistic landscape. It is cited as the birthplace of the English landscape movement.  The gardens were an attempt to symbolically recreate a garden of ancient Rome by Lord Burlington. The gardens here were originally of a standard Jacobean design, but from the 1720s they were in a constant state of transition. Burlington and Kent experimented with new designs. The first architect appears to have been the king's gardener, Charles Bridgeman, who was believed to have worked on the gardens around 1720, and subsequently with William Kent, inspired by the landscape paintings of French artists. In 1929 the Duke of Devonshire sold the site to Middlesex County Council. It later came under the Ministry of Works and subsequently of English Heritage, Along with Hounslow Council the Chiswick House and Gardens Trust was set up in 2005.
Bowling Green. This has been since the early 18th and it is surrounded by old sweet chestnut trees. Also called Chestnut Square
Ionic Temple and Orange Tree Garden. This temple was designed by Lord Burlington in 1719.
Lilly’s Tomb. This is the grave of a pet dog and has a latin inscription. The dog belonged to Lady Harriett Cavendish around 1800.
Northern wilderness. In the 18th ‘wilderness’ was a fashion feature in gardens. It was planted with shrubs and had meandering paths.
The Lake. Originally Bollo Brook flowed through the south east part of the site. It was turned into a linear water feature and was modelled by William Kent in the 1730s.
Classic Bridge. Probably designed by James Wyatt in 1774. Damaged by Second World War bombing
Cascade. Designed by William Kent in 1738 – but never worked. English Heritage has tried to sort this out
Western wilderness. Designed by William Kent and this was changed in the 1780s by Samuel Lapidge.
Patte d’Oie and obelisk. These were designed to mirror each other across the lake The obelisk was designed by William Kent to display an antique Greek tombstone.

Devonshire Gardens
1-2 this was originally Mrs. Crampton’s Ladies College built in 1887

Ellesmere Road
This is part of the same section of A4, Great West Road, as Cedars Road in upgrading a road which was originally residential.

Elmwood Road
The road, and the church, are on the site of a lake which was in the grounds of Little Sutton House. This site of this house is now the Porsche garage in Cedars Road.
St.Michael’s Sutton Court.   In 1906 it was proposed to create a Parish of St. Michael, Sutton Court. The new church was to be financed from the sale of St. Michael, Burleigh Street, Strand. A wooden hall was built and services were held there until the church opened in 1909. The architects were Caroe and Passmore and it is in the Arts and Crafts style. The original wooden hall was replaced in 1996 by a new building

Fauconberg Road
The road runs on the line of a path between Sutton Court Manor and Chiswick Park Farm, accessed by a gate opposite the Manor.
Sutton Court Manor House. The house was on the corner with Sutton Court Road and in the late 17th it was the home of the Earl and ‘Countess of Faulconberg.  This was the house for Sutton Manor, the property of St.Paul’s Cathedral and dating from at least the late 14th.  The house was held and used by the Crown and then leased out. In 1800 it was sold to the Duke of Devonshire. It had had a malthouse and farm buildings, and by the 17th the gardens included a maze  and a bowling green. The house was rebuilt around 1795 and in the mid 19th was used as a school. In 1900 it was used as a temporary town hall and demolished in 1905.
Sutton Court Mansions 1906, on the site of the old manor house
Chiswick Park Club. This sports ground lay to the south of Fauconberg Road. In 1883 the Duke of Devonshire leased a piece of land to residents for a sports club. The other boundaries were what is now Grove Park Terrace, Sutton Court Road on the east and the railway line, Chiswick Park Lawn Tennis Club was located here and for many years the Middlesex Open Tennis Championships, were held there.
St Thomas's Sports Ground, From 1897 St Thomas's Hospital Medical School leased some of the Chiswick Park Club grounds as a sports field. From 1925 it was the Chiswick Cricket and Lawn Tennis Company but in 1946 Brentford and Chiswick UDC compulsorily purchased it for the St Thomas's housing estate

Grove Park Bridge
This bridge takes the north/south road over the railway at a point which was originally a level crossing. It was built in the late 19th following a fatal accident involving a horse bus. It is in London stocks bricks with red brick and stone piers

Grove Park Terrace
Level crossing with brick staircase over it.  Also apparently it has “4 unipart rail LED wigwags and 4 barriers SPX rail systems Romford and a rubber crossing plant with wooden anti trespass guids’
23 Clifton Works . This was the premises used by the estate builders in the 19th. It is now offices for a media company.
Domed brick structure outside Faulconberg Court. This is thought to be part of an ice house once in the grounds of Sutton Court. It was discovered by workmen in 1949

Grove Park Road
Old Station House. This was, until recently, the Grove Park Hotel. This was one of the first buildings on the Grove Park Estate built in 1867. It hoped to cater for the growing interest riverside and sporting activities. Originally a white wooden balcony ran around the building at first floor level.
Entrance gates to The Grove house would have stood at the south end of the road opposite the church.

Hartington Road
Hartington is the title of the Duke of Devonshire’s eldest son

Kinnard Avenue
In 1928 Grove Park House was replaced with modest detached houses by L.H. Harrington for the Kinnaird Estate Company.
Grove House, This stood near the corner with Hartington Road and Kinnard Road will have run through the centre of it! The house dated from around 1530, but is thought to have been on the site of an earlier one. It had been remodelled in the 18th by Decimus Burton, Iit had eighty acres of formal gardens, stables, an ice house and a lake, It was demolished in 1928 and there are stories of it being re-erected in the US.  Kinnaird Avenue was built on its site as part of a development by the Duke of Devonshire.. Some of the chestnut trees from the grounds remain.

Nightingale Close
The road name is a link with St Thomas's Hospital once the land owner here.
Grove Park Primary School. The school was opened in 1952 on a site previously owned by St Thomas's Hospital.  The purpose built Nursery class opened in 1985.

Spencer Road
1 site of The Roystons which was built in the 1870s and was at one time a home for motherless children

Staveley Road
Cherry Trees. Much of the street is lined with cherry trees for blossom in the spring. These were planted in the 1920s for the Cherry Blossom polish factory
1-50 housing for Cherry Blossom employees
22 Chiswick New Cemetery. Opened in 1933 on former water meadows between the Great Chertsey Road and the railway line. There are a large number of Russians and Poles buried here.  There is a large ‘art-deco’ style Chapel and landscaping is in a park style.
Chiswick School. This opened as a Central School in 1927  and became a secondary modern in 1968 having merged with Chiswick Grammar School. In 2012, it became an ‘Academy; and its name changed from Chiswick Community School to Chiswick School. Most of the buildings are new although the North Eastern block remains from the original girls' school.
Chiswick Park Farm.  This stood roughly on the site which is now the corner with Chatsworth Road. In 1894 this became the club house of a golf course built in the surrounding fields.  It closed because of encroaching developments in 1907;.
Memorial to the first V2 which landed here on 8 September 1944 killing three people.  This was unveiled in 2004 and organised jointly by the Brentford & Chiswick Local History Society and the Battlefields Trust. It is sited near where it landed near the junction with Burlington Lane.

Sutton Court Road
This preserves the name of  the old manor of Sutton Court – the house demolished in 1896.
Grove Park Studios. This is a small office complex in what was a garage and the Crusader hall

Sutton Lane
Sutton Close is on the site of almshouses - six almshouses, and a hospital - were built here in 1676 by William Ashburnham who lived at Sutton Court. The inmates moved to Turnham Green by 1822 but the buildings were not demolished until 1957.

Sources
Arthure.. Life and Work in Old Chiswick
British Listed Buildings. Web site
Chiswick House trail, 
Chiswick House and Gardens. Web site
Chiswick Remembers. Web site
Chiswick School. Web site
Chiswick W4. Web site
Clegg. The Chiswick Book
English Heritage. Chiswick House
Field , London Place Names, 
Grove Park Primary School. Web site
London Borough of Hounslow. Web site
Parks and Gardens UK. Web site
Pevsner and Cherry.  North West London
SABRE. Web site
Stevenson. Middlesex
Walford . Village London
Wheatley and Meulenkamp. Follies 

Comments

Unknown said…
This is the first page I have looked at, and there is some fantastic information here, but I have spotted a few errors.
"Chiswick School. This opened as Chiswick County School for Girls in 1916"
The Girls School was in Staveley Road and Fitzroy Crescent, Crofton Avenue and Huntingdon Gardens were built on the site in the late 1980’s.
"Grove Park Bridge. at a point which was originally a level crossing."
The original crossing was slightly further down the tracks, but the bridge was built to replace it.

Popular posts from this blog

South Norwood

Bromley by Bow

River Lea/Bow Creek Canning Town