Wistow Hall is a 17th-century country house in Wistow, Leicestershire, England which has been converted into an apartment building. It is Grade II* listed.[1]
The Hall was built to an H-plan of rendered brick with a Swithland slate hipped roof. It has a seven window frontage with two storeys of sash windows and a row of dormer windows in the roof behind a parapet. At each corner are turret buttresses.
- Walled Kitchen Garden
The WKG is about 200 yards west of the house. There are trees to the north and east of the WKG which would have provided shelter and hidden the garden from the hall.
The north wall is curved and the east and west walls run straight from the curve on each side. There is no south wall and no evidence that there has ever been one. The west wall extends at a right-angle away from the garden. There is a vinery against the South side of this extension wall and a row of backsheds and a boiler house on the north side.
The site is occupied by the Ken Bailey Garden Centre. Plants for sale are displayed in poly tunnels and in the open area within the garden. The vinery is used for rearing new plants. There are shops in the original backsheds and the boiler house is still home to the boiler used to heat the vinery.
The disused door in the North East side of the WKG showing the difference in height between the curved North wall and the straight side wall The curved North all from the outside of the WKG showing the buttresses The wall bracket in the foreground is one of a series equally spaced along the West wall and the western side of the North wall. These were used to support a shelter for the plants from the intense heat of the morning sun after a frosty night The interior of the vinery showing the central partition and weights along the back wall that are part of the original mechanism to open areas of the roof The roof of the vinery showing the lower edges of each pane of glass designed to provide better drainage Some of the backsheds, now shops, that are behind the vinery. The lower lean-to at the end is the boiler house See our full research report on the Wistow Hall Walled Kitchen Garden here:
Wistow Hall, Wistow - Photos
- Official Designations
English heritage listed building Reference:
Vinery at Wistow ID 1360737 Grade:II - References
OS Maps 25”= 1 mile 1st and 2nd editions, 1886 and 1904
Heritage Gateway website
Wistow.com – History of Wistow