Painshill
Painshill is a restored, 18th-century English park and landscape garden in Cobham, Surrey, England. It was created between 1738 and 1773 by the owner, Charles Hamilton, from an area of heathland and woodland. Painshill is laid out as a series of scenes, crafted by combining architectural features with trees and shrubs, many of which are non-native species. Several of the surviving follies are listed in their own right, including the Gothic Tower, at the western end of the park, and the Gothic Temple, which overlooks the northern part of the lake. The Grotto, the largest in England, is decorated with crystalline mineral stones, including quartz, feldspar and Blue John.
In designing Painshill, Hamilton was influenced by 17th-century landscape artists, whose works he had encountered on Grand Tours in continental Europe. Instead of trying to replicate specific artworks, Hamilton used the techniques of landscape painting to create scenes with contrasting emotional tones – from the solemnity of the dark evergreens surrounding the Mausoleum, to the brighter trees and flowers at the Temple of Bacchus. Advocates of the Picturesque were complimentary of Hamilton's work, particularly the hillier, western half of the park, which Horace Walpole likened to a "kind of Alpine scene". International visitors to the park and garden included John Adams, the future American president, who wrote that "Paines Hill is the most striking piece of art that I have yet seen."
Hamilton borrowed heavily to finance his work and was forced to sell Painshill in 1773. The estate passed through a series of private owners until the Second World War, when it was requisitioned for military use. In the late 1940s, it was divided into lots and parts were used for commercial forestry and pig farming. The architectural features began to decay and much of the land became overgrown. Concerns over the condition of the park were voiced in the following decades, leading to the purchase of over by Elmbridge Borough Council in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In June 1984, around of Hamilton's original estate was designated a Grade I Park and Garden on the register of historic parks and gardens maintained by Historic England.
Restoration of Painshill began in the early 1980s, with the aim of reinstating Hamilton's original design wherever possible. Surviving architectural features, including the Gothic Temple and Ruined Abbey, were restored, and those that had disappeared completely, such as the Turkish Tent and the Hermitage, were reconstructed. The part of the park owned by the borough council was reopened to the public on summer weekends from mid-May 1989 and seven-days-a-week from April 1997. In January 1999, the park was awarded a Europa Nostra medal for its "exemplary restoration", and in May 2006, the plantation of non-native trees on the Chinese Peninsula was awarded "national collection status" by the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens. Since 2000, Painshill has been used as a filming location for the feature films Dorian Gray and Suffragette and for the television series Black Mirror and Bridgerton.
History
Early history
The earliest surviving record of Painshill is from 1548, when it appears as Payneshill in a Land Registry manuscript. The area may have been named after the Payne family, who owned part of the land in the late Middle Ages. A "Richard Payne" appears in the 1263 assizes documents and the name "John Payne" can be found in local subsidy rolls from 1332. In the 16th century, the area surrounding Painshill House was recorded as the "Painshill common field" and "The Paynes Hawe".Painshill was originally part of the manor of Walton-on-Thames, but had become separate by 1512, when a portion of the land was conveyed to Richard Foxe, then Bishop of Winchester. Foxe transferred his holding to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, which he founded in 1517. In 1539, Henry VIII expanded the Chase of Hampton Court, incorporating "parte of the or Village of Cobham in the of ". A survey of the chase from around 1540 identifies six areas within Painshill owned by the Crown, including the "Greate grove", of around, and "hale hill", the future site of the Grotto.
Henry VIII died in 1547 and Painshill was subsequently divided into plots and leased. The two largest areas, the "Tenement at Payneshill" and the "Tenement at Coveham Bridge", became a single holding in 1570. Comprising around, the united tenement forms the core of the land at Painshill owned by Elmbridge Borough Council. A survey of March 1649 suggests that part of the area was being used as arable farmland, although there were still significant areas of woodland. There is also a record of a warren at Painshill in the 17th century.
At the start of the 18th century, Painshill was divided between land leased from the Crown by Robert Gavell and a freehold property owned by the Smyther family. Gabriel, Marquis du Quesne, bought the Smythers' land in around 1717, by which time it consisted of two or three farms. Du Quesne is thought to have built a house and laid out a small garden, but he was ruined as a result of the collapse of the South Sea Company in 1720 and he sold Painshill to William Bellamy in 1725. Bellamy, a barrister at the Inner Temple, also started to lease the land owned by the Crown, which had become available following the death of Gavell in 1724.
Creation of the park
was born in 1704 in Dublin, the 9th son and 14th child of James Hamilton, 6th Earl of Abercorn. In 1718, he became a pupil at Westminster School, where he was a contemporary of John Petty, 1st Earl of Shelburne, the future owner of Bowood House. He began studying at Oxford University in 1720, where he formed friendships with Henry Hoare, who would later create the gardens at Stourhead, Wiltshire, and the brothers Stephen Fox, the future 1st Earl of Ilchester, and Henry Fox, the future 1st Baron Holland. After gaining a BA in 1723, Hamilton set off on his first Grand Tour in 1725 and, while in Rome, collected numerous artworks and became familiar with the landscape paintings of Claude Lorrain, Nicolas Poussin and Salvator Rosa. He returned from Europe two years later and became the member of the Irish House of Commons for Strathbane. During his second visit to Rome in 1732, Hamilton was introduced to George Knapton, the artist and dealer, and his portrait was painted by Antonio David.Hamilton began to acquire property at Painshill in 1737, purchasing William Bellamy's freehold and lease from the Crown, and adding additional land to create an estate of more than. He moved to Painshill in 1738 and began to create the park shortly afterwards. A map by John Rocque, dated 1744, indicates that the first part of the lake had been dug out and formal areas of planting at the Amphitheatre and Keyhole had been created. In the mid-1740s, Hamilton began planting exotics, non-native species of trees and shrubs, some of which were supplied as seeds by John Bartram, an American horticulturalist.
File:Grottan i Painsvhill, nära Cotham - Nationalmuseum - 56103.tif|thumb|right|Elias Martin, Grotto at Painshill, near Cobham. Watercolour on paper. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm. |alt= A watercolour painting of the interior of a cavern with stalactite-like projections hanging from the roof
The earliest known folly to have been erected at Painshill was the Chinese Seat, described and sketched by Sophia Newdigate after a visit in August 1748. It is not mentioned in any subsequent first-hand account and Michael Symes, a garden historian, suggests that it was replaced by the Hermitage, first recorded in 1752. The majority of the other architectural features were constructed in the late 1750s and early 1760s, although work on the Grotto continued until around 1770. Towards the end of the 1760s, Hamilton constructed a brickworks in the southern part of the park in an attempt to develop an income stream from his land; the scheme was a financial failure and he constructed the Ruined Abbey in 1772 to conceal the remains of the works.
Although a relatively private person, Hamilton nevertheless entertained small parties of guests in the garden. On those occasions, refreshments were probably served in some of the follies, especially the Temple of Bacchus. Painshill was also open to respectable visitors, not specifically invited by Hamilton, who were generally shown round by the head gardener for a tip after giving their names. Among those to write about their experiences were William Gilpin, a leading advocate of the Picturesque, who considered Painshill "one of the most beautiful things of the kind I have seen", and Thomas Whately, the landscape garden author, who wrote that "a boldness of design, and a happiness of execution, attend the wonderful efforts which art has there made to rival nature." Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, future American presidents, toured the garden in 1786, and Adams wrote in his diary that "Paines Hill is the most striking piece of art that I have yet seen." Other international visitors included Prince Franz of Anhalt-Dessau and Count Ferenc Széchényi, a Hungarian statesman and founder of the National Museum of Budapest. Views from Painshill were painted on some pieces of the Frog Service commissioned by Catherine the Great of Russia from Wedgwood. In the early 19th century, Jane Austen and John Claudius Loudon visited the garden.
Although Hamilton had received an income while working as Clerk Comptroller to Frederick, Prince of Wales, between 1738 and 1747, he also borrowed money from Henry Hoare and Henry Fox to finance the work at Painshill. The repayment of these loans became due in 1773 and Hamilton was forced to sell the estate to Benjamin Bond Hopkins. In around 1778, Bond Hopkins commissioned Richard Jupp to build a new mansion to the south of Hamilton's residence, which became the site of the stables. Bond Hopkins continued to invest in the park, constructing the Bath House and a boat house, as well as planting new trees. He died in 1794 and, three years later, the trustees of his estate sold Painshill to Robert Hibbert, a merchant.