Wightwick Manor, Wolverhampton

Wightwick Manor

Wightwick Manor three miles outside Wolverhampton is perhaps the best surviving example of a home furnished under the influence of the Arts & Crafts movement. The house was presented to the National Trust by Sir Geoffrey Mander under the Country Houses Scheme in 1937.





Wightwick Manor (pronounced 'Wittick') is a Victorian manor house located on Wightwick Bank, Wolverhampton, West Midlands, England, and one of only a few surviving examples of a house built and furnished under the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement. Wightwick was built by Theodore Mander, of the Mander family, who were successful 19th-century industrialists in the area, and his wife Flora, daughter of Henry Nicholas Paint, Member of Parliament in Canada. It was designed by Edward Ould of Liverpool in two phases; the first was completed in 1887 and the house was extended with the Great Parlour wing in 1893. Theodore Mander asked his architect Edward Ould to build a neo-Tudor building complete with mock medieval Great Hall next to the remaining buildings and malt house of the old manor. The house is now famous for its associations with the Arts and Crafts movement and in particular William Morris.




Entrance Hall


Pomerganate Passage

This family house portrays life during the Victorian era and is a notable example of the influence of William Morris, with original Morris wallpapers and fabrics, William de Morgan tiles, Charles Kempe glass, and Pre-Raphaelite works of by Rossetti and Burne-Jones. Theodore and Flora Manders using Morris and Co for many of the furnishings. Later additions to the building included the Great Parlour which was designed in the style of a Tudor Hall with screens, a minstrel gallery and exposed roof timbers.


Composer Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber at Wightwick Manor in front of Burne-Jones's "Love among the ruins" - He called it “the most extraordinary place” and in the visitors book he wrote: “In all my years of loving Victorian Art, I had no idea until now just how precious this house and its collection is.”

With Inglenook fireplaces, oak panelling and the frequent use of carved mottos the house must have been a source of inspiration for later Arts and Crafts Architects and designers. It is this later parlour wing which is the more ornate of the two, inspired by the Tudor buildings of the Welsh Marches, Standing on a plinth of local red sandstone, it has a gabled roofline, with carved fascias, banks of typical spiralling Tudor chimneys. The flowing Gothic design of the elaborate bargeboards epitomise the medievalising spirit of the Pre-Raphaelites, whilst the castellation of the first phase, employed by Ould, aims to resemble a castle keep at the core.







Entrance

The drawing room is the highlight of the Pre-Raphaelite collection with Morris silk / wool tapestry hung on the walls with panelling carved with a motto from Ruskin’s ‘Modern Painters’. The stained-glass windows are by Charles Kempe, whilst the Italian Renaissance chimneypiece possesses a surround with William de Morgan tiles whilst even the candelabra were designed for Holman Hunt, with the walls adorned by paintings by Ruskin, Madox Brown and Rossetti.




Great Parlour Inglenook

The ‘great parlour’ acting as the heart of the house, is a double height space with an open-work timber roof. Kempe was not only responsible for windows here but also painted the ceiling and the designed the fireplace alcove and minstrel’s gallery and completed the plaster frieze depicting the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice. William Morris’s last ever textile design, the ‘Diagonal Trail’, hangs on the wall alongside paintings by Millais and Elizabeth Siddal, with the electric light brackets even designed by Morris & Co.


Kempe Screen

These are a wealth of rooms within the house which cannot be described to provide them with the full justice that they deserve so you’ll just have go and see them yourself. While you can describe the house the atmosphere domestic bliss, harmony and enclosure is generated by the total Arts and Crafts experience, the architecture, drapes, furniture, lighting, carpets, rugs, timber and works of art. The house has splendid Victorian gardens and the outbuildings house stables, a handmade pottery shop, studio workshop and an antiquarian bookshop.


South Terrace


Grooms Cottages


Tudor style chimneys

The house sits in seven hectares (seventeen acres) of attractive Arts & Crafts gardens, designed by Thomas Mawson, which are Grade II listed in their own right. The gardens were originally laid out by Alfred Parsons from 1887 onwards and he developed a series of compartments with clipped yews. Thomas Mawson, of Windermere in the Lake District, added more topiary in 1906 as well as more hedges particularly in the rose garden near the house. Parts of the formal gardens are known as the Poet's Garden as many plants and shrubs were started from cuttings donated by people such as Shelley, Tennyson, Dickens and William Morris himself. Further away from the house is pleasant woodland with two ornamental lakes. The main framework consists of large trees with an eye-catching octagonal arbour hung with clematis and roses in the centre of the rose garden. A less formal area has a pool, shrubs and rhododendrons.






Pond






Crowns in the garden salvaged from Big Ben, London, after it was bombed in WW11

In addition there are two rows of yews, herbaceous borders and beds containing plants from gardens of famous authors such as Tennyson and Dickens. The Bridge Garden accessed via the Mathematical Bridge is filled with spring bulbs. This and the peach house and rose garden have now been restored. The bridge over Wightwick Bank, which connects two parts of the garden, a "replica" of the Mathematical Bridge at Cambridge. It might be better to say that it is similar to, or reminiscent of, that bridge - in much the same way as any wooden bridge of this size is likely to be. Generations of Manders had studied Natural Sciences (as Chemistry etc; used to be called) at Cambridge as preparation for being involved in the family business.


Old Manor House





Other buildings on the site include the Old Manor House which is listed Grade II*, dating from the late 16th to early 17th C with later 19th C. additions, which although restored by Theodore Mander, was not felt to make the grade for the Manders, hence the new commissions. Other buildings of note include the Old Malthouse (also Grade II* listed) and dating from the same time, whilst the later Stable House (Circa 18th C.) now includes the fountain which was rescued from the Town’s Market Hall which was demolished in 1961. A stone tablet beside it records that "This fountain stood outside Wolverhampton market from 1861 to 1961. Re-erected here in 1971". The fountain was given to the town by Theodore Mander and now the Borough Council graciously gave it back to him, or his house, when they no longer wanted it because they were demolishing the market buildings for what eventually became their new Civic Centre.




Fountain & Plaque

Behind the stable block are the entrances to the public lavatories. Along this lavatory wall, beside a narrow path, the National Trust has seen fit to place two war memorials. This seems to me to be a thoroughly unfortunate placement but in fairness to the NT they are trying to make the best of a bad job in preserving these memorials and the fountain from the Old Market in Wolverhampton – they should still be on display in the centre of Wolverhampton, a town somewhat short of adornment . Both memorials came from the Mander factory in the town centre, which was demolished when the works were moved out of town and the site turned into a shopping centre. Apparently these memorials were wanted neither in the new factory nor the new shopping centre, despite the fact that both are unusually well designed and executed. Next to them, near the doorways to the lavatories, there is a finely executed stone tablet recording the source of the memorials and continuing: "These men died for their country. The profits from their working lives helped establish Wightwick Manor which we enjoy today". This is an unusual, and perhaps surprising, recognition of where industrialists such as Mander got their money from.






War Memorials


Family Sleigh

The Victorian Turkish bath at Wightwick Manor is one of only two which are known to have survived in a privately built country house. The other—like Wightwick, now owned by the National Trust—is at Cragside, Lord Armstrong's home in Northumberland.


Geoffrey and his family. Children Anthea and John are in the centre, and Rosalie his wife, the Victorian biographer, is on the right.

In the local paper, The Express and Star of 2.9.2003, in a feature article, Anthea Mander was quoted as saying that her father, Sir Geoffrey Mander MP, tried to sell the place in 1926 but he couldn't. "The ideal solution came in 1937 when it was given over to the National Trust. At first the National Trust were reluctant to take it but people like John Betjeman said one day people would be interested in the Victorian era and how right they were. My memories of it are that it was a very lonely and cold and I have never got over those things. You are very isolated and you don't have neighbours. Also there was nowhere you could bring somebody home, there was nowhere to go." She is quoted as saying that in reality only the library and the nursery were used. Descendants of the family retain rooms in the manor.


Kitchen


A Dinner Party Menu 1904

His daughter is quoted in the guide as saying the house was designed to maximise inconvenience. One example is the kitchens which are factory like with their adjoining sculleries, cold rooms and stores. In Victorian houses of this era the kitchens were designed to be as far away from the Dining Room as possible with many twists and turns in the corridors connecting them. The reason? Well, the Victorians hated cooking smells and with a kitchen preparing meals for the House, Servants Hall and Nursery this was a big consideration in the days before extractor fans where Mrs. Beeton’s Cookbook dictated cabbage should be boiled for between 35/45 minutes.


Day Nursery

Another charming insight into Victorian life can be obtained from the Day and Night nurseries in the house. Here the children lived under the care of a nurse and nursemaid (The house had 12 “indoor” and 10 “outdoor” staff) next to the main bedrooms and bathrooms. Original nursery furniture, toys and children’s books from the 1880s to the 1950s remain many of which belonged to Anthea Mander the last member of the family to have occupied the nurseries during her childhood. The Day Nursery was where the children played and eat their meals and was designed to be airy and sunny. The nurse slept in the Night Nursery with the younger children; as the children grew older they would move to other rooms.




"Love among the ruins" - Sir Edward Burne-Jones 1894

The National Trust has maintained the buildings and grounds since 1937 and until recent times managed to open it occasionally. But these days it is open 5 days a week in summer and two days a week in winter and there is a range of special events and activities. The volunteer guides are very good and the interior gives a good impression of the taste and lifestyle of the rich industrialists of the time. However, it might be noted that the interior was mostly done by Williams Morris' company and Morris himself appears never to have been there. The National Trust is also busily promoting the gardens originally designed by Thomas Mawson. The Trust has added a vegetable garden designed after some old plans which may show what was once intended but was never actually made. They have also decided to use "Wightwick Manor and Gardens" as their title for the property.

In 1773 Benjamin Mander and his brother John, founded Mander’s works in St. John's Street. Benjamin was a japanner, and the company produced paint and varnish for decorating their products. Japanning describes the European imitation of Asian lacquer work, originally used on furniture. The art of applying paper cut outs to other items (decoupage) became very popular, especially the botanically inspired works of Mary Delaney who lived at Delville Lodge, outside Dublin.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2008/01/botanic-gardens-glasnevin-dublin_31.html

Wolverhampton and Bilston were important centres for the manufacture of japanned ware. The company went from strength to strength and eventually closed the japanning side of the business to concentrate on paints and varnish. The company eventually became one of the largest printing ink manufacturers. The St John's Street premises closed in 1965.





The family company, Mander Brothers, was known between the wars as a model company. Geoffrey, as the eldest of his generation, was chairman, while his cousin, Charles Arthur (the second baronet), and was managing director. Sir Charles was 'wet' as a Tory, active in local government and Midland affairs, and deeply interested in everything that touched the human side of industry. In Parliament Geoffrey had pushed through the Joint Industrial Councils and Work Councils Bills. Together they implemented typically progressive initiatives in industrial welfare, to foster peace in industry. These included a joint works' council providing a workable system of joint consultation (1920), a welfare club (1920), profit-sharing schemes for employees, holiday schemes, suggestion schemes (1925), works pensions (1928), a house magazine, staff pensions (1935), and a 'contributory co-partnership scheme' setting aside shares for employees, with provisions to pay for shares by instalments.





Most notably, Manders was the first company in the country to introduce the forty-hour week. The historic agreement, the first of its kind in Britain, was brokered and signed by Ernest Bevin, general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union, in September 1932. 'Bevin was very proud of signing that agreement', said Geoffrey later: 'He used often to refer to it when were both in the House of Commons.' The press wrote: 'In the history of industrial welfare, Manders may claim a high place', where welfare had been 'part and parcel of the outlook of Manders as employers almost since the company's foundation in [1773]'.



To get to Wightwick / Wolverhampton we wandered like an itinerant supply teacher through the leafy suburbs of Birmingham the city which styles itself as “The Heart of England.” Going through the prosperous suburbs of Edgbaston, Handsworth and the town of Dudley towards Wolverhampton you get a sense of the prosperity enjoyed in Victorian times by this City. The city's reputation was forged as a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution in England, a fact which led to Birmingham being known as "the workshop of the world" or the "city of a thousand trades". Although Birmingham's industrial importance has declined, it has developed into a national commercial centre. It is also the fourth-most visited city by foreign visitors in the UK.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/04/birmingham-centre-of-england.html

Then there is Wolverhampton voted by Lonely Planet as Britain’s worst city. It also probably has Britain’s worst University but we can’t be sure as it stopped participating in the league table when it got into the last 5! Even those who live there will admit that Wolverhampton is not the most glamorous of destinations. After decades at the heart of Britain's industrial revolution no one would expect it to be. But not even they thought it would be named as one of the worst places to live in the entire world. Eight years after the old market town was awarded city status the renowned Lonely Planet guide branded it the fifth worst city on the globe. But in its heyday with its access to coal, iron, clay and salt and potash from Cheshire it supported a great deal of industrial innovation with important firms such as Chubb, Sankeys, GKN and steel conglomerates such as Thompsons who could (and did) supply and build complete coal fired power stations anywhere in the world from the boilers down to the valves. As an important industrial centre it was heavily bombed in the war but some would say what Adolf Hitler started was excelled by philistine councillors and the stupidity of British industrial policy after WW11.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/12/wolverhampton-is-worst.html

The Manor and Gardens are situated at Wightwick Bank, three miles outside Wolverhampton, West Midlands, England on the road to Bridgnorth, off A454 beside Mermaid Inn. There you will find a Tea-room serving food grown in the kitchen garden, a unique William Morris and Arts & Crafts-inspired gift shop and Plant sales from the garden to tempt your green fingers. You can also browse the bargains in the second-hand bookshop.




Theodore Mander

The car park is now on the new entrance to property with increased parking capacity and a brand new Visitor Reception Centre. You need to get timed tickets here and NOT at the house. Disabled drivers can still park by the house from the Wightwick Bank entrance but check in and get tickets and a permit from the visitor centre first. The tearoom doesn’t really do meals as we found on the day we visited with limited hot food up to 2.00 pm. The Mermaid Inn on the corner is not a bad alternative offering a full menu all day and evening and was once owned by the Mander family who ran it as a Temperance pub!

http://www.vintageinn.co.uk/themermaidwightwick/



This is a lovely property, wonderfully preserved by the National Trust and you will not find a better example of the Arts & Crafts movement anywhere. Even if you think you are not a fan you will be impressed by the warmth and richness of the interiors which envelop you with warmth rather than overpower. There is an enormous amount of William Morris interior items - in fact the house stands pretty much as a William Morris museum. It has a great setting too with quaint and compact attractive gardens. It owes its sense of completeness to the early deaths of Theodore Mander and his wife and the fact that Geoffrey Mander and his wife increasingly lived in London. This and their collecting instinct allowed them to ensure that the house has a classic Arts and Craft interior unmodified by improvements which the National Trusts gentle conservation and restoration has enhanced.







Wightwick Manor and Gardens

Wightwick Bank, Wolverhampton, West Midlands WV6 8EE

Telephone: 01902 761400

Check the National Trust site for up to date information on opening times, tickets, etc;

http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-wightwickmanor



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