About Kelmarsh Hall
“There is nothing could more add to the happiness I enjoy,” wrote owner William Hanbury as he watched the roof going on his new Palladian style mansion in the early 1730s. The virtuoso architect of his day, James Gibbs, and builder, Francis Smith of Warwick, had been instructed to replace the former Jacobean hall with something more modern.
The historian Pevsner praised their results as, “a perfect, extremely reticent design…done in an impeccable taste.”
Another arbiter of fashion left her mark on the interiors of the Hall in the late 1920s. Drawn by the house’s fine bone structure, Nancy Tree’s (later Lancaster) taste for combining comfort with formality set the trend for what we recognise today as the English Country House look. Even Country Life came to photograph the glamorous American’s trend setting.
Her spirit still pervades the house today and visitors can see Nancy Lancaster’s style most clearly in the delicate pink terracotta of the Great Hall, the exuberant Chinese wallpaper and seasonal flower arrangements on display.
The Hall and Gardens will be closed on Bank Holiday Sunday 26th August 2007;
but the Hall, Gardens and Tea Rooms will be open to visitors on Bank Holiday Monday 27th August 2007 between 2-5pm.
