Myddelton House
Directions
Return to the road (Forty Hill) and turn left. The entrance to Myddelton House (entry now free) is about 800 metres further on, on the left.
Description
Myddelton House, named after the architect of the New River, Sir Hugh Myddelton, was built in 1818 by George Ferry and John Wallen for Henry Carrington Bowles, the last Governor of the New River Company, replacing an earlier Elizabethan house.
Edward Augustus Bowles (b. 1865) lived here and, from the 1890s, was largely responsible for creating the magnificent gardens, although the overall design, paths and much of the structural planting pre-dates Bowles' work. A member of the Royal Horticultural Society Council from 1908, and vice president from 1926, Bowles has been described as ‘the greatest amateur gardener of this country, and the most distinguished botanist and horticulturist serving the Royal Horticultural Society’.
After Bowles' death in 1954, the gardens and house were transferred to the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine and the University of London's School of Pharmacy. In 1968 the Lee Valley Regional Park Authority purchased the house and gardens and use Myddelton House as their headquarters, although the School of Pharmacy and the Royal Free Hospital retained parts of the estate.
Further information on www.leevalleypark.org.uk.
Further information on LGT Inventory
