Stour House
An imposing exemplar of
Victorian Gothic Revival
Built in 1868, Stour House was once the centre of an 800-acre Constable Country estate.
The former seat of 800-acres comprising 39 properties, Stour House is set in over five acres of formal garden, and was part of a joint project to fully restore the remaining buildings and landscape of the estate. McCabe & Abel purchased the imposing Victorian building with intent to restore the property after its fall into disrepair. The final result is an impressive and fully restored family home, located in the heart of Constable Country.
The property, which encompasses over 7,000 square feet, includes eight bedrooms, bespoke Aga kitchen, tower room, service wing, library, drawing room with Victorian coffered ceiling and substantial glasshouse. Stour House is approached via two sweeping gravel drives, and the property's original nineteenth century features are present throughout. The glasshouse, stable and coach house were added between 1875-1898, and both buildings were originally surrounded by orchards. The estate originally included a dairy, brewhouse, and workshop and washhouse for servants, who lived in the house's service wing. The remaining staff for the estate lived in the two wings of the coach house.
'1868. Large, of dark red brick, in a style perhaps fondly imagined to be Elizabethan. A square tower with gables on four faces, topped with a wrought-iron gazebo. On the north side of the house, a fine free-standing [glasshouse] with transepts, clerestory, and central turret.'
- Bentley & Pevsner, The Buildings of England
Stour House and coach house, Christmas 1908.
The original Stour House estate, named after Dedham's River Stour, was formed in 1868 for landowner and seed merchant William Herbert Dunnett in the Neo-Gothic, or Gothic Revival style. The Victorian home was built on the site of a previous farm house recorded from the fourteenth century, known as Pit (or Pet) House.
Dunnett was co-founder of the James Carter & Co. seed company, who by 1880 had patrons including the British, Portuguese and Italian royal families, and the Ottoman sultan. Carter's were the official seed suppliers to Queen Victoria and the Prince of Wales, with much of the produce grown in the grounds of Stour House. During the nineteenth century, it was a known meeting place for Essex and Suffolk fox hunts. In 1886, Dunnett hosted a large summer party of agriculturists, horticulturists and floriculturists to a feast in the garden. The group were shown rare flowers and vegetables grown in the grounds, including currants supposedly as large as grapes, which were of particular interest to Dunnett's American visitors.
Stour House was occupied by the Ministry of Defence during World War Two, in which it served as a convalescent home. It is listed as a building of note in Bentley & Pevsner's The Buildings of England.
History of Stour House
The Restoration
Prior to the restoration, the building and gardens had fallen into disrepair, with large parts of the property not inhabited for decades. Both the internal and external period features were restored to maintain the original fabric of the building. Stour House was sold off-market.
