Garsington Manor

The manor house was built on land once owned by the son of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, and at one time had the name "Chaucers". It was constructed in the 1630s by a William Wyckham. Lady Ottoline and her husband, Philip Morrell, bought the manor house in 1913, at which time it was in a state of disrepair, having been in use as a farmhouse. They paid £8,450. Their moving in was delayed until May 1915, due to the continuing occupancy by the former tenants. Garsington became a haven for the Morrells’ friends, including D. H. Lawrence, Siegfried Sassoon, Edward Sackville-West, Lord David Cecil, Lytton Strachey, Aldous Huxley, Mark Gertler, Bertrand Russell, Virginia Woolf,}} In 1916, they…

The house is a rectangular structure, of two storeys with attics. The building material is limestone rubble. In his memoirs, True Remembrances-the memoirs of an architect, Philip Tilden recorded the unobtrusive style he sought to achieve at Garsington; "I doubt whether the present-day visitor could spot these alterations, they were made out of odd bits, and the workmanship was carried out by men of the old school". Garsington is a Grade II* listed building, A number of other buildings on the estate, and landscaping features in the gardens have Grade II listings including the stables, the bakehouse, the gates at the forecourt to the manor, the pool, a summer house and statuary and an…