page_title: Winslow Hall
section_title: Architect
hierarchical_section_title: Winslow Hall / Architect
caption_attribution_description: English: Winlsow Hall, Buckinghamshire, England.
context_page_description: Winslow Hall is a country house, now in the centre of the small town of Winslow, Buckinghamshire, England. Built in 1700, it was sited in the centre of the town, with a public front facing the highway and a garden front that still commanded 22 acres in 2007, due to William Lowndes' gradual purchase of a block of adjacent houses and gardens from 1693 onwards. The architect of the mansion has been a matter of prolonged architectural debate; the present candidates are Sir Christopher Wren or a draughtsman, whether in the Board of Works, which Wren oversaw, or a talented provincial architect.
context_section_description: "Winslow Hall was built in 1700 by Secretary Lowndes", claims Kip and Knyff's Britannia Illustrata (1708), with no mention of an architect. Winslow Hall was probably designed by Sir Christopher Wren, according to Howard Colvin, who found the case not proved. George Lipscomb was less cautious: he notes the "commodious plain brick edifice with a flight of several steps to the door over which is the date of its erection 1700 and the name of William Lowndes" and adds confidently, "for whom it was designed by Inigo Jones". Inigo Jones died in 1652, and so is unlikely to have designed Winslow. Pevsner too feels the house was in "all probability" designed by Wren.
  Sir Christopher Wren is thoroughly plausible – in a ledger book discovered in the early twentieth century detailing work on the house, scattered among the payments made to stonemasons and bricklayers, and for the carpentry to Matthew Banckes, are alterations in payments to craftsmen, authorised by 'St. Critophr Wren Surveior Gen'  [sic] The account book is complete and detailed and yet records no payment to Sir Christopher Wren himself. William Lowndes (the owner) and Wren knew each other, they served on a committee together in 1704. All Souls College, Oxford owned a three-volume collection of architectural drawings by Wren, although most pertain to the plans for St Paul's cathedral there are also sketches and plans for his domestic buildings - there is nothing resembling Winslow Hall or anything there to suggest that Wren was the architect.
  The master carpenter documented at the house was Matthew Banckes, who had been Master Carpenter in the Office of Works since 1683, and was Master of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters at the time the house was built. Banckes often acted as surveyor at works by Wren, including six of the City churches and at Trinity College Library, Cambridge.
  The fireplaces on the ground floor are no longer original, but one room on the first floor retains an original corner fireplace. Corner fireplaces are said to have been a feature of Wren's domestic work. However, they consequently became a fashion at the time. The four massive chimney stacks, dominating the mansion, are not repeated on any house designed by Wren. While in the ledger book is recorded the most menial labourer's name to the highest surveyor's, never once is the architect mentioned. A 1695 engraving of Sarsden House, Sarsden, Oxfordshire, shows a very similar house to Winslow. As happened the length and breadth of England it is likely that similar projects were copied by a local draughtsman, and in the case of Winslow Hall, Wren kept an eye on the work and the books as a favour to his friend. Whatever the truth, it is doubtful three hundred years later a definite answer to the architect's identity will be found. Thus without stronger evidence, while it is probable Wren was involved, Winslow Hall can only be attributed to Sir Christopher Wren. If the house is by Wren, it is the only surviving example of a substantially unaltered Wren House outside London.
caption: Winslow Hall – the three-floored central corps de logis distinguished by the unusual central chimney stack is all that remains of William Lowndes' mansion. Photographed from the public highway.