Wollaton Hall

Coordinates: 52°56′53″N 1°12′35″W / 52.947974°N 1.209642°W / 52.947974; -1.209642

Wollaton Hall is an Elizabethan country house of the 1580s standing on a small but prominent hill in Wollaton Park, Nottingham, England. The house is now Nottingham Natural History Museum, with Nottingham Industrial Museum in the out-buildings. The surrounding parkland has a herd of deer, and is regularly used for large-scale outdoor events such as rock concerts, sporting events and festivals.

Wollaton is a classic prodigy house, "the architectural sensation of its age", though its builder was not a leading courtier and its construction stretched the resources he mainly obtained from coalmining; the original family home was at the bottom of the hill. Though much re-modelled inside, the "startlingly bold" exterior remains largely intact.

History

Wollaton Hall was built between 1580 and 1588 for Sir Francis Willoughby and is believed to be designed by the Elizabethan architect, Robert Smythson, who had by then completed Longleat, and was to go on to design Hardwick Hall. The general plan of Wollaton is comparable to these, and was widely adopted for other houses, but the exuberent decoration of Wollaton is distinctive, and it is possible that Willoughby played some part in creating it. The style is an advanced Elizabethan with early Jacobean elements.

Wollaton

Coordinates: 52°57′00″N 1°14′06″W / 52.95010°N 1.2349°W / 52.95010; -1.2349

Wollaton (often mistakenly spelt Woolaton, in accordance with its pronunciation) is a suburb and former parish in the western part of Nottingham, England. It is home to Wollaton Hall with its museum, deer park, lake, walks and golf course.

Overview

The centre of Wollaton village, the original heart of the suburb, has remained relatively unchanged over the past few hundred years and is dominated by the Admiral Rodney public house and the Anglican church of St Leonard dating back to the 13th century. It also features historic cottages, an Elizabethan dovecote and a water pump. The village was incorporated into the City of Nottingham in 1933, with urban development starting shortly afterwards. Most areas of the former parish were built-up by the end of the 1960s.

Wollaton proper is entirely situated in the City of Nottingham, although a small part of the Broxtowe borough may be referred to as Wollaton by local people. Other areas of the Nottingham which were not in the original parish of Wollaton may also be described as Wollaton, notably those parts of the former parish of Radford known historically as Radford Woodhouses, and the part of Wollaton Park which was used for housing (usually called the Wollaton Park Estate) which was primarily in the former parish of Lenton.