Monument record 1837/1/1 - Garden gateway at Tilstone Hall 130m South of Tilstone Hall Farm

Ruins of gatehouse. Late C16/early C17. Red sandstone ashlar with English garden wall bond brickwork. Ruinous ground floor and part of first floor. West front: Central round pedestrian archway with moulded springers and ovolo moulding to the arch voussoirs. Plinths and capitals of missing columns to either side of arch. To the left is a blocked 3-light mullioned window with chamfered surround and a pediment over. Remnants of similar to right. Entablature above which projects above the capitals - and again at the corners. Further pediment resting on the cornice at left. East front: Similar to the west face but with two sets of 2 pediments and one cabled Roman Doric column. The building is somewhat similar to the screen at Speke Hall, Lancashire, in its proportions and the use of cabled Roman Doric columns (1).


Almost certainly the work of Sir Thomas Wilbraham of Woodhey, the builder of Tilstone Hall (?), and probably a gatehouse to a garden, or a garden pavilion (2).

The monument includes the ruins of a two-storey gatehouse for a walled garden originally attached to Tilstone Hall. The house was built around AD 1600 by Thomas Wilbraham of Woodhey and, after damage during the Civil War, was pulled down in about AD 1740. The gatehouse is all that remains of this mansion and its garden. The gatehouse, which is listed Grade II, is built of red sandstone ashlar with some brickwork repairs to the structure and brick infilling of the window openings. On the south west front there is a central pedestrian archway with moulded springers and ovolo moulding to the arch voussoirs. This was flanked by mullioned widows with pediments over, now blocked with brickwork. The north east face is similar, with a central archway and blocked mullioned windows. One cabled Doric column survives on the right hand side of this doorway. Other columns are now missing (3).

<1> English Heritage, 2005, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, 55818 (Digital Archive). SCH4666.

<2> de Figueiredo P & Treuherz J, 1988, Cheshire Country Houses, /178 (Book). SCH785.

<3> English Heritage, Various, Schedule Entry (Scheduled Ancient Monuments Amendment), 30367/ 1998 (Scheduling Record). SCH2950.