Hagley Hall

Hagley Hall is a Grade I listed 18th-century house in Hagley, Worcestershire. It was the creation of George, 1st Lord Lyttelton, secretary to Frederick, Prince of Wales, poet and man of letters and briefly Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Why not spend an enjoyable afternoon at Hagley Hall. Step back in time and discover the exciting history of Hagley Hall and the Lyttelton family. Our experienced tour guides can tell the story of where two of the gunpowder plot conspirators hid at the old Hunting Lodge and how the disastrous fire of 1925 nearly destroyed the House and its possessions.

History

There has been a park at Hagley since the reign of Edward III but the present outstanding landscape was created between 1747 and 1758 with follies designed by Lord Camelford, Thomas Pitt of Encombe, Henry Keene, James 'Athenian' Stuart, and Sanderson Miller. Horace Walpole, notoriously hard to please, wrote after a visit in 1753, 'I wore out my eyes with gazing, my feet with climbing and my tongue and vocabulary with commending'.

Follies

The folly castle found in the grounds of Hagley Hall (often known as Hagley Castle) is important because it was deliberately built to look like a ruin. Designed by pioneer of Gothic revival architecture and landscape designer Sanderson Miller for George Lyttleton in hte middle of the 18th Century, it is a prime example of the mock castle which marks the Gothic revivalist era, much like nearby Clent Castle.