Strawberry Hill House - home of Horace Walpole

Strawberry Hill is Britain's finest example of Georgian Gothic Revival architecture and interior decoration. It began life in 1698 as a modest house, built by the coachmen of the Earl of Bradford.

It was transformed into 'a little Gothic castle' by Horace Walpole, man of letters and the son of England's first Prime Minister. Between 1747 and 1792 Walpole doubled its size, creating Gothic rooms and adding towers and battlements in fulfilment of his dream. Further additions were made by the Countess Waldegrave in the 19th Century.

Strawberry Hill was already a famous tourist site in its own day. It has miraculously survived into ours, its rural surroundings gone, but its charm undiminished. The plaything of Walpole and his friends, it established a taste for the Gothic: fireplaces and gilded ceilings like mediaeval tombs and vaults, painted glass with rustic and biblical scenes and heraldry.

Over the last two years a massive amount of research has been carried out by Inskip and Jenkins, the conservation architects, with the help of many of the Friends and Guides. Strawberry Hill is now probably one of the best documented houses in the country. We are all aware of its unique importance to the history of architecture and of literature and its significance as a local treasure.

Once the funds are in place some more detailed research needs to be carried out on the interior fabric of the house. If all goes well, work will begin in 2008 and the house will open to the public in spring 2010 to coincide with an important exhibition about Horace Walpole and his collections at the V&A, curated by Michael Snodin, Chairman of the SHT.