Foxhill House is a Gothic revival style building on what is now the Whiteknights campus of the University of Reading at Earley, adjoining the English town of Reading. It currently houses the University's School of Law.
The house was originally built in 1868 by the famous architect Alfred Waterhouse and used as his own residence until, in the early 1870s, he moved into an even grander property, Yattendon Court, which he had built in 1867. In the early years of the 20th Century Foxhill was occupied by Rufus Isaacs, 1st Marquess of Reading, who was variously Member of Parliament for Reading, Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, British ambassador to the United States and Viceroy of India.
In 1919 Isaacs sold the lease to Hugo Hirst, founder of the General Electric Company Ltd, who in 1934 became Baron Hirst of Witton. Hirst lived in the house until his death in 1943. Subsequently the house was used by his daughter, Muriel, and her husband Leslie Carr Gamage until about 1958 when the University gained possession.
Used for a period as student accommodation, Foxhill House was extensively restored between 2003 and 2005, in order to suit its new role as the home of the School of Law. In 2007 the courtyard of the building was refurbished with a grant from PriceWaterhouseCoopers in memory of Edwin Waterhouse, who was both a co-founder of that company and the brother of the building's architect. Foxhill House is a grade II listed building.
Famous quotes containing the word house:
“The night in prison was novel and interesting enough.... I found that even here there was a history and a gossip which never circulated beyond the walls of the jail. Probably this is the only house in the town where verses are composed, which are afterward printed in a circular form, but not published. I was shown quite a long list of verses which were composed by some young men who had been detected in an attempt to escape, who avenged themselves by singing them.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)