Henry Holland (architect) - Early Work

Early Work

Holland began his practice by designing Claremont House for Robert Clive, 1st Baron Clive, with his future father-in-law in 1771 and their partnership lasted until Brown's death twelve years later. Claremont is of nine by five bays, of white brick with stone dressings. The main feature on the entrance front is the tetrastyle Corinthian pedimented portico. This leads to the entrance hall with red scagliola columns, these are arranged in an oval with the rectangular room. The drawing room has a fine plaster ceiling and marble fireplace with two caryatids. There is a fine staircase.

In 1771 he took a lease from Charles Cadogan, 2nd Baron Cadogan on his Chelsea estate and began the Hans Town (named after an earlier owner Hans Sloane) development on 89 acres (360,000 m²) of open field and marsh. There he laid out parts of Knightsbridge and Chelsea, including Sloane Street and Sloane Square, and Hans Place, Street and Crescent and Cadogan Place. The buildings were typical Georgian, terraced houses, they were three or four floors in height plus an attic and basement and two or three windows wide, of brick, decoration was minimal, occasionally the ground floor was decorated with stucco rustication. These developments quickly became some of the most fashionable areas in greater London. Construction was slow, the start of the American war of independence in 1776 being one of the factors (Lord Cadogan also died that year). Sloane Square was virtually complete by 1780. Apart from a few houses on the east side Sloane Street was not developed before 1790. By 1789 Holland was living in a house designed by himself, called Sloane Place, it was to the north of Hans Place. The house was large 114 feet in length, to the north the octagonal entrance hall had a black and white marble floor the south front had a one storey ionic loggia across the central five bays with an iron balcony above in front of the main bedrooms, the rooms on the ground floor south front were the drawing room, dining room, lobby, library and music room. As the area was developed on ninety-nine year leases Holland's houses were almost entirely rebuilt from the 1870s onwards. A few houses survive in Hans Place, Nos. 12 and 33-34. Cadogan Square was laid out from 1879 onwards in part over the gardens of Sloane Place.

Another joint work was Benham Park 1774-75 designed for William Craven, 6th Baron Craven, three stories high, nine bays wide, in a plain neoclassical style, of stone, with a tetrastyle Ionic portico, the building was altered in 1914, the pediment on the portico was replaced by a balustrade and the roof lowered and hidden behind a balustrade. The interiors have also been altered. Though the Circular Hall in the centre of the building, with its large niches and fine plasterwork, is probably as designed by Holland, is has an opening in the ceiling rising to the galleried floor above and a glazed dome. The principal staircase is also original.

Brown had been designing the landscape of Trentham hall since 1768, for the owner Granville Leveson-Gower, 1st Marquess of Stafford (he was an Earl at the time), when it was decided to remodel the house, this took from 1775–78, it was enlarged from nine to fifteen bays, the pilasters and other features were in stone, but the walls were of brick covered in stucco to imitate stonework. The building was remodelled and extended by Sir Charles Barry in 1834-40 and largely demolished in 1910.

John Stuart, 1st Marquess of Bute commissioned Holland and Brown to restore Cardiff Castle (1778–80), Holland's interiors were swept away when the castle was remodelled and extended by William Burges in the 1860s. The east front of the main apartments retain Holland's work a rare example of him using Gothic Revival architecture and the neoclassical style Drawing Room being the only significant interior to survive more or less as Holland designed it.

In 1776 Holland designed Brooks's club in St James's Street, Westminster. Build of yellow brick and Portland stone in a Palladian style similar to his early country houses. The main suite of rooms on the first floor consisted of the Great Subscription Room, Small Drawing Room and the Card Room, Brook's was known for its gambling on card games, the Prince of Wales being a member. The interiors are in neoclassical style, the Great Subscription Room having a segmental barrel vault ceiling.

From 1778-81 for Thomas Harley, Holland designed and built Berrington Hall, Herefordshire, one of his purest exercises in the Neoclassical style, the exterior is largely devoid of decoration, the main feature is the tetrastyle Ionic portico. The interior are equally fine, the most impressive being the staircase at the centre of the building, with its glazed dome and the upper floor is surrounded by Scagliola Corinthian columns. The main rooms have fine plaster ceilings and marble chimneypieces, these are the library, dining and drawings rooms. The small boudoir has a shallow apse screened by two Ionic columns of Scagliola imitating Lapis lazuli. Holland also designed the service yard behind the house with the laundry, dairy and stables as well as the entrance lodge to the estate in the form of a Triumphal arch.

• Berrington Hall

• Detail of portico, Berrington Hall

• The stables, Berrington Hall

• Entrance Arch, Berrington Hall

In 1788 Holland continued the remodelling of Broadlands in Hampshire for Henry Temple, 2nd Viscount Palmerston started by Brown. The exterior was re-clad in yellow brick and a three bay recessed Ionic portico added on the north front, a tetrastyle Ionic portico was added on the south front, within he added the octagonal domed lobby, also by Holland are the ground floor rooms on the south front library (Wedgwood room), saloon and drawing room, and on the east front the dining room, all in the Adam style.