HORACE WALPOLE'S "SEA-PORT IN MINIATURE"

During the early days of the internet Clare Phelps, the Secretary of the Strawberry Hill Residents Association, wrote to ask if I could put information about Strawberry Hill on the World InfoZone website.

In the history of the Strawberry Hill area the great names are Horace Walpole and Alexander Pope. Walpole, can be said to be the founder of Strawberry Hill as the area is named after Strawberry Hill House, an amazing example of Gothic Revival architecture; Alexander Pope, the famous poet, lived on the banks of the Thames.

The site of Pope's home is next to Radnor Gardens in Strawberry Hill and further along the idyllic river vista the view can be seen of Walpole's sea-port in miniature.


"From the window, Walpole would be able to look left towards Twickenham (which he described as a ‘sea port in miniature’)"

"The enclosed enchanted little landscape, then, is Strawberry Hill.... This view of the castle is what I have just finished [it was a view of the south side, towards the north-east], and is the only side that will be at all regular. Directly before it is an open grove, through which you see a field, which is bounded by a serpentine wood of all kind of trees, and flowering shrubs, and flowers.

The lawn before the house is situated on the top of a small hill, from whence to the left you see the town and church of Twickenham encircling a turn of the river, that looks exactly like a sea-port in miniature."


MY STRAWBERRY HILL HOUSE:

Local Area, Prado's Grapes, Gifford Lodge, Pope's Legacy, Grand Neighbours in Richmond House.

Photographs World InfoZone Ltd 2011

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