Harlaxton Manor

Harlaxton Manor is a building that takes its inspiration from the country houses of Elizabethan England.

In 1831, the architect Anthony Salvin was commissioned by Gregory Gregory to build his new Manor house, with work commencing in 1832. But, by 1838, building work at Harlaxton was in the hands of the architect William Burn to whom the service wings and courtyards, with their distinctive Tudor arches, may be attributable.

Both architects were, however, subject to the overarching vision of their client. John Claudius Loudon, on visiting Harlaxton in 1840, concluded that Gregory had entered “so completely into both the design and the practical details of execution he may be said to have embodied himself in the edifice”.

This is remarkable in itself, but what makes Harlaxton unique was his brilliant idea “that Elizabethan and Jacobean could be fused with Baroque”. This idea is what elevates Harlaxton from the remarkable to the sensational.