Packwood House

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Packwood House

View from garden

Yew trees looking south towards Sermon on the Mount

House & Yews from The Mount

Packwood House (not to be confused with Packwood Hall which is a private residence and not open to the public) is a stately timber-framed Tudor moated manor house owned, since 1941, by the National Trust, situated near Lapworth, Warwickshire. It is a Grade II* listed building. It has a wealth of tapestries and fine furniture, but is most famous for its yew garden (topiary) in which the clipped trees are said to represent the Sermon on the Mount.

The house began as a modest timber-framed farmhouse constructed for John Fetherston between 1556-1560. During the 1920s and 1930s, Graham Baron Ash used his father's fortune to create a house of Tudor character, and purchased an extensive collection of 16th and 17th century furniture, some obtained from nearby Baddesley Clinton. What was once the great barn of the farm was converted into a Tudor style hall, and connected to the main house by the addition of a Long Gallery.

The famous Yew Garden containing over 100 trees was laid out in the mid 17th century by John Fetherston, the lawyer. The clipped yews are supposed to represent 'The Sermon on the Mount'. Twelve great yews are known as the 'Apostles' and the four big specimens in the middle are 'The Evangelists'. A tight spiral path lined with box hedges climbs a hummock named 'The Mount'. The single yew that crowns the summit is known as 'The Master'. The smaller yew trees are called 'The Multitude' and were planted in the 19th century to replace an orchard.^[1]

Packwood is "one of the great topiary gardens of England...with an assembled multitude of Yew specimens, some over 50 feet high...more yew trees per square inch here than almost anywhere else in the country."^[2] Whilst the beauty of the house is impressive the garden is positively breathtaking. The Yew Garden is entered by raised steps and a wrought iron gate. The garden slopes upwards and an avenue of trees leads the walker to a raised path which circles upwards and round until you reach a wooden seat beneath a yew tree from where you can admire the garden and its tranquility from a raised vantage point.^[3] Behind the house is a substantial lake, and opposite the front entrance is the impressive Packwood Avenue, a tree lined public footpath which runs straight for around a kilometre through grounds also owned by the National Trust.

Packwood House lies between Darley Green (outside Knowle), Lapworth and Hockley Heath and is open to visitors Wednesday to Sunday, for several months of the year.

Near Packwood House stands St Giles', an ancient church with one of England's rare extant Doomsday Walls. Painted on either side of the aisle before the altar, this depicts on the lefthand side the rich (taller, well dressed individuals) and the poor (shorter, starving people). However on the righthand side all these people are shown after death: here they appear as skeletons - all of the same height - demonstrating that all are the same in Death and in the eyes of God.