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Commanding superb views over the whole of Bath, Crowe Hall is one of the city's finest Regency villas, set in thirty acres of landscaped garden, woods and parkland.
Originally built in 1760, the house was remodelled in the fashionable neo-classical style in the early 19th century by the banker George Tugwell, whose family lived there for the next 100 years. It was extensively rebuilt after a fire in 1926, which fortunately left the magnificent pillared portico intact. In 1961 Crowe Hall was bought by the distinguished chemist, industrialist and connoisseur, Sir Sydney Barratt.
While its gardens have often been open to the public, relatively few people were aware that for half a century Crowe Hall housed an extraordinary private collection of paintings, furniture and ceramics. This had been built over a lifetime by Sir Sydney and then preserved, as if in a time-capsule, by his son John Barratt, who lived at Crowe until his death last year.
In 1960 the New Scientist described Sir Sydney as "a notable example of the way that a successful academic scientist can switch to industry in mid-career, become even more successful in his new field than his old one and yet retain the qualities of a scholar". Not only had he built the chemicals company Albright & Wilson into a player to rival ICI, he had also, while on secondment as an advisor to Churchill's War Cabinet from 1942 to 1944, played a major part in the development of air warfare technologies, including the "bouncing bomb" used by the Dam Busters.
The way that Barratt's scientific brilliance and business acumen were matched by his passion for the arts was no less remarkable. His interest in painting had been sparked by his tutor and mentor at Oxford, the physicist Sir Thomas Merton, who was later scientific advisor to the National Gallery from 1944 to 1969. Merton, who became Barratt's lifelong friend, had himself built a world-class collection of Renaissance painting, much of it now in hanging in major public galleries in London, Washington and elsewhere.
Under Merton's expert tutelage, Barratt also developed a love for Renaissance art, acquiring several significant European paintings of the period, as well as many exquisite bronzes and ceramic pieces. But after moving to Summerhill, a Georgian country house in Staffordshire in the 1940s, his attention turned to 18th-century painting, furniture and antiques.
By the time he bought Crowe Hall, he had already amassed superb collections in these fields, having been lucky enough to snap up many blue-chip pieces at several country house sales that followed the Second World War. The challenge of filling Crowe Hall with pieces of a scale and quality to match the house was one to which he rose with tremendous relish and an unerring eye.
He was determined that everything in the house should not only be beautiful in its own right but also that it should complement the overall effect, from the oriental carpets on the floors to the neo-classical frieze in the library (whose shelves were stocked with a fabulous collection of rare books on art, architecture, gardening and furniture). And his eye for detail was legendary - he was never without his pocket magnifying glass, which he would use to scrutinise everything from hallmarks on a silver candlestick to the joint-work on a cabinet.
His passion for the objects he collected was both fierce and encyclopaedically well-informed, to the extent that it could be rather intimidating. As his grandson Tom Scott, who sometimes accompanied him on purchasing expeditions in the 1960s and 1970s, recalls: "Any dealer who tried to pull the wool over his eyes by passing off an inferior piece would receive short shrift, and it was woe betide any grandchild who mistreated a piece of china or picked up a dining chair in the wrong way!"
Sir Sydney's polymathic interests in the fine and decorative arts are represented in the quality and diversity of items that graced the rooms of his home at Crowe Hall; the contents of which are included in this extraordinary auction.
A REGENCY GILTWOOD CONVEX GIRANDOLE MIRROR
CIRCA 1830-35
Details
A REGENCY GILTWOOD CONVEX GIRANDOLE MIRROR
CIRCA 1830-35
The circular convex plate surrounded by a reeded ebonised slip and stylised foliate carved border, surmounted by an eagle and rockwork cresting and with a foliate carved apron flanked by two scrolling candle branches
39 in. (99 cm.) high; 26 in. (66 cm.) wide
CIRCA 1830-35
The circular convex plate surrounded by a reeded ebonised slip and stylised foliate carved border, surmounted by an eagle and rockwork cresting and with a foliate carved apron flanked by two scrolling candle branches
39 in. (99 cm.) high; 26 in. (66 cm.) wide
Brought to you by
Flora Elek
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