The Landscape at Croome was not made as an afterthought. House and garden here form an integrated design. The park may be in the naturalistic style, based partly on the landscape paintings of Claude Gellee ‘le Lorraine’ and Nicolas Poussin and partly on ‘Capability’ Brown’s native Northumberland scenery, replacing the formal patterns of earlier periods, but every element in it is in fact orchestrated. The house and the lake, the follies, temples and statues, the parkland and the river are all carefully arranged in relation to each other.*

*From the Croome guide book

A signboard next to these carefully crafted and decorated wooden objects informs that they are a pair of commodes:

The name is taken from the French word for a chest of drawers. They were introduced during the reign of King Louis XIV (1638-1715) and the style was adopted in the mid-1700s when French fashions became popular in Britain.

The term usually describes cupboards with curved or ’serpentine’ fronts, supported by legs. In this case the shape is a very plain rectangular chest with all the emphasis being on its elegant decoration.

Commodes were used on the principle floor of a house, either in the main reception rooms or in bedrooms and dressing rooms.

Many commodes were not functional at all but simply a means of showing off the decorative skill of the maker and they sometimes formed part of a decorative scheme for a complete interior.

This pair was functional and designed for use in a bedroom to store clothes. One of the interiors is fitted with shelves and the other with sliding drawers. The top has a narrow shelf which could be slid out, traditionally for use as a flat surface for brushing clothes.

After Croome Court passed out of the hands of the Coventry family it had several owners each leaving their mark as can be seen in different rooms around the house.

In 1921 the 9th Earl set up the Croome Estate Trust, in order to ensure that the 15,000 acre estate would be preserved. However, in 1939, fate and the tragic circumstances of the Second World War intervened. The 10th Earl having volunteered when war was declared, was killed in the retreat to Dunkirk. A whole new chapter began when, after the war was over, such houses were not longer viable and had to be sold.*

Initially the Croome Estate was sold to the Roman Archdiocese of Birmingham. The house was adapted to become a Catholic junior boarding school for disadvantaged boys who were taught by Nuns. This part of the house’s history  lasted from the 1950s-1970s.

Croome subsequently became the headquarters for the Society for Krishna Consciousness. They provided a primary school for devotees and a worldwide centre for training students in Krishna Consciousness.

The house then became the base for various property developers until it came up for sale in 2004 when the Croome Trust were able to buy back the Coventry family’s ancestral home, whereupon they leased it to the National Trust for 999 years.

*Introduction to the National Trust Handbook of Croome (George Coventry, 13th Earl)

Source of information – National Trust Handbook of Croome

Within the Church of St Mary Magdalene shrubbery, the ice house that served Croome Court can be found. The ice house became overgrown and filled with rubble when it ceased to be used in 1915.

The thatched roof was partly a decorative touch to make the building blend in with its surroundings but it also fulfilled a practical function of keeping it cool. More than two thirds of the building is below ground. The depth of the Ice House is 24 feet which is a surprising drop. The Ice House worked rather like a thermos flask. The walls are double-skinned, and ice would have been taken from a nearby pond in winter and packed into the chamber, which was lined with straw for extra insulation. Throughout the summer the ice from the Ice House would have been used to preserve food and cool drinks as well as to create ice creams and sorbets.*

*From the National Trust Croome Handbook

The original medieval church was considered, by the 6th Earl of Coventry and Capability Brown (who landscaped the estate) to be too close to the house and was demolished. A new church was built in 1763 which incorporates interior masonry and timbers from the old church. The exterior of the church was designed by Capability Brown in imitation of the ‘Gothic Style’, whilst the interior was designed by Robert Adam in a ‘Georgian Gothic’ style. As part of his design Adam had suggest stained glass windows but instead the church has clear glass in its windows.

The Coventry family cared for the church until 1949 when the house passed out of the family, and they are commemorated by a series of magnificent monuments. By the late 1960s the building was no longer viable as a parish church and was placed in the care of The Churches Conservation Trust in 1975.*

The 6th Earl had the tombs of four of his ancestors moved here from the demolished church and installed in the chancel. The bodies of the Coventrys, including the 6th Earl, are buried in a vault beneath the Church, which could be accessed via a secret passage at the side of the building, marked with the words Candide et Constanter, the family motto. Not all of the ancestors appear to have been moved, so it is assumed that there are many more still under the soil near the house.. **

The new Church was built on higher ground so that it could be visible from many parts of the estate.

*The Churches Conservation Trust

**From the National Trust, Croome handbook

C.S. Lewis

The tree leaflet for Hampton Court Castle and Garden provides the following information:

The oldest Cedar, growing on the slopes of Mount Lebanon, is approximately 16mts in girth and estimated to be 5.500 years old. By comparison, the first Cedar to be planted in this country, in 1647, is now 10mts in girth and our largest a mere 8mts.

Our Cedars were given pet names by one of the castle’s previous inhabitants, Johnny Arkwright (1833-1905), when he was convalescing as a child and was confined to the Orangery. The largest of the Cedars was christened Julius. We think that Julius is the tree with the door into the trunk.