historical house, gallery
Sir John Soane, 1800
Mattock Lane, Ealing, W5 5EQ
Designed by Sir John Soane as a family home and country residence. Following a three-year conservation project, Pitzhanger has been returned to Soane’s innovative original design and re-opened to the public in March 2019.
Ealing Broadway, South Ealing
Ealing Broadway
65, 207, 427, 483
65, 207, 427, 483, 607
Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery is fully accessible for people with wheelchairs, buggies or who may find stairs challenging.
There is a wheelchair onsite which may be used by visitors, to ensure it is available please email pitzhanger@pitzhanger.org.uk
Pitzhanger Manor was designed by Sir John Soane (1753-1837), one of England's greatest architects. He bought the Pitzhanger site in 1800 in the hope of creating a showcase for his collection and his talents, and a family home for a dynasty of architects, starting with his young sons. In 1810, when his sons proved a disappointment, Soane sold Pitzhanger and moved his library and art collection to his London home in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
The house stayed in private hands till it was sold in 1901 to Ealing District Council. The building stands in Walpole Park which was formerly the ornamental gardens and parkland to the house, designed for Soane by John Haverfield in 1800.
In March 2015, Pitzhanger closed to the public to undertake a major project, aiming to return Sir John Soane’s Manor to its original design.
The project, led by Ealing Council in collaboration with Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery Trust, peeled back layers of history, extensions and overpainting, returning Pitzhanger to Soane’s original design, now visible for the first time in over 175 years. The Regency Manor, built between 1800 and 1804, is a rare and spectacular example of a building designed, built and lived in by Sir John Soane himself. With its stripped classical detail, canopy domed ceilings, radical decorative paint schemes and inventive use of space and light, Pitzhanger features many architectural elements that Soane adapted for his later buildings including Dulwich Picture Gallery and his city home in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
Important structural elements of Soane’s design were reinstated, such as the conservatory demolished in 1901 and the dramatic central roof light which returns Pitzhanger to the silhouette Soane intended.
Soane’s original intricate paint schemes, which were overpainted in the 1830s, have also been meticulously recreated throughout the Manor. The dramatic marbling in the entrance hall and the hand-painted Chinese wallpaper in the Upper Drawing Room have revitalised Pitzhanger’s interiors.
