West Wycombe Park
West Wycombe Park is a country house in Buckinghamshire. It was built primarily as a pleasure dome for the 18th century libertine Sir Francis Dashwood, and the naughty dilettanti members of his infamous ‘Hellfire Club’. It is architecturally unique, containing the complete mix of styles that spanned 18th century England.
West Wycombe Park has been described as one of the most theatrical buildings in England. Prodigal society fop Francis Dashwood inherited it from his father in 1724. He employed five different architects to redesign the house and its grounds. The result is an extraordinary mixture of baroque, neo-classicism and Palladianism, with some of the earliest examples of Greek revival architecture in Britain. It is a monument to 18th century taste.
Inside, the walls, floors, and ceilings are covered with classical scenes depicting Greek and Roman mythology, all alluding to love-making, eating, drinking, etc. Outside, the ‘walk round the lake’, so beloved of landscape architects, continues the theme of bacchanalian indulgence, with temples dedicated to Apollo, Diana and Venus. The garden is considered one of the finest surviving from the 18th century. A grade 1 listed building, it is now run by the National Trust and the current members of the Dashwood family.