Buildings through 500 years

More than three hundred buildings in Epsom and Ewell are officially listed for their historic importance.  The oldest ones were standing when Henry VIII was building his great palace of Nonsuch nearby.  The newest were built in the memory of people now living.  They are all protected by law.

Visiting Old Buildings

Some of these buildings can be viewed on Heritage Open Days, which take place every September – thanks to the generosity of property owners and local volunteers. Several buildings are marked by plaques and a historic trail for Ewell village prepared by the Council and Ewell local Rotary Club will be available in Spring 2009. 

Tudor times

Between 1540 and 1680, the main streets of Epsom and Ewell were lined with substantial farmhouses built from a timber frame filled in with wattle and daub panels.  Each stood in two or three acres of its own ground, with stables and worksheds behind.  There is a fine example at Fitznells in Chessington Road, Ewell.

Epsom Spa

By 1714, the old village of Epsom had been rebuilt for visitors who came to drink the waters at Epsom Spa.  The rustic houses in the High Street were replaced by neat brick buildings with sash windows, let out as lodgings in the summer.  There were entertainments at the Assembly Rooms, built c1690 and now a Wetherspoons pub.  A model of the original building is on display at Bourne Hall Museum.

Houses of the Gentry

As Epsom grew in popularity many rich merchants built houses on the outskirts of the town.  Church Street, South Street, and Woodcote were favourite areas.  Ebbisham House in Church Street is a fine example, as are the Hylands and Hylands House in Dorking Road, and Woodcote Grove in Chalk Lane, now the headquarters of W.S. Atkins.  The Cedars in Church Street was given an elegant brick front in the 1720s.

Ordinary Homes

Until about 1850, most homes for working people in Epsom and Ewell were built from a timber frame clad in wooden weather-boarding. Important buildings like the Upper Mill in Ewell (now rebuilt) were kept trim with a coat of white paint.  Many attractive buildings of this period can be seen around Stamford Green, close to Epsom Common.  The Spring Hotel in Ewell was two separate properties, one of them a farmhouse, until they were joined up in the 1820s to attract the coaching trade.

Georgian Elegance

Many large houses were remodelled in the eighteenth century.  The Farmer family chose the architect James Wyatt to redevelop Nonsuch Mansion House, and he remodelled the eighteenth-century building to look like a miniature castle, with its brick walls covered in stucco to resemble stone, and fake towers and battlements.  The Friends of Nonsuch open the old kitchen wing once a month. 

Victorian Mansions

By the 1860s, mansion houses were being built for the well-to-do who wanted a place in the Surrey countryside.  The most famous was Lord Rosebery, the Liberal Prime Minister, who rebuilt an old property at The Durdans in 1878.  He was passionate about horse-racing and added stables and an indoor riding school.  Many of these houses copy the features of earlier styles.  Glyn House (in Ewell Church Street) was built like a Scottish baronial tower, while at Ewell Court the timber-framed front of an Elizabethan farmhouse served as the inspiration for the new building. 

In 1812, the rich landowner Thomas Calverley was looking to build a new house in Church Street, Ewell.  He chose a local architect, Henry Kitchen, the son of a village builder (also a Henry) who had sent him to be trained by the famous James Wyatt.  The result was called Ewell Castle.  It resembles Wyatt’s building at Nonsuch Mansion House, with battlements – of stucco, not stone – and a grand hall with a fan-vaulted ceiling lit by a Gothic window.  Ewell Castle is now a school.

Follies and Fantasies

In Epsom, 54 Castle Road has a tower and battlements.  It was built to look good when viewed across Epsom Common from Horton Place, which is now part of the Manor Park estate.  In the gardens of Pitt Place in Epsom there is a battlemented icehouse, used for keeping food cool before the invention of the fridge.  These are private property, and so is the mysterious tower, decorated with broken china, which stands behind Pit House in Ewell.

Traces of the Past

There are many historic places to visit in Epsom and Ewell.  Our oldest monuments survive from the mediaeval churches of the area.  The church in Ewell is dedicated to St. Mary’s in Ewell, and that in Epsom to St. Martin.

Old St. Mary’s

Today, the church tower of old St. Mary’s stands alone in the ancient graveyard.  It was built in the early fifteenth century, out of flints from the nearby fields mixed with soft Reigate stone.  The foundations rest on the old Roman road, Stane Street.  On the second stage there are four small windows to light the ringing chamber, and the five bells were sent off to Whitechapel to be recast as six in 1767.  Some twenty years later the blacksmith Richard Bliss designed a weathervane which still stands on the brick turret.  He lies buried within sight of it, to the south of the church path.  The rest of the church was demolished in 1848 at the instigation of the new vicar, Sir George Glyn, who built the new Victorian church of St. Mary's instead.  The tower is now looked after by the Ewell Tower Preservation Trust, who can be contacted via the Epsom & Ewell Local History & Archaeology Society.

Old St. Martin’s

Unlike its neighbour, St. Martin’s Church still stands on the same site, but only the fifteenth-century tower survives from the early period.  This was the church where Samuel Pepys came to worship – so did his friend John Evelyn, whose family memorials can be seen inside.  After years of neglect, the townsfolk of Epsom had the rest of the church rebuilt in 1824, in a light and elegant style.  It was too small for the ambitions of W. Bainbridge Bell, the vicar in 1904, who wanted Epsom to become Surrey’s cathedral town.  He started rebuilding it on a grand scale at the east end, but died before work could get any further than the chancel.  The Church House, in a former brewery, welcomes visitors.  Inside the church are monuments by Flaxman and Chantrey, and one to Jonathan Boucher, the American loyalist who came to England after the Revolution and became vicar at Epsom.  

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