Title:  Villa in the Regent's Park, The Residence of the Marquis of Hertford         Artist: Shepherd, ThomasEngraver / Plate Maker:  Tingle, JamesSize: 5.75" x 3.5"Print Date: 1827The Villa was designed by Decimus Burton and built in 1825 for Francis Charles Seymour Conway, 3rd. Marquess of Hertford, who lived there until his death in 1842. It was situated a short distance from Grove House on the opposite side of the road which circles the Park. The Marquess was immensely wealthy, his life revolved around his friend George IV and his Court. He had inherited a large art collection from his father, and started to add extra reception rooms to  accommodate this, and his own collection of artwork, acquired on the Continent during and after the Napoleonic Wars. In 1830 he purchased the large clock with striking figures from the old church of St. Dunstan's in Fleet Street, which was demolished as part of a road widening scheme and then re-built in its own churchyard. The clock was installed in a newly build campanile in the grounds, the Marquess re-named the Villa, St. Dunstan's. The best of his and other members of the Hertford family's art collections were brought together by the Marquess's heir Sir Richard Wallace and presented to the Nation in 1894. The Wallace Collection can be seen in Hertford House, Manchester Square London. The Villa was occupied from 1845 until 1914 by five tenants, the next  occupant was Otto Kahn, a German who went to America and became one of the founders of the banking house Kahn, Loeb, and was also associated with the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. He surrendered the Villa's lease in 1917 to enable it to be used as a training centre for blind and disabled soldiers and sailors. This Institution later took its name from the Villa, and in 1921 St. Dunstan's Institute for the Blind transferred to St. John's Lodge. The Villa appears to have been unoccupied from 1921 until 1934 when Lord Rothermere, a publisher and newspaper owner took up residence. The following year he returned the clock to St. Dunstan's Church. In 1936, disaster struck the Villa, in the shape of Barbara Hutton, the Woolworths' heiress who took over the lease of the building and then promptly demolished it. How this was allowed and who authorised this wanton destruction appears to have been lost in the mists of time. In its place she  built a Neo-Georgian or Colonial Revival Mansion, which she named Winfield House. She owned the property until the break up of her marriage to the actor Cary Grant in 1945. She either gave or sold the lease of Winfield House for $1 to the United States Government. Since 1954 the house has been the official London residence of the United States Ambassador. 

collapse [-]