Marble Hill House

Marble Hill House is a Neo-Palladian villa in Twickenham, London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. It was built between 1724 and 1729 for Henrietta Howard, Countess of Suffolk, and designed by Roger Morris with Henry Herbert, 9th Earl of Pembroke. The house stands on a 66-acre park known as Marble Hill Park. It became a model for Georgian English villas and plantation houses in the American colonies. The villa was the first eighteenth-century house in England preserved by a public body. The house contains lavishly gilded decoration and five capricci paintings by Giovanni Paolo Pannini. It also holds a loaned collection of early Georgian furniture and paintings, including the Chinoiserie collection of the Lazenby Bequest. Regular guests included Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift. In the late 18th century, the Prince Regent rented it for meetings with Maria Fitzherbert. Archaeologists found evidence of a bowling alley-like feature in 2017. The grounds provide leisure facilities such as rugby and hockey pitches, cricket nets, tennis courts, and a children’s play area. Restoration work took seven years and cost £8 million. English Heritage describes the restored house as “one of the forgotten gems of Georgian London.” The house appeared as a plantation house in the 1994 film *Interview with the Vampire*.