The Shell House is a Grade 1 listed building built into the north wall of the garden adjacent to Harper House in Hound Street, Sherborne. It consists of an octagonal ground floor ‘shell room’ with seven alcoves, the walls of which are decorated with shells from the British Isles. It is topped with a conical thatched roof that would originally have had a glazed cupola or lantern. Decorated in the mid-eighteenth century Rococo style, the Shell House is thought to date from around 1750.
Research by Anne Andrews and Oliva Eliot has shown that the Shell House originally belonged to a house in Cheap Street owned by lawyer Samuel Foot (1704-1792). In August 1787 an advertisement appeared in the Bath Chronicle advertising the sale of the Samuel Foot’s house and gardens:
‘A Roomy and Convenient DWELLING-HOUSE, situate in the center of the town of SHERBORNE , in the county of Dorset, late the residence of Samuel Foot, esq; to which adjoins a large garden, divided into pleasure and kitchen ground. In the pleasure ground, which is spacious and handsomely laid out, and well planted with shrubs, stands a large and elegant Octagon Shell-House; and in the kitchen garden is a hot and green-house; adjoining the kitchen garden, in a court-yard, is an excellent three-stall Stable, Granary, &c. and two Tenements, either of which may at a small expence be converted into a coach-house. For a view, and further particulars, apply to Mr Batson, attorney at law, at Sherborne aforesaid. Sherborne, Aug. 7, 1787.’
The property was purchased by Thomas Gollop (1746-1793) who bequeathed to his wife Jane his dwelling house in Sherborne ‘with the garden, shell house, outhouses and buildings thereto belonging’.
In 1812, Benjamin Vowell (c.1769-1829), a wine merchant in Cheap Street, purchased Thomas Gollop’s former house and garden. Benjamin Vowell clearly enjoyed the garden as after his death in 1829 the sale particulars for its sale by auction on 18 May 1830, described it as comprising ‘All that very excellent and extensive walled garden, clothed and stocked with the choicest fruit trees in full bearing, and presenting a delightful site for the erection of a retired residence. On an elevated part of the Garden stands the beautiful and well-known Shell House, and in a well selected spot a capital Hot House, built on the most approved principle; also excellent Melon Pits and an arched Summer Seat.’ (Sherborne Mercury, 26 April 1830).
The Shell House and garden were purchased by the wealthy Whitty and Pretor banking families who lived in adjoining houses on the southside of Long Street (now The Old Bank House and Abbott’s Litten). On the opposite side of Long Street they created a pleasure garden with a grand joint entrance (now the site of the Cloisters retirement housing complex) from which they created a straight path that led up through both gardens directly to the Shell House.
In 1873, The Retreat in Hound Street became a Sherborne School boarding house (later renamed Harper House) run by housemaster the Rev. John Blanch (1842-1907). Shortly after 1873 the Rev. Blanch purchased the Shell House garden, turning it into a kitchen garden for Harper House, accessed via two new openings in the east wall of the garden. In around 1896 the Rev. Blanch sold the southern section of the garden, cutting off the Long Street entrance to the Shell House.
When the roof was repaired and re-thatched in September 2001, the thatcher found evidence of earlier stone tiles and a glazed cupola or lantern.
Between October 2003 and March 2004, Nimbus Conservation Ltd undertook essential conservation and consolidation repairs to both the exterior and interior of the Shell House. The project was overseen for Sherborne School by OS architect Michael Carden, MBE, AAdip, RIBAOS, and the Director in charge for Nimbus Conservation Ltd was OS Adam Daybell.
In 2008, the Shell House was awarded Grade 1 listed status by Historic England.
Sherborne School is very grateful to the Dorset Gardens Trust for their contributions towards funding the restoration of the Shell House.
Take our 360° tour of the Shell House
Further reading:
- The Shell House by Anne Andrews & Olivia Eliot (Dorset Gardens Trust, August 2008) (pdf)
- The Shell House, Historic England listing
- Dorset Gardens Trust
- Michael Hill, John Newman & Nikolaus Pevsner, The Buildings of England: Dorset (Yale University Press, 2018)
- Tim Mowl, Historic Gardens of Dorset (The History Press, 2003)
To arrange a visit to the Shell House please contact Sherborne School’s Events Manager on email events@sherborne.org
For further information about the Sherborne School Archives please contact the School Archivist
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