Building record 0420802003 - GOTHIC 'UMBRELLO', Stowe Landscape Gardens

Plan Form - Octagonal.
Brief description (B7).
Grade II. Small stone conduit head. C18, designer unknown. Octagonal, gothic style. Not owned by Stowe school (B14).
The Conduit House occupies a key position in the Deer Park, linking the extensive woodland of the ridings with the landscape gardens. It is first mentioned in Abraham Allen's Survey of the Demaynes of Stowe in 1662-3. A sketch plan of 1754 shows the house and planting scheme and suggests that the land was to be ploughed for one more year. Thus, the current building is likely to have been built in 1756. The coade stone panel above the door was added in 1793. The windows are tracery style and the external walls were once plastered and limewashed. Its foundations are a series of brick vaults which form three paralllel passages for the water cistern. Three pipes lead into the space. A large lead filter has also been recovered which presumably prevented debris from entering the system and polluting the supply to the main house. An earthwork survey carried out by English Heritage in May 2000 revealed that the building sits in a circular hollow caused either by its construction or erosion by cattle. It is surrounded by an area of slight earthworks and medieval ridge and furrow. The building stands towards the SE end of a terrace defined by two scarps 0.8m high. The terrace is 70m long x 35m wide. The terrace also features hollows where trees from the 18th century designed planting have been removed. A slight linear feature runs for some 70m NW to SE terminating just short of the Conduit House and three slight mounds lie close by. The linear feature may be the remains of a headland associated with the ridge and furrow. To the east is a small pond, defined by scarp, which is marked on the 1843 estate map. A series of channels run away S from the area of the pond and are probably the remains of field drains. To the south of the pond there is an ovoid depression and a linear scrape believed to be the remains of quarrying (B18).
The SE window had been blocked probably soon after building. External ironstone panels form additional decorative details. The iron gate stands to its original height and the tracery above probably terminated just above the gate. The interior was renderd with a plaster ceiling. Traces of moulded cornice survive iinsitu. The floor was originally brick, but this has been replaced with concrete on a yellow gravel base. No roof covering survives, but the rood structure was based around a kingpost - 60% of which survives. Surrounding the building, particularly to the SW are a series of earthwork terraces and platforms. A gravel road has been identified running NE-SW and below this a clay bank with a wattle hurdle. Field drains of varying types have been found - stone and rubble, clay pipe, rubble sealed with clay. Roman pottery has also been found (B20).