Nuthall Temple

Nuthall Temple in Nottinghamshire, one of England's lost houses, was one of five houses built in the United Kingdom generally said to have been inspired by Palladio's Villa Capra in Vicenza.

Only two 18th century examples remain: Mereworth Castle and Chiswick House. Both are today conserved as Grade 1 listed buildings. The fourth, Foots Cray Place, was demolished in 1950 after a fire in 1949, while the fifth, Henbury Hall, was built in the 1980s.

Nuthall Temple was completed in 1757 towards the end of the Palladian fashion in England. Nuthall Temple does not follow the imitation of Villa Capra as closely as its earlier prototypes, although the homage to Palladio's concepts is strongly pronounced. In fact the house bears a closer resemblance to Rocca Pisana (1578) by Palladio's follower Vincenzo Scamozzi. This similarity makes the architecture of Nuthall extremely interesting as Scamozzi's building, like Nuthall, has a recessed portico rather than prostyle inserted within the facade. This was to become a strong feature of the neoclassical architecture which was to follow Palladianism in the United Kingdom and makes Nuthall avant-garde in its late Palladianism.

The design is attributed to Thomas Wright whose patron was a country landowner, Sir Charles Sedley. The house was designed around a 58 ft high hall beneath the central dome. The hall was decorated with rococo plaster-work of a standard easily equal to that at Claydon House. In 1778 Sedley commissioned James Wyatt to undertake a number of alterations. Externally these included the installation of Venetian windows on the garden front and the lowering of balustrades below some others. Internally the redesign of the music room in a neo-Classical style illustrated how much taste had changed within a short period of time

...
Wikipedia