Langley Park, Buckinghamshire

The present-day house is the most recent to be built on the site of a medieval deer park. The deer park is first mentioned in historical documents dating to 1202, and was crown property. It was used for hunting deer throughout the medieval period, with a hunting lodge. This was situated about 100m south of the Kederminster house, and was finished in 1760. The estate remained in the ownership of the Harvey family until 1945 when it was sold to Buckinghamshire County Council. During the First World War Langley Park House was used as a hospital officers of the 2nd Regiment of King Edward's Horse (a cavalry regiment of the special reserve forces, formed in London in August 1914 and moved to France as a dismounted unit in May 1915). In 1993 the house was leased for 99 years by Buckinghamshire County Council for commercial use but had become unused by 2001. The leasehold of the house was sold (i.e. the freehold remained with Buckinghamshire County Council) in 2004 for £2.4 million; in 2018 it reopened as a hotel run by the Marriott Group. ==The house==

Langley Park House is Grade II* listed. Robert Bateson Harvey (1825–1887), grandson of the first Harvey to own the house, added Vanbrugh-style quadrant wings ending in square pavilions with angle towers to the east (main) front in c. 1850–60. ==The gardens and pleasure grounds==

The formal gardens on the north, west and south sides of the house were created between 1882 and 1899. They include gravelled paths, lawns and a rock garden, and in some areas are separated from the less formal parkland by a ha-ha. Together the gardens and the parkland are Grade II listed. ==The park==

The park, designed by Lancelot 'Capability' Brown in the 1760s, has woods, a lake formed by damming a stream, pastures and trees in clumps and individually planted. At the site of a Palladian octagonal temple by Roger Morris (c. 1740, demolished in the mid-19th century) was a 30m-high oriental column (1864, demolished c. 1960). A rhododendron collection now grows in this area, known as the Temple Gardens. ==References==