Notice
From Monday 3rd February, the Stables Restaurant and Gift Shop will be open only on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday (apart from February Half Term). The Gardens and House will remain open daily as usual.
The Terrace Seat, the newest addition to the Landscape Gardens, looks out towards the Mausoleum across the Pear Pond, and is the eleventh building to be reinstated at Hestercombe.
Commissioned in 2021, the seat was completed and put in place this year on September 9th.
Designed by architect Robert Battersby, who has worked with Hestercombe for many years, the seat mirrors the archway of the Mausoleum, and has been created in the shape of a clam shell, which represents birth, or new beginnings - fitting perfectly with the journey around the Landscape Garden.
The crafting of the seat was all down to Joe Blathwayt of the Boat Building Academy, based in Lyme Regis, who built the seat from one piece of English oak, using copper and steel rivets.
Joe worked for eight weeks in his workshop to create the Terrace Seat and estimates that 750 to 800 copper ’nails and roves’ were used to create the rivets.
There is no known description or image of the original Terrace Seat, so it is considered an evocation rather than a restoration, although built on the foundations of the original.
