Kenwood 1913: part 3.

The penultimate section of Theophilus A Allen's original 1913 plan for what was to become Kenwood - this time showing the 1st floor (2nd floor US). Again, it's interesting to note the coal burning fireplace in each room. The master bedroom in the Lennon-era consisted of a large bedroom, a dressing room, and an en-suite bathroom. If the guesswork about the position of this photo is correct (namely the right hand side of bedroom 2 on this plan), then it's possible that they knocked the wall between bedrooms 1 and 2 down, and filled in the fireplace and right hand entrance, thus making one big room. Many thanks to Chris Sileo for his renderings here of how that might have been. (Also note: The only bit left of that side when Joe Baiardi was there was the dressing room fireplace).

Kenwood: 1913 part 3.

Another section of the original plan, showing the roof (the more eagle-eyed among you may have been able to spot that). Evidently the front attic window was there from the start. Note too the stamp in the bottom right-hand corner - final proof that Kenwood is not a Tarrant house. The precise layout and look of the attic during the Lennon-era is another mystery; in contemporary interviews, John mentioned a room that was randomly painted in different colours - according to when his various pots of paint ran out. In 1966, the Beatles Book monthly reported this: "Anyone who has visited John's home will no doubt be impressed by his music room. It is situated at the top of the house, and its decor is a multi-coloured effort by John. Amplifiers, guitars, organ, piano, juke boxes - you name it he's got it. Everything is littered all over the place". Yet the June '67 music room photos don't show multi-coloured walls. Beatles chauffeur Alf Bicknell also lived with John at Kenwood for a while in 1966, occupying a "flat" in John's house - which must have been the attic rooms, other than the music room. Plans, I fear, are lost to history. UPDATE - as it turns out, that is more bollocks. See later Ken Partridge plan related posts...

Kenwood: 1913 part 1.

On May 1st 1913, architect Theophilus A Allen submitted his plan for "Proposed House For Norman H Johnson Esq At St Georges Hills" to the Walton-on-Thames Urban Council for planning approval....and here, following a couple of months rummaging around various Home Counties archives, is the part depicting the ground floor area. What the plan shows is not only pre-Kenwood, but also pre-Brown House - the name eventually given to this inaugural incarnation.
The first thing you notice is how much smaller it was originally - the whole north-west section, which is what one pictures most readily when Kenwood comes up in everyday conversation (err...), simply didn't exist then: So no sunroom, no left-hand extension, and only one of those distinctive Hansel and Gretel windows. These days it's easy to forget that this is actually the back of the house - not a mistake you'd have made in 1913.
The next thing that is apparent is the way the ground floor has been divided up: On the one hand you have the servants' areas, namely the servants' hall, the kitchen, the pantry, the coal room (every room had a coal burning fireplace in those pre-central heating days), the scullery, the knives and boots room(!) and the fenced off yard. On the other hand there were the three grand rooms for the master of the house - the study, the drawing room and the dining room. And rarely the twain would meet. It's interesting that in the 50 or so years separating Norman H Johnson from John W Lennon, this type of segregation, as reflected in the room layout, had largely disappeared. Although John employed a housekeeper, a gardener and a chauffeur, none of them were live-in: The servants in Mr Johnson's time would have lived in the attic.
I've wasted yet another half hour of my life crudely altering one of Joe Baiardi's back yard pics from 2008 to give a rough idea of how this end of Kenwood might have been back then. Again, judging by the lack of windows on the plan, it would appear the back of the house was strictly functional, and somewhat inelegant - in marked contrast to the eccentric charm of the rest. Whatever, this is fascinating stuff, and I'll be posting the other portions of Mr Allen's work in due course.

Kenwood: the Brown House.

Kenwood is generally regarded as being a Tarrant house (ie one designed and built by master builder W.G. Tarrant). It was certainly sold as such last time it came on the market. However, my "research" (for want of a better word) has just turned up the information that it isn't a Tarrant house at all. In fact, it seems it was designed by Victorian (and Edwardian) architect Theophilus A Allen, and built by the firm of B Love and Sons, of Surrey. Plans were filed with Walton-on-Thames Urban District Council on 1 May 1913; specifically plan No 1215, for ‘Proposed House for Norman H. Johnson Esq at St. George’s Hills’. So Kenwood (or the Brown House as it was originally known) was commissioned by and built for this Mr Johnson. (I am still on the trail of these plans). In that case, where did the Tarrant business come from? Well, there is a connection - namely, the garage. This was built later - plans were filed on 16 June 1919; architects the macabrely monikered Pine-Coffin, Imrie & Angel and, here the connection - builder W.G. Tarrant, Son & Co. So the firm of Tarrant and son built the garage, but had nothing to do with the house proper. Interesting stuff. The list of former owners of Kenwood grows - Norman H. Johnson, manufacturer Kenneth Wood (UPDATE - I've since learned that he never owned Kenwood), an unknown American woman, someone or other called John Winston Lennon (whoever he was), songwriter Bill Martin and an unknown Swedish businessman...(By the way, the illustrations above are another Theophilus A Allen designed house at Woburn Park. There is something quite Kenwood-esque about those chimneys.)