Surrenden Dering, Pluckley, Kent: unexecuted design for a greenhouse for Sir Edward Dering, Bt, c1762-92 (3)
c1762-92
The Surrenden Dering estate was formed in the Norman period, and inherited by the Dering family in the mid-fifteenth century. The house was built by the first Baronet during the reign of Charles I. A service wing was added during the eighteenth century by an unknown architect, and further alterations and additions were made in c1850 to designs by William Burn (1789-1870). The estate was sold for the first time since its Norman formation in 1920, and became a school. A fire in 1952 destroyed the majority of the house, save the former service wing which had been added during the eighteenth century by the 5th Baronet in a sympathetic seventeenth-century-style.
Sir Edward Dering, 5th Baronet (1732-98), had succeeded his father in 1762. He served as MP (Tory) for New Romney in 1761-70, and 1774-87, having inherited estates in the area through his first wife Selina Furness, the daughter of Sir Robert Furness, 2nd Baronet, of Waldershare, Kent, whom he married in 1755 (she died 1757). He married again in 1765, Deborah Winchester, the daughter of a surgeon.
At an unknown date Sir Edward commissioned Robert Adam to make a design for a greenhouse for the park at Surrenden Dering. This was presumably at around the same time that he added the service wing to the main house. Adam's greenhouse, however, was not executed.
Literature: A.T. Bolton, The architecture of Robert and James Adam, 1922, Volume II, Index pp. 30, 68; J. Ingamells, A dictionary of British and Irish travellers in Italy: 1701-1800, 1997, p. 293; D. King, The complete works of Robert & James Adam and unbuilt Adam, 2001, Volume II, pp. 183, 225; History of Parliament online: 'Dering, Edward (1732-98), of Surrenden Dering, Nr. Ashford, Kent'; British listed buildings online: 'Surrenden House, Pluckley'