Horsley Towers

A 19th Century country house enlarged by Lord Lovelace in the 1860’s and displaying Italian-style towers which give the house its name.

There was an earlier Georgian house at this location which was demolished in 1820 after it was acquired by wealthy banker Williiam Currie who began work on a new country house designed by Charles Barry in the ‘Tudor revival’ style. Barry would later go on to design the Houses of Parliament. 

When Currie died in 1829, the estate (then called East Horsley Park) was acquired by William King, a resident of nearby Ockham. King was elevated to the peerage in 1839, becoming Lord Lovelace. He set about making substantial changes to the newly acquired house, including adding a third level to the main building in 1849. Following a European tour, he added two flanking towers in an Italian style, which immediately gave the building the name it still bears today. Lord Lovelace also encircled the building with a complex of walls, tunnels, arches, bastions and a decorative cloister drawing upon construction materials of local flint and brick from his own brickworks at Ockham. 

Lord Lovelace was married to Victorian mathematician, Ada Lovelace, the only legitimate offspring of Lord Byron. Her large inheritance played an important part in enabling Lord Lovelace to fund his construction work at Horsely Towers and across the surrounding village of East Horsley. When Lord Lovelace died in 1893, he was buried in his own mausoleum in nearby St Martin’s Church, designed in his familiar flint and brick style. 

Horsley Towers is a Grade II* listed building and there are four separate Grade II listings for decorative flint walls, cottages and pavilions around the estate, as well as a Grade II listing for the Lovelace mausoleum in the nearby graveyard. Horsley Towers is now part of the De Vere Horsley Estate and used for weddings and other functions.