Messenger Building

What is now known as the Messenger Building is a large glasshouse with stores and bell tower, seen as you enter the Walled Garden. It replaced an earlier glass house known from maps dated 1839, reusing the original foundations and being adapted to fit.

Messenger & Co were the go-to firm for glass houses, verandas, summer houses, cucumber frames and melon pits, and built the Messenger Building in 1930. Messenger & Co featured innovative ‘beaver-tailed’ glazing bars, which encouraged the flow or rainwater to drain away from the wooden bars and help prevent the wood rotting over time.

The building has recently undergone a sensitive restoration, with support from the Historic Houses Foundation and the Cultural Heritage Recovery Fund through Historic England, and is now back to its former glory. Look out for the replica bell – complete with a Holkham ostrich – which was recast specially at John Taylor & Co Bell Foundry.

Find out more about the Walled Garden.