Exterior view

Among Baillie Scott’s best early country houses is Blackwell at Bowness, Westmorland (now Cumbria). All show his ability to design open plans with highly personalized interiors.

Blackwell was originally built as a rural holiday retreat for Manchester brewery owner Sir Edward Holt (1849-1928), his wife Elizabeth and their five children. The house later became a school, then an office space and is now an internationally significant Arts and Crafts house open to the public.

Mackay Hugh Baillie Scott had already made a name for himself when he completed his work on Blackwell, having published his sketches and ideas in The Studio, a magazine read by everyone interested in art, architecture and interior design. Blackwell offered him the opportunity to put his ideas on the use of space, light and texture into practice on a grand scale. He experimented in ways that might not have been possible had the property been intended as the client’s main home rather than a holiday home away from urban life.