UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

architecture, building, Elizabethan, garden, half-timbered, landscape, people, tree.

There are minor variations in the title, as follows:

'Speke Hall' (1870s, possibly Whistler). 2
'Speke Hall. No. 2' (1909, Howard Mansfield (1849-1938)). 3
'Speke Hall, No. 2' (1910, Edward Guthrie Kennedy (1849-1932)). 4

Whistler's title, 'Speke Hall', is sufficient to distinguish this drypoint from Speke Hall: The Avenue 101, which was called 'Speke Hall, No. 1' by Kennedy.

In the background is a half-timbered house with four gables in front and a gable and two chimneys at the left. Poles project from the apex of three gables. In the foreground is a garden, with a shrubbery at the left and trees at the right. In the foreground at far right is a tree with two long bare branches projecting to the left.

Speke Hall from the gardens, 2009.
Photograph © M. F. MacDonald, Whistler Etchings Project.

Speke Hall is a fine timber-framed house on Speke Manor near Liverpool in north west England. It dates from 1490-1612, and was the home of the Norris, Beauclerk and finally the Watts families. It was leased to Frederick Richards Leyland (1832-1892), between 1867-1878, and he had restoration work carried out on the ground floor. The house passed to the National Trust in 1943. 5

Whistler made three etchings that have 'Speke' in the title, and were done outdoors: this one, Speke Hall: The Avenue 101, and Speke Shore 139.