Published at 08:54, Wednesday, 11 September 2013
An estate on the shores of Derwentwater which inspired Beatrix Potter to write The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin has been given Grade II listed status.
The Department of Culture, Media and Sport said the listing would preserve the home, Lingholm, at Portinscale, near Keswick.
The home and surrounding area are said to have inspired some of the author’s most famous works, including The Tales of Peter Rabbit, Mrs Tiggywinkle and Benjamin Bunny.
The woodland nearby and its population of red squirrels is also recognised as an influence behind The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin, and Potter was known to be a dedicated conservationist who spent much of her life trying to preserve the area.
The listing means the home is recognised as “being of special architectural or historic interest” and protected against “unauthorised demolition, alteration or extension”.
Ed Vaizey, culture minister, has hailed the decision, saying: “Beatrix Potter’s tales are loved and cherished by people young and old around the world and ‘Lingholm’ as the inspiration for so many of these classic children’s stories deserves to be protected.
Potter spent nine summers at the Victorian mansion which her parents rented as a summer bolthole from London.
The mansion and its surrounding estate, which still supports a healthy population of red squirrels, was last year put on the market for £6.5m after being bought in the early 1900s by Colonel George Kemp, 1st Baron Rochdale.
He was the grandfather of the current owner, St John Durival Kemp, 2nd Viscount Rochdale.
Built in the 1870s, the home was designed by Victorian architect Alfred Waterhouse, the man behind London’s Natural History Museum.
Squirrel Nutkin was first published in 1903 after Potter spent hours walking in the woodland observing and sketching wildlife.
“There are such numbers of squirrels in the woods here,” she wrote in a letter to a former governess in September 1901.
“They are all very busy now gathering nuts which they hide away in little holes where they can find them again in winter.”
Her correspondence was illustrated with sketches of squirrels, one of which she called Nutkin.
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk