Still wondering about Werrington

THANK you for publishing the introductory paragraph to my letter on Werrington Park (‘A wonder of the West Country’, May 24 and Letters, June 7). I would like to add that the front range is dated by the diary of Lord Sandys. He visited the house in September 1751 (COUNTRY LIFE, November 30, 2000) and noted that the owner, Humphrey Morice (1723–85), was then ‘adding a handsome apartment to the house’.

This presumably rules out William Kent, who died three years previously, as its designer. Likewise, Roger Morris died in 1749, although he could plausibly have designed the church (incidentally, Morris also designed the Twickenham house of the painter Thomas Hudson, whose signed— rather than attributed—portrait of Humphrey Morice (above) hangs on the stairs at Werrington).

Richard Garnier has, instead, attributed the building to Robert Taylor, whose career began shortly after Morris’s death. Taylor’s early buildings share much in common with those of Morris. Werrington Park may, therefore, be an instance of Taylor succeeding to Morris’s practice. Richard Hewlings, Cambridgeshire