Major overhaul of horse racing yard will be a boost for the sport, architect says

THE ARCHITECT behind a major overhaul of the last northern racing yard to win the Derby says the “considerable investment” will realise a huge boost for the sport in the region.

Bedale-based architect Malcolm Tempest was speaking after the initiative at the 289-acre Manor

House Stud, in Middleham, put forward by racehorse owner and stockbroker’s firm boss John Dance and his wife Jess, was enthusiastically approved by Richmondshire District Council’s planning committee.

The large-scale scheme, which will see the farmhouse, agricultural buildings and stables demolished and replaced with buildings for racehorse training, hospitality and ho using for some of the yard’s 35 new employees. It has received consent less than a year after it was announced Sir Michael Stoute’s assistant James Horton would become the yard’s private trainer. While the scheme has progressed at pace, the yard has a long history with the sport, with Lenore ‘Lennie’ Peacock, who died in 2019 aged 97, having bred and raised the last northern-trained Derby winner, Dante, there. Dante won the race in 1945.

Modern facilities at the yard include an extensive indoor riding school, stables for more than 70 horses and a new gallops away from ones used by other yards in the town.

Councillors praised the efforts of the developers for producing high-quality Yorkshire Dalesstyle

buildings and plans to sensitively landscape the farm, which features William’s Hill, an 11th century motte and bailey castle, on the holding.

Councillors were told the scheme had been designed to avoid harming the setting of the scheduled monument, which is the predecessor to Middleham Castle, the childhood home of Richard III.

Lower Wensleydale councillor Richard Ormston said that when the building works were complete the yard could look at increasing the amount of accommodation for staff.