History

Swerford Park was built in the late 18^th Century for the Duke of Buccleuch as a hunting lodge.

It was later sold to Lt General Sir Robert Bolton. General Bolton was a career army officer, serving with distinction and being awarded a knighthood. He purchased Swerford in 1820, and he commissioned Joseph Gandy to remodel the house into the present style of the house between 1824-1829.

The house also contains several important pieces by the renowned sculptor, W R Colton RA – including the Crown of Love piece.

Joseph Michael Gandy (1771–1843) was an English artist, visionary architect and architectural theorist, most noted for his imaginative paintings depicting Sir John Soane's architectural designs. He worked extensively with Soane both as draughtsman and creative partner from 1798 until 1809 when he (ultimately unsuccessfully) set up his own practice.

Gandy built little in his career, having a reputation as a difficult individual to deal with. However his work included the Phoenix Fire and Pelican Life Insurance Offices (1804–1805, destroyed ca. 1920) in London, Doric House at Sion Hill in Bath (1818), and the remodeling of Swerford Park house in Oxfordshire (1824–1829). Commercially he was a failure and served two terms in a debtors' prison, but his published and exhibited work was largely a critical and popular success. In 1821 he published two articles in the Magazine of Fine Arts on The Philosophy of Architecture. He intended to expand upon this subject in an eight-volume work entitled Art, Philosophy and Science of Architecture, of which his unpublished manuscript survives.

He died in a private asylum in Plympton, then on the outskirts of Plymouth where his family had placed him in 1839. Many of his paintings can be seen in the Pictures Room of Sir John Soane's Museum in London.

William Robert Colton RA (25 December 1867 – 13 November 1921) was a British sculptor. After completing his studies in London and Paris Colton established himself with solid, career-long business relationships, secured admission to exhibitions at the Royal Academy and the Salon in Paris. His works included commissions for busts, statues and war memorials. His clientele included royalty in England and India.