Old Palace Croydon: great chamber and undercroft range

Summary

Great chamber for the archiepiscopal palace built above an undercroft retaining some fabric from the 12th century, but principally dating to the 14th century. The earliest phase dates to the second quarter of the fourteenth century under Archbishop Stratford, before it was remodelled and completed in around 1400 under Archbishop Arundel. Substantial work was carried out under Archbishop Juxon from the 1660s with fenestration altered and high-level rebuilding in brick. Restoration work principally dates to the early 1900s.

Reasons for Designation

The great chamber and undercroft range of the Old Palace at Croydon is listed at Grade I for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as an important example of a medieval great chamber and undercroft with an elaborate roof structure, along with joinery, framing and decorative work from successive campaigns of building of clear distinction;
* as a major element of the architectural evolution of the Old Palace, demonstrating through its distinct phases of development the enlargement and aggrandisement of the complex from the C14.

Historic interest:

* as a key part of an important and extensive archiepiscopal manor with standing elements dating back to the C12. The Old Palace is the best-surviving example of a medieval palace of the Archbishops of Canterbury, built on the route between Lambeth and Canterbury to serve as a residence suitable for the Archbishop’s retinue and frequent royal visitations;
* for its strong association with successive Archbishops of Canterbury, to whom distinct campaigns of building work are attributed.

Group value:

* with the other seven Grade I-listed buildings forming the Old Palace complex and the adjacent Grade I-listed Croydon Minster (Church of St John the Baptist).

History

The Old Palace at Croydon formed one of a chain of great houses to be occupied by archbishops and their retinues when travelling between Canterbury and Lambeth. The archiepiscopal manors were established to allow the journey to be divided into easy stages of around 20 miles, with the route proceeding via Charing, Maidstone, Otford, and (after 1450) Knole. The Old Palace at Croydon was the final staging post on this route towards London and it became one of the largest and most important sites of the archiepiscopal estate. The palace site is likely to date back to the 8th century or early 9th century, with a ‘monasterium’ recorded from 809, at which time a Royal Council was assembled at Croydon. By 880, the site certainly constituted part of the endowment of the Archbishop of Canterbury, becoming an important part of the estate in the late-Saxon period. The palace came to be favoured by archbishops as a summer residence from the C13, by which time it had an early hall, private chambers, kitchens and surrounding grounds. With the adjacent church and village, the area became known as Old Croydon, distinct from New Croydon, which developed to the east as a commercial centre along a main route to London, receiving a market charter in 1276.

The Old Palace at Croydon is an extraordinarily complex site of multiple phases; indeed, almost every generation since the C12 has adapted the palace buildings to some degree to meet their evolving demands. A series of timber buildings centred on a hall built from the 9th century onwards appear to have preceded the stone and brick structures. The evidence indicates that rebuilding in masonry began with the private chambers during the C12, towards the western edge of the palace site, with subsequent development suggesting that that the principal early buildings - the private chamber, hall and kitchens - were strung together from west to east. The later C14 saw a surge in building at the archbishops’ estates, recorded in some cases as repairing damage following social and political unrest across the country culminating in the Peasant’s Revolt of 1381, when Archbishop Sudbury was seized and beheaded in London and the archepiscopal property was attacked. There is no specific record of an attack on the Old Palace at Croydon, though the heightened building activity from this time may have been spurred by these events.

The main standing elements of the Old Palace were built from the mid-C14 to the late C15, by which time the manor was highly regarded, acquiring high-status accommodation suitable for royal visitations. The scheme appears to have begun with an early iteration of the great chamber above its undercroft in the second quarter of the C14 for Archbishop Stratford (1333-1348), and with the hall, probably begun under Archbishop Courtenay (1381-1396) and completed by Archbishop Stafford (1443-1452), whose throne partially survives. The later C14 and early C15 saw a major phase of building by Archbishop Arundel (1396-1397 and then 1399-1414), who completed the great chamber in its present form, probably extending accommodation to the south-west, possibly the site of an earlier private chapel or oratory. The lower section of what was likely at that date to be a chapel (since the existing chapel was built above it) also dates from the later C14. The upper part was then rebuilt in the mid-C15 following its partial collapse. In around 1500, Archbishop Morton (1486-1500) extended the chapel and private chambers westwards, with a west range built to link them. The east range closing the south court appears to have been built at around the same time.

Despite the closure of many religious houses under Henry VIII, the Old Palace at Croydon was retained while other archiepiscopal estates were sold or reduced, and perhaps in response to this loss Archbishop Cranmer added a long gallery, built in 1538-1539, to complete the plan that fundamentally exists today, with enclosed north and south courts. The manor was first described as a ‘palatium’, or palace, by John Whitgift (1583-1604) in the later C16, although after the Reformation its popularity waned. Henry VIII reputedly refused to stay at Croydon claiming it to be bad for his health on account of its low-lying position and waterlogged condition at this stage. Both church and palace were built on an island site and until the early C19 the palace site was surrounded by water, with fishponds, ornamental ponds and waterways.

In the C17, Archbishop Laud (1633-1645) committed to remodelling the archiepiscopal chapels in line with his religious tenets, and at the Old Palace the raised pew, stalls and altar rails are attributed to him. During the Commonwealth (1649-1660), Parliament seized the site and sold it to Sir William Brereton. However, the Old Palace was reinstated as archiepiscopal property in 1660, perhaps a reflection of its importance, and remained so until the later C18. On the restoration of the monarchy, Archbishop Juxon (1660-1663) set about restoring the buildings, particularly the chapel which was significantly reconfigured during this time and likely continued by his immediate successor, Archbishop Sheldon (1663-1677).

Although some improvements were made by Archbishop Wake (1715-1737), who spent frequent summers at the Palace, and by Archbishop Herring (1747-1757), who spent £6000 on the buildings and gardens, by the later C18 the Old Palace was less popular as a residence and had fallen into a poor state of repair. In 1780 it was sold to Abraham Pitches and then subsequently to Sam Starey, becoming a calico printing and bleaching factory. The site was industrialised, land was sold, buildings were adapted, subdivided and used for multiple purposes, including as lodgings. The wider complex of the palace was significantly truncated and all of the northern ancillary buildings of the outer court were lost during this period. The northern stables and the gatehouse were largely demolished in 1806, followed by the western lodgings in 1808 as part of the expansion of the churchyard (marked by the present brick boundary wall from this date). The service range which had been connected to the hall was pulled down in 1810, which ultimately contributed to the collapse of the east wall of the Great Hall in 1830. The final remaining vestige of the outer court was the eastern range of lodgings running along what is now Old Palace Road, which remained in use for most of this period but was finally demolished in 1880.

In order to save the Old Palace from demolition in 1887, the site was bought by the Duke of Newcastle, a follower of the Oxford Movement, who gave it to the Anglican Sisters of Mercy to secure its future for religious purposes. The Sisters established a small school in 1889 that was recognised as a higher-grade elementary school in 1892 and in 1904 as a secondary school. From the outset, the Sisters embarked on a programme to restore the neglected buildings, employing the architect Sir Banister Fletcher in 1905 to work on the chapel restoration. After the Second World War it became a Direct Grant Grammar School and new school buildings were added in phases to the south-west of the site. In 1974 it became an independent school, passing in 1994 to the Whitgift Foundation. In September 2023, the Whitgift Foundation announced the decision to close the school permanently by August 2025.

HISTORY OF THE GREAT CHAMBER AND UNDERCROFT
It is probable that a private chamber connected to a hall existed at Croydon by the middle of the C12. The walling to parts of the undercroft retains visible reset stone fragments from this period along with recycled joists in the floor over the main body of the undercroft, from a tree felled 1134-1174. Because these recycled elements are not evident in the fabric of later phases, they potentially derive from the predecessor of this range, which would have been demolished to make way for it in the second quarter of the C14. The one upstanding length of wall of later-C12 origin is found in the south-east corner of the western range, immediately to the west of the present guard chamber undercroft. This wall section appears to represent the undercroft of an inner chamber, built as an addition to the earliest principal chamber, the predecessor of the present structure. A survey of 1909 recorded here a Romanesque, monolithic, round-headed window (Hobson, 1909, p226), which is consistent with its probable origin as an undercroft beneath a chamber. This wall fragment survived the demolition of the rest of the inner chamber when the western block was built in the 1490s because by this stage the range to the south (west range of the southern court) clasped it. This is the earliest standing structural element at the Old Palace.

The C12 inner chamber was retained when the principal chamber was rebuilt on a larger scale in around 1331-1355 (from dendrochronological dating of the principal floor framing). This was the first major phase of later-medieval rebuilding at the Old Palace, very probably under Archbishop John de Stratford (1333-1348), sometime Lord Chancellor of England. The entrance to the rebuilt undercroft appears to have been from the north elevation at its east end (the skewed spine wall of the later east range of the north court aligning with this now blocked doorway). Surviving splayed reveals (later widened externally) demonstrate there were three narrow windows on the north side, probably with two to the south wall. Little is known of the original appearance of the chamber at its principal first-floor level because of the extent of later-C17 rebuilding, though it is likely that it was entered from the east and formed part of a linear arrangement with the hall and apartments. The fireplace to the north wall is off-set to the west, implying there was an original doorway in the north side wall to the east end, aligned with the undercroft doorway. The lateral fireplace also indicates that it was not a first-floor hall, but rather an audience chamber of the suite of archbishop's apartments beyond the hall.

The roof of the principal chamber of the private apartments was rebuilt at its present, higher level, providing the archbishops with an impressive audience chamber. This was constructed under Archbishop Arundel (1397-1414), as indicated by the heraldry to the roof corbels. Subsequent additions of around 1450 under Archbishop Bourchier (1454-1486) include the addition of an oriel window to the south elevation to take advantage of the gardens this chamber would have overlooked prior to the building of the southern range. The term ‘guard chamber’ became attached to the great chamber in relation to royal visits under Henry VII, when the convention was that the visiting monarch took the best apartment, entry to which was controlled by guards. This seems to have followed the naming of a similar room at Lambeth Palace and implies that work carried out to aggrandise the chamber was spurred by royal visitations at Croydon. The western extension under Archbishop Morton of the 1490s, which required the demolition of the later-C12 inner chamber, demonstrates the increasing demand for private apartments at the Old Palace by the end of the C15.

Further major investment followed the recovery of the palace in 1660 after seizure during the Commonwealth. Restoration under Archbishop Juxon (1660-1663) was probably continued by his successor, Archbishop Sheldon (1663-1677). This involved extensive reconstruction in brick of the upper portions of the walls and the installation of oak casement windows. Two large windows in the principal chamber appear to broadly occupy the position of their medieval predecessors, and a new widened doorway was cut through a medieval one at the east end of the north wall, indicating that this remained an important route to the chapel along with the western range. Internally, the chamber was extensively refitted with bolection-moulded panelling, in common with the adjacent eastern staircase and several other first-floor rooms of the south court. The walls were lined with panelling up to the heads of the windows, above which they were plastered. The 1880 survey shows that more of this panelling had survived; the line marking its former extent remains visible. The chief elements now remaining are the fireplace and its overmantel, and the doorcase to the north-east. The ‘minstrel's gallery’, as it has been misleadingly termed, was never a feature of the historic chamber and was formed by the opening created in the C17 west wall as part of a C19 alteration (during its industrial use), to which the rough scarring to the sides attest. The rail at the upper level is C17 in style but is a later-C20 insertion.

Work to restore the guard chamber after 1887 as part of the school focused principally on the southern oriel window, which was largely rebuilt in 1910. The undercroft was converted in 1947 to serve as the dining hall. Some bomb damage was sustained during the Second World War, requiring the replacement of glazing with later C20 armorial glass, featuring the arms of former archbishops. The first-floor chamber became the school library, with a spiral staircase added to the west end to connect with the second-floor gallery of the western range late in the C20.

Details

Great chamber for the archiepiscopal palace built above an undercroft retaining some fabric from the C12, but principally dating to the C14. The earliest phase dates to the second quarter of the C14 under Archbishop Stratford, before it was remodelled and completed in around 1400 under Arundel. Substantial work was carried out under Juxon from the 1660s with fenestration altered and high-level rebuilding in brick. Restoration work principally dates to the early 1900s.

MATERIALS: principally flint rubble and brick with stone dressings and quoins, partially rendered.

PLAN: the range consists of a three-bay chamber aligned with the great hall, set above an undercroft. The great chamber or ‘guard room’ is reached from ground-floor level stairs to the east and to the west it adjoins Morton’s apartments of the 1490s. It forms the central spine between the north and south courts, linked to the chapel through the west range and at undercroft level to the eastern range of the north court.

EXTERIOR: the north elevation is of flint rubble with later brick patching and inserted and blocked openings to the undercroft level and rendered above. The height of the range in its earliest form when built 1331-1355 can be determined from the brick line roughly half the height of the chamber window, which would have coincided with second-floor level in the block built under Morton to the west, suggesting that the predecessor inner chamber was of similar height to the new chamber. A distinct full-height break in the fabric between the guard chamber range and the later apartments of the 1490s is marked by stone quoins at the west end. The principal feature is a large twelve-light casement window inserted after 1660, with chamfered mullions and transoms and leaded lights, set on a chamfered brick cill. The western bay has a narrow external stack in stock brick and, at the level of the first-floor fireplace, a shallow pentice with a pantiled roof. There is an inserted doorway and a window opening to the undercroft. There is an internal stack at the angle of the chamber and west range, with a square brick base and tall red brick shaft with tall pots.

Forming the north range of the south court, the south elevation is dominated by the south-facing oriel window to the great chamber, which originally overlooked the gardens. This elevation is principally in red, brown and buff brick in English bond, with some flint, and with a buttress with stone dressings. The oriel window at first-floor level is in stone, heavily restored in 1910, above a canted flint, brick and stone base and with flint rubble and stone above. In two tiers of four lights, it has moulded stone mullions and transoms with moulded spandrels to each light. At ground-floor level a pair of openings into the undercroft have chamfered brick reveals and pointed arched brick heads. At first-floor level to the east is a tall, timber mullion and transom window with rectangular leaded lights beneath a segmental brick arch, also lighting the great chamber.

INTERIOR: the undercroft is formed of two mid-C14 chambers with walls in ashlar and stone rubble, mostly exposed. The intervening wall incorporates reused fragments of worked stone in a chevron pattern typical of the C12. The chambers are linked by a pointed arched stone doorway with a chamfered doorcase and this opening is marked by a massive spine beam in the eastern room, roughly square in section, supported on bulky arch-braced Samson posts on later masonry piers. The diagonal alignment of the spine beam appears to be positioned to accommodate the large northern hearth (which survived complete though until at least 1880). The main beam is partially chamfered with simple stepped stops, creating an arched profile above the central post which has stepped chamfers at the angles. This is of higher quality than the remainder of the props, except for that against the hearth to the north wall, which is contemporary with it. Some braces are also chamfered indicating they are contemporary. The rough-hewn wall posts which are set forward from the outer stone walls are later additions; the associated wall plates and transverse ceiling joists, some with chamfers, are all exposed. Early exposed ceiling joists have been reused in the structure, one giving a felling date of 1134-1174, which may indicate the approximate date of the predecessor structure. This western bay has a reused spine beam which, like the outer props for the joist ends in the adjacent room, belongs to a secondary phase. The end wall in the west bay is thinner than the other perimeter walls because this was originally built as an internal wall connecting to the earlier inner chamber, which survived until the work of the 1490s.

The great chamber is entered from the eastern end by the open-well stair (part of the eastern range of the south court). The chamber is of three bays defined by a four-centre arched roof, the principals supported on large, carved stone corbels in the form of angels, four bearing shields depicting the arms of Archbishop Arundel. The timber roof is constructed with closely-spaced square oak rafters, which are tied with collars, under which are struts forming four-centre arches. There were no purlins in this roof; consistent with its probable construction in around 1400. All of the roof joinery is of the same massive construction and is carefully jointed and pegged. The roof was probably originally open, but lathe and plaster vault has been applied to the soffits of the arches, with roll moulded oak braces exposed. The internal walls of the guard chamber are principally of brick, now painted, with a moulded timber wall plate to the longitudinal walls. The embrasure of the oriel window, beneath a shallow rear arch, has stone quoins and hollow chamfered stone arched lights with moulded spandrels, mullions and transoms. The armorial glass is a later C20 replacement for the bomb-damaged windows. The glazing panels feature the arms of former archbishops. The adjacent window has timber ovolo moulded mullions and transoms, with a small central opening light, and is set in a reveal with plain panelled linings.

Central to the north wall is a pedimented timber chimneypiece with a damaged bolection moulded fire surround, and above, an overmantel containing a raised and fielded panel, beneath an open segmental pediment with a pronounced oversailing cornice. Adjacent to this is a further, timber, ovolo moulded mullion and transom window in a painted brick reveal, with a plain panelled lining below the window. At the north-east corner of the room is a raised panel in a rectangular architrave, added after 1887 by the school.

Sources

Books and journals
Cherry, B, Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: London 2: South (1983), pp212-214
Bagshawe, B, Some notes on the Old Palace of the Archbishops at Croydon in The Reliquary, ,Vol. 15, (1909), 226-239
Some Account of the Town, Church and Archiepiscopal Palace of Croydon in Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, ,Vol. XII, (1783), pp30-67, Appendix 1 (Extracts from the Archiepiscopal Registers at Lambeth), pp1-26
Pugin, A, Examples of Gothic Architecture Volume 1 (1838), pp26-30, Plates 38-42

Websites
'Croydon: Introduction and Croydon Palace', in Malden, HE (ed), A History of the County of Surrey: Volume 4 (1912), accessed 24 March 2025 from https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/surrey/vol4/pp205-217

Other
Lea, R, Observations at the Archbishop’s Palace, Croydon, 1987 to 1996 (English Heritage, 2004)
Drury McPherson Partnership, Croydon Archiepiscopal Palace, The Evolution of the Buildings (July 2020)
Drury McPherson Partnership, Old Palace Croydon, The Chapel, Heritage Impact Assessment (February 2020)
Hilton, K, The Old Palace School, Centenary History 1889-1989 (1989)
The Heritage Advisory, Old Palace School, Croydon, Conservation Management Plan (January 2016)
Arnold, A, Howard R, The Archiepiscopal Palace (The ‘Old Palace’) John Whitgift School, Croydon, London, Tree-Ring Analysis of Timbers (February 2020)
Drawings of The Archepiscopal Palace, Croydon c1880 (Society of Antiquaries, B.P. Surrey, no. 53)
Oswald, A, 'The Old Palace, Croydon, Surrey: A Former Residence of the Archbishops of Canterbury', Country Life, (April 1965), pp806-810, 876-880

End of official list entry