The Wildernesse Estate is one of the most exceptional residential locations in the south-east of England. Its substantial, high quality homes sit in a peaceful, rural setting. Yet it is close to London, just outside the M25, with excellent rail and transport links to the capital, airports and the continent. It lies in the north-east corner of Sevenoaks, in easy walking distance of the town, with its restaurants, theatre, cinema, two mainline rail stations, high quality schools, two golf courses and other sporting facilities.
The Estate originated in the 1920s when land around the historic mansion Wildernesse House was sold for development. Houses were built on large individual plots. The covenants which limit building to one house on each original plot are still in force today and ensure the spacious, rural quality of the Estate.
There are now more than 160 detached houses with large gardens on the Estate, together with two sets of mews houses and Wildernesse House itself, which contains luxury apartments for older people. The Estate incorporates several private roads and part of three public roads. It includes parkland and woodland. In total, it occupies some 300 acres.
A significant number of the houses in the Estate were built in Arts and Crafts style, some according to designs by eminent architects of the 1920s and 1930s, such as Baillie Scott. They retain that style today, despite extension, modernisation and improvements over the years.
The Estate straddles two local council areas. Most lies within the boundaries of Sevenoaks Town Council, but the northern part is in Seal Parish. All is covered by Sevenoaks District Council.
The history of Wildernesse House and the Estate can be traced to 1327, when a substantial house, Stidulph’s Place, is recorded in the area. The first Wildernesse House mansion was built in 1680 and a deer park established. In 1815, the Duke of Wellington visited Wildernesse House, then owned by the Marquis of Camden, a former Lord Chief Justice. An avenue of lime trees was planted along the main entrance road to the house. That road is now Wildernesse Avenue and the lime trees, known as the Waterloo Limes and carefully maintained and renewed over the years, still form an impressive route through that part of the Estate.
After the First World War, the then owners of Wildernesse House and its estate sold off the mansion and parts of the estate in various parcels, prior to moving away. The core land around the House became the present Wildernesse Estate. The original developer of the Estate, Percy Harvey, imposed the mutual restrictive covenants which protect it today. Wildernesse House became a country club for the Wildernesse Golf Course, before serving as a hospital in World War Two. It then became a school for blind children owned by Royal London Society for Blind People (RLSB). It has now been redeveloped by new owners as a set of luxury homes for older people.
The ‘e’ on the end of Wildernesse appears to have been added early in the 1800s, probably due to a misspelling which was then perpetuated.
The WRA has published two brochures on the Estate, one showing the original sales brochure from the 1920s and the other a ‘Guide for Residents’ written in 2000, which provides a very good overview of the history and other aspects of the estate, although some of its references to latest circumstances are inevitably outdated. Both brochures are available from the WRA.