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Historic house to be bulldozed for luxury flats

This is part of a set of pages about Keep Hatch House.

[Originally published in The Wokingham Times, 4 September 1997. Written by Jerry Bridge-Butler. Reproduced with permission.]

A 120-year-old manor house in Wokingham is to be razed to the ground to make way for a large complex of luxury flats.

Keephatch House in Binfield Road is to be flattened after owners, Taywood Homes, were given planning permission to redevelop it at a meeting of the development control sub-committee at the district council last Wednesday.

The new classically-styled building will contain 28 two-bedroom and seven three-bedroom flats, with an underground car park.

Taywood bought the Victorian house in June after it had been empty for a decade and was in a derelict state after a run of break-ins and vandalism.

Cllr Mary Robertson told the committee: "I am very happy to see such a tasteful development taking place."

Cllr Ray Eke was also pleased with the plan, adding that it is important to lure people out of their large empty houses and into flats like this.

There was [sic] mixed feelings from town councillor James Stott whose ward includes the old house.

He appeared in the Times in March amid concerns that the house was becoming a death trap after a spate of vandalism.

He said it is sad the old building was not looked after, but he was happy to see it redeveloped because it is a bit of an eyesore at the moment.

He said: "It will be sad not to see the old house as it was, but the flats seem a jolly good idea to me."

But Trevor Ottlewski, the chairman of Wokingham Society History Group, said it was a pity to see a piece of history disappear.

He said: "It's a shame because it is another bit of Wokingham's history gone."

He said somebody should have kept their eyes on the old house before it began to deteriorate a few years ago.

He added that preservation should be more of a priority for local authorities which like to perpetrate an image of Wokingham as a historical town.

One of the conditions accompanying planning permission for the Keephatch Estate was that work had to start on Keephatch House before the 90th house in the estate was occupied.

There are currently about 40 occupied houses.

Keephatch House was built in 1871 by a Colonel deVitre on his return from India.

It was occupied until 10 years ago, and has received planning permission to be converted into a hotel and a nursing home since then.