Marble Hill House.

Marble Hill House is at Richmond Road, Twickenham, London, TW1 2NL.

It was built in the 1720s for Henrietta Howard, who overcame a difficult childhood and disastrous first marriage to become a remarkable figure in Georgian court society.

The villa is an important and relatively rare example of a house built for and by a woman in Georgian England.

It’s a textbook example of Palladian architecture, the fashionable style based on classical principles and inspired by the 16th-century Italian architect Palladio.

Henrietta and her home became a magnet for London’s cultural and political élite – including her neighbours Alexander Pope, John Gay and Horace Walpole – on a scale said to rival the royal court.

The gardens were designed with advice from Alexander Pope and Charles Bridgeman, later royal gardener to George II.

The house and estate were saved from development by an Act of Parliament in 1902 because they lay at the heart of the famous view from Richmond Hill. Marble Hill has been a public park ever since.

The house now has a fine collection of early Georgian paintings, including portraits of members of Henrietta Howard’s circle.