Key Locations

Find out more about the key locations we cover

Four Oaks Park

Sir John Hartopp sold Four Oaks Park Estate in the late 1870’s to a race-horse company when paddocks, stables, offices and a large grandstand were constructed. The racecourse ran around the Bracebridge end of Sutton Park, where the wall was subsequently built. The first race meeting was held in 1881 and The Grand National was run on the course later that year. On race days crowds flocked from Four Oaks Station, walking to the racecourse along Bracebridge Road. In 1890 the estate was bought by the Marquis of Clarikarde and he proceeded to lay out the grounds as a Residential Estate. Later that year the first phase of the demolition of the racecourse took place when the racing stands and the farm buildings were offered for sale. Certain of these properties remain today including Park Cottage on Four Oaks Road.

In June 1898 the Royal Agricultural Show was held with the then Prince of Wales in attendance. Subsequently the land was divided into large building plots, some as large as seven acres. Buyers were predominantly successful Birmingham and Midland industrialists who commissioned their Architects to build and design residences in the grand -style, some with mansion proportions. Four Oaks Hall (illustrated on the front cover) stood on the present site of Carhampton House in Luttrell Road, the Hall having been demolished in 1908.

Several of the houses were built in the ‘Arts and Crafts” style by recognised Architects such as C E Bateman, Sir Edward Lutyens, Bidlake and Crouch & Butler. The importance of the ‘Arts & Crafts” movement and the development of design has recently seen the Four Oaks Park Estate designated as a Conservation Area, with certain of the fine houses being Listed.

The Quantrill family have been selling prime residences on the Four Oaks Park Estate for nearly seventy years, commencing with the original family business of Quantrill Smith & Co. During that time the Quantrill name has been associated with the sale of many fine individual residences.

In1960 a residence set in two acres backing onto Sutton Park was sold for just under £10,000 and a half acre plot in the same year for under £3,000. In 2001 Quantrills achieved over £1 million for a Four Oaks Park Estate property for the first time while today there are several fine residences which achieve in excess of £3million if offered for sale.

Little Aston Park

In 1509, John Bailey paid a half year rental of £5 for the Manor of Aston to William Lycett, Lord of Aston Manor. The Fowke family, who owned many substantial properties in Staffordshire, purchased the Manor for £850 in 1574, subsequently selling it in 1621 to the Norman family Ducie, who lived there until 1720. Robert Ducie, a respected man throughout the country, was knighted and appointed Lord Mayor of London from 1630 - 1631. 

In 1730 Richard Scott of Barr Hall had ‘a fine new house’ constructed and the old mansion, which was a half timbered building, was used as a stable. In 1765 the Hall was restyled by Humphry Minchin who had taken a 99 year lease on the property, with the grounds strategically planted to create a fine Georgian Landscape. William Tennant then purchased the Freehold of the Estate in 1820 and employed the services of James Wyatt, a famous Architect and a Landscapist named Eames to create “a little paradise amidst the surrounding desert” (the front cover illustration shows the Hall as it was in 1801). The Estate was sold in July 1828 to William Leigh of whom little is known and in 1844 the Honourable Edward Swynfen Parker Jervis had the Hall purchased for him by his father, the Second Viscount St. Vincent. During the period 1857-1859 the Hall was updated giving it a style of Finistral Italianate Palazzo and in 1872 a lease was granted to a society for the “Treatment and Cure of Inebriety”.

In 1907 Little Aston Hall was purchased along with its 1500 acres of Estate by an eminent Birmingham solicitor, Joseph Bennett Clarke. Clarke retained the immediate 100 acres of deer park and gardens around the Hall for his own personal use, along with Barns Farm. The rest of the Estate was sold a few months later, including four hundred acres on which Little Aston Golf Course was developed.

Clarke conceived the plans to give over large areas of the Estate grounds for residential development and in order to ensure that only high quality residences were built, restricted covenants were enforced. Cautious development proceeded until 1925 and only 16 houses were built, including Claverdon and Stonehouse, each with approximately seven acres. In the same year, Little Aston Park Estate was sold again and further plots of land were made available for individual residences.

The Hall was purchased at auction in 1924 by Harry Scribbans, a local cake maker.  The  Scribbans’ famous slab cake was supplied in huge quantities to the forces’ canteens in the First World War. Harry Scribbans died in 1935 and was described as one of Birmingham’s richest but lavishly generous men.  His widow, having re-married, moved out of the Hall in 1949. Unfortunately, the Hall did not sell for four years and fell into disrepair until Esso Petroleum Ltd acquired the premises for its Midland Division Headquarters, operating from there until 1968 when GKN took up residence.

The Hall was brought back to its original style and glory, having been sympathetically restored and converted by K.B. Jackson into seven luxurious apartments approximately thirty years ago. These are some of the very finest apartments in the Midlands with their unrivalled and original Georgian Parkland setting.

In the latter part of the twentieth century, further building took place on the Estate, including Squirrel Walk, Stonehouse Drive, Rosemary Drive and Roman Lane. Michael Quantrill recalls that a half acre building plot was sold by Quantrills for £10,000 in the late seventies and a similar plot has recently been sold for around £750,000.  Quantrills have achieved some outstanding sales in Little Aston Park recently and there will always be considerable demand for quality residences in this area.

Moor Hall Drive

Bishop Vesey, created Bishop of Exeter in 1519, rebuilt Moor Hall in 1527. The Bishop was born in a farmhouse on the estate where the Hail was to be built and which still stands today. It is reputed that the Bishop ultimately had 140 servants and a regular guest at the Hall was Henry VIII, who visited the area for hunting days in Sutton Park. The regular visits of Henry VIII had influence in Sutton Coldfield being granted The Royal Charter in 1528.

Princess Mary, prior to becoming Queen Mary, was tutored by the Bishop and stayed at the Hall over a number of years. Bishop Vesey died in 1555 and the Estate passed to his nephew John Harman, who had the Hall rebuilt. John Hackett, the great nephew of Harman later inherited the Hall and carried out rebuilding once again, with the Hackett family residing at Moor Hall until 1863.

It is believed the Hall was bought by Sampson Lloyd, who then sold it to a Midlands businessman, A. R. Dear who was known as the ‘Carpet King’ due to his financial successes in carpet manufacturing.

The Hall was then purchased by Colonel Ansell of the famous Ansell brewing family, who completely rebuilt the Hall in 1905 to its present structure. Also, around this time, the grounds were laid out as a Golf Course along with a Club House.

The Hall was auctioned in 1930 and purchased by W. Streather of the renowned Four Oaks Building Company, who converted the building into a Hotel where ‘retired’ gentlemen spent most of the day buried in ‘The Times’.

In June 1961, Mr Hildick of Whittalls Wines and Mr Michael Webb took over the property and transformed the building into a residential club. In 1965 Mr. Webb wished to extend the Hotel and Whittalls Wines wanted to expand their off licence business. This resulted in Mr. Webb buying out the Whittalls’ share and Moor Hall has since been run as a quality four star hotel with extensions for conference and leisure facilities.

Streathers Ltd. built the majority of the houses in Moor Hall Drive and Little Sutton Lane from around 1930 until about 1960 when the building firm ceased trading. The individual houses and bungalows are greatly sought after and many have been sold by Quantrills (who were originally Quantrill Smith & Co., established in 1934) over the years.

In the early eighties a building plot sold for £7,000 with views of the golf course, today some of the larger properties sell for figures well in excess of £1million.