MOGGERHANGER

Source unknown - probably 1975

A hill top village dominated by St John Evangelist 1860-61 by Slater, an assured design owing nothing to local tradition. But French though it may be, and unlikely the accompanying vicarage in an east Bedfordshire setting, there is here more guts and fitness of purpose than in the prissy suburbanisation around which is doing so much to reduce the character of the village. Settlement sits loosely around a square which ought to be the village centre, thus preventing the housing from gradually spilling over the edges of the hill as it does at present. Planning policies have not yet assimilated a fact which is obvious to the layman.

Moggerhanger Park originally built for Godfrey Thornton, and later modified after 1805 for Stephen Thornton is lovely, delicate and ultra Soanian in its refinement, it sits uneasily beside its utilitarian sanitorium neighbours, but this use assures its survival and is the price to be paid for the enjoyment of an architecture which has never been understood. Witness the barbarious destruction of Soane s work at the Bank of England of which of course Godfrey Thornton was Governor when Soane was commissioned to work both there and at Moggerhanger.

The Guinea public house offers refreshment in civilised surroundings and is an effective if frankly fancy dress rehabilitation of a formerly undistinguished building.