Period of ROBERT ADAM (1728-1792)

72.00inch wide   55.00inch high   4.00inch deep (182.88 cm wide  139.70 cm high  10.16 cm deep)

In 1771 Sir George Amyand, Bart, a successful London banker of Huguenot descent, married the sole heiress, Catherine Cornewall. Amyand was conspicuously wealthy. His grandfather had been a notable surgeon and a member of the Royal Society; his father George Amyand, the first Baronet, acquired a fortune as an army contractor during the Seven Years War. This he used to develop extensive interests in the West Indies and North America, estates worth up to £600,000 per year. He also became a director of the East India Company.

Under the terms of her father's will, Catherine's marriage meant that Amyand took the name and arms of the Cornewall line. Amyand was indeed a great agricultural improver. (He was also a prolific correspondent and documenter: the Cornewall papers are the largest single archive in the Hereford Records Office.) Initially the newlyweds were living in a much earlier house sited near the church at Moccas, but in 1775 the young couple began work on a grander building that we now know as Moccas Court. This was in the height of fashion, employing the services of the most sought-after designers and architects. The plans for the new house were originally commissioned from the brothers Adam; these were subsequently replaced by a design by the Gloucestershire-based architect Anthony Keck, incorporating much of the Adam style. In particular, the ornate classical decoration in the main rooms remains faithful to Adam's designs.

Work began in 1776 and was complete by 1783. Meanwhile the Cornewalls also looked to improve their immediate surroundings.Landscape designers such as Lancelot "Capability" Brown were in great demand, and in 1778 he was commissioned to produce a design for Moccas Court. His plans incorporated the deer park and the immediate grounds, and is full of characteristic touches – long, sweeping views, studded with mighty oaks and interrupted only by the stream that meanders through the grounds on its way to the Wye.

A fine and rare Adam Period carved and decorated Overmantle Mirror in the Neo-classical taste, the broken arch pediment with a central tablet, dentil and palm leaf details, the frieze with ribbon tied bell flower swags flanked by oval paterae, the rectangular mirror plate with re-entrant corners within moulded borders flanked by flat pilasters containing trailing husks and berries raised on plinths with bellflower rings.