Built / Designed For: John Strutt

House & Family History: John Johnson designed the main part of Terling Place circa 1772-78. The wings were added to the designs of Thomas Hopper, 1818-21. The Saloon is particularly fine; it rises to two stories and has a Parthenon-like frieze by Westmacott, done in 1823; the Library and Drawing Rooms were done in a matching Greek style. Terling Place is most famous today because of John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh, an eminent English physical scientist who made fundamental discoveries in the fields of acoustics and optics that are basic to the theory of wave propagation in fluids. In 1894 he conducted experiments at Terling Place (he constructed a laboratory adjacent to the House; it was there that he had carried out virtually all of his major scientific investigations) that led to the discovery and successful isolation of argon, for which he received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1904.

Comments: Pevsner called the neo-Greek saloon "a perfect room for its date."

Garden & Outbuildings: Terling today remains the center of a large agricultural estate, operated as Lord Rayleigh's Farms Ltd.

Chapel & Church: The church and green lie to the north of the House. The church houses a number of monuments to the Strutt family and has a separate entrance and gate leading to Terling Place.

House Listed: Grade II*

Park Listed: Grade II

Current Seat / Home of: John Gerald Strutt, 6th Baron Rayleigh; Strutt family here since the 18th century.

Past Seat / Home of: Col. John H. Strutt; 19th century; John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh, 19th-early 20th centuries.

Current Ownership Type: Individual / Family Trust

Primary Current Ownership Use: Private Home

House Open to Public: No

Historic Houses Member: No