History

Thorndon Hall, completed in 1770, is the impressive backdrop to the 18th hole of Thorndon Park golf course. It was formerly the home of the prominent Petre family, and the vast acreage they owned was originally a deer park. In the 1730's the 8th Lord Petre, a keen botanist, added substantially to the natural beauty of the park when he imported a collection of nearly 200,000 plants from the colonies and also planted about 60,000 trees. These comprised fifty different species including oaks, chestnuts, tulip trees, red Virginian cedars .... all now a feature of the course.

Ravaged by fire in 1878, Thorndon Hall was offered a new lease of life in 1920 when a small group of businessmen saw the substantial grounds as the perfect venue for creating a golf course and for developing a magnificent residential estate similar to those at Wentworth, Sunningdale and St George's Hill. These clubs had chosen the illustrious Harry Colt as their architect and wisely he was chosen to design Thorndon Park golf course.

But with the onset of the Second World War and the subsequent constraints of the Green Belt laws, their plans for an estate never materialised.

The East Wing of Thorndon Hall was leased to the Club in 1921 and, by the late 1940's, the club had also bought the chapel within the hall, which was converted into the mixed lounge.

Over a period of time the Club bought the 240 acres the course occupied and, in 1968, Thorndon Hall. With the building of a new clubhouse in 1974, the Hall was sold the next year to a building company which restored the facade of the Palladian mansion to its former glory and turned the building into luxury apartments with tremendous views over the attractive golf course.