Join us on the journey.
Set in the historic park and gardens surrounding Aldenham House, Home Farm was once the showpiece ‘model farm’ of the Aldenham Estate.
We will transform our old farm buildings into a business hub that meets the demands of businesses in a post-Covid landscape, using 400 years of our ancestors’ hard work to inform our design and help us leave a lasting legacy.
Join us on our journey by opting to learn more about our plans for the future and read the latest press articles about the development.
Thank you,
Jessica Allen-Back & Humphrey Gibbs | Estate Directors | The Aldenham Estate
Honouring the past to evolve the future.
The Aldenham Estate has been managed by the Gibbs family and their ancestors for 400 years. Henry Hucks Gibbs, together with his son Vicary, created the notable park and gardens surrounding Aldenham House (now Haberdashers Aske’s School) at the turn of the 19th Century.
The estate became renowned for its botanical and rare tree collections, and for its water gardens with a sequence of small lakes and characterful bridges. Home Farm forms part of this Grade II registered park.
The Home Farm at Aldenham was largely built between 1880 to 1885 as part of Hucks’ plans for the park, gardens and wider estate. Conceived as a ‘model farm’, the only original buildings remaining mostly intact are the decorative farmhouse and attached dairy, now Grade II listed, which were designed by William Butterfield, a revered gothic revival architect. While the house and dairy were the focus of Home Farm, they sit outside the application boundary of this scheme. The associated historic brick outbuildings have been much altered over the last century, but for the purposes of this scheme they are treated as Grade II listed by virtue of their being within the curtilage of the original farmhouse, and the emphasis of the scheme is therefore to improve the overall setting of these historic buildings.
As with many farms in this area, Home Farm suffered in the post-war years from moves towards intensive farming, and many of the historic buildings were replaced by more practical structures. Despite this, the farm was unable to keep pace with modern machinery and food production requirements, and agricultural buildings have moved into industrial use over the decades. These buildings are now largely obsolete and their dilapidated appearance detracts from the setting of the listed farmhouse, the historic park and the glamping site also adjacent to this complex. The historic outbuildings themselves are much altered and in great need of investment and restoration.
Jessica Allen-Back (nee Gibbs) returned to the farm in 2014 to help run the farm with her father. Like her family, Jess has a strong affinity for the great outdoors, which was intensified by her career in the City of London. Together with her brother Humphrey, Jess now manages the Aldenham Estate Office, as well as a successful leisure business, Home Farm Glamping, and the nearby London Elstree Aerodrome.
The family is now working to increase economic opportunity on its sites, regenerate intensively farmed land, make the estate more accessible and safe for visitors, and build a strong platform for future generations. Please do get in touch to learn more.
