Harewood House: Estate set to drain lake in bid to finally end 250-year leak saga
The view from the lake towards Harewood House, with its great expanse of water reflecting the sky and the enormous neoclassical stately pile, is one of Capability Brown’s most famous vistas.
But the famous 18th century landscape architect’s creation has been plagued with problems lurking under its calm waters ever since work began on it in 1775.
And now the search is about to begin for the source of the problem – which could turn out to be damage from a stick or stone as part of a £500,000 project.
After it was built, the dam leaked and had to be reconstructed. Even after repairs were completed in spring 1778, it leaked again.
Edwin Lascelles commissioned the construction of Harewood House and its grounds and in a letter from Steward Samuel Popplewell, who oversaw the work, it’s noted that there was a hole “large enough to bury a horse.”
Tensions between Lascelles and Brown escalated. In correspondence dated 29 February 1778, Lascelles expressed his dissatisfaction: "I have always said and did insist upon it the ground was scandalously lay’d and beggarly sown…several parts slovenly run over and badly finish’d particularly the island."
With Brown unable to meet expectations, he was replaced by surveyor John Hudson in 1780. But Hudson couldn’t solve the problem. The dam leaked again that same year.
To this day Harewood is still grappling with the 32-acre lake’s legacy. Now the issue lies with the Victorian outlet sluice, built in 1898, which has been leaking for several years.
The flow has increased significantly over the past five years, making it difficult to inspect the culvert that runs from the outlet sluice to the Himalayan Garden. If left unchecked, the leak could compromise the integrity of both the culvert and the dam wall.
The Harewood House Trust also faces challenges in managing water levels during extreme weather events, such as the drought affecting Yorkshire.
Head gardener Trevor Nicholson said “during the summer it was getting very low – in 2022 it dried up.
"We wanted to shut the valve off to preserve water for the fish. It was stop and go at one stage”.
They are now working with marine and civil engineering contractors EDS who from next week will start draining down the lake, catch all the fish, which will be taken to ponds on the estate, and install a temporary dam.
Once the source of the leak is identified they’ll decide whether to repair or replace the sluice. The work will be funded by the Lascelles Family Will Trust.
Mr Nicholson said: “If we are going to have hotter, longer, dryer summers, it is something we want to sort out now and get it working right. It is very important to us that we manage the gardens and the estate very much sustainably and with biodiversity at the centre of our programmes. We don’t want the beck to run dry.
"In these 200 years it’s developed its own eco-system. We have otters, kingfishers, herons and bats who live in the old trees and buildings and rely on larvae hatching out in the spring – it’s a whole food chain.”