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 In 1883, it was sold to the Victorian ship owner and merchant George Holt who founded the Lamport and Holt Shipping Line. The house was his residence until his death in 1896 during which time he formed a magnificent collection of contemporary art and sculpture. He decorated and furnished the ground floor rooms and hung his collection of paintings here. The Sudley House Art Gallery is now part of the National Museums of Liverpool with permanent displays in period rooms with many fine examples of 18^th and 19^th century Pre-Raphaelite paintings. Indeed, Sudley House now accommodates Britain’s only remaining complete art collection of a Victorian merchant and entrepreneur. The artists include John Everett Millais, Landseer, George Romney, Reynolds, Frith, William Holman-Hunt, Edward Burne-Jones, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and JMW Turner.

A family estate of 30 acres, 12 (ha) and suburban stately home built in 1821 and owned by Nicholas Robinson a Corn Merchant, one of the rising merchant classes of Liverpool in the late 18^th century. Rich Liverpool merchants favoured two extremes of architecture; the flamboyant and the austere classical style. Sudley House is built in the latter style with window openings devoid of decoration, mere holes punched in the plain ashlar walling.

 In 1883, it was sold to the Victorian ship owner and merchant George Holt who founded the Lamport and Holt Shipping Line. The house was his residence until his death in 1896 during which time he formed a magnificent collection of contemporary art and sculpture. He decorated and furnished the ground floor rooms and hung his collection of paintings here. The Sudley House Art Gallery is now part of the National Museums of Liverpool with permanent displays in period rooms with many fine examples of 18^th and 19^th century Pre-Raphaelite paintings. Indeed, Sudley House now accommodates Britain’s only remaining complete art collection of a Victorian merchant and entrepreneur. The artists include John Everett Millais, Landseer, George Romney, Reynolds, Frith, William Holman-Hunt, Edward Burne-Jones, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and JMW Turner.

After George Holt died, his daughter Emma continued to live here. She never married and died in 1944. She bequeathed the house, the painting and the grounds to the people of Liverpool. It is now managed by National Museums Liverpool.

The Sudley Estate is largely cultivated amenity grassland and pasture fringed by lowland mixed woodland; broad-leaved, deciduous and young plantation. There is also dense or continuous scrub. In 2007 the Mossley Hill Residents Association donated eight oak trees to celebrate the 800^th anniversary of King John granting a charter to the City of Liverpool. The oaks were planted in Sudley Park in support of and as part of, the work of Friends of Sudley Estate.

Table of comparison of Quercus robur and Q. petraea

Working in partnership with The Friends of Sudley House Estate at Sudley House Museum Liverpool 410 trees supplied by Woodland Trust were planted in the grounds of Sudley House. The planting is part of a plan for a Woodland Walk to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War 1. The planting consists of Rowan Sorbus aucuparia, Birch Betula pendula, Wild cherry Prunus avium, Common oak Quercus robur, Field maple Acer campestre and Grey willow Salix caprea.

Acknowledgements:  National Museums Liverpool, Liverpool Heritage Bureau, Quentin Hughes, Maria Knowles.