Commandree, Little Gothics & Gothics
House with additional ranges, now forming 3 dwellings. Late C15 house with probable C17 additions and mid C19 remodelling. Timber-framed, rendered. Plain tiles, red brick stacks. Original house had open hall range with jettied cross wing to left and service wing to right.
- 72
- Grade 2
- C15 House, now split into 3 dwellings
- 51.972287, 1.012694
Local History
EDWARD ARDIZZONI
Edward Ardizzoni 1900-1979, cartoonist, official war artist 1940-1946 and illustrator of more than 170 books spent some of his childhood in the house called ‘Gothics’ here in East Bergholt.
Ardizzone’s father Auguste was a Frenchman of Italian descent, born in Algeria and worked on overseas government service in the French colonial empire. His mother Margaret was English, her father Edward Alexander Irving was assistant Colonial Secretary in Singapore, and Edward was born in Haiphong (then known as Tonkin), a city now in Vietnam, while his father was working for the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company.
By 1905 Margaret Ardizzone returned to England with her three eldest Children who were brought up in Suffolk largely by their maternal grandmother whilst Margaret returned to join her husband in the far east
The Ardizzone family spent their time between houses in Corder and Gainsborough Road in Ipswich and ‘Gothics’in Gaston Street, he went to Ipswich School and then Clayesmore School, a boarding school in Dorset and where his interest in drawing was encouraged by an art teacher.
Having left school in 1918, Addizzone tried to enlist twice in the British Army but was refused, so spent several years working as an office clerk in Warminster and London until 1922 when he became a British Citizen. He spent his free time painting and in 1926, and with the financial support from his father, gave up his job to concentrate on being a freelance artist.
In the 1930,s he worked on advertising material for Johnnie Walker, Punch and The Radio Times, and by 1936 he inaugurated his best known work, the ‘Tim’ series of books, featuring the maritime adventures of its young hero.
During WWII and after a short spell of serving in an anti aircraft unit, he was assigned to the war office and posted overseas as a full time official war artist, recording troops and travelling with the Eight Army until 1944 when he covered the Allied invasion, so by the time he returned to England in May 1945 he had completed almost 400 sketches and watercolours of the war, most held today at the Imperial War Museum.
After the war he resumed his freelance career working for The Strand Magazine, Ealing film studios and Guinness, he was commissioned to produce a watercolour portrait of Winston Churchill and he continued to write and illustrate his famous ‘Tim’ books which he continued until 1972.
Besides writing and illustrating his own books, he also illustrated books of other authors including some for C. Day Lewis, H E Bates and of course Clive Kings Stig of the Dump, he also illustrated serveral telegrams for the Post office in the 1950’s and 60’s and worked part time as an instructor in graphic design until he retired from teaching in 1972.
He had married Catherine Berkley in 1929 and they had 3 children. He died of a heart attack in 1979, and after Catherines death in 1992 the British government accepted 64 of Ardizzone’s sketchbooks in lieu of inheritance tax which are now held by the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford
The British Library also published an illustrated bibliography of his works in 2003.
Details
House with additional ranges, now forming 3 dwellings. Late C15 house with probable C17 additions and mid C19 remodelling. Timber-framed, rendered. Plain tiles, red brick stacks. Original house had open hall range with jettied cross wing to left and service wing to right. Projecting added cross wing to each side, that to right of 2 builds. Further additions to right and rear. Mid C19 remodelling in Tudor style. 2 storeys, except for former hall range which is now one storey and attic. C15 range: internal evidence for original cross passage entry to right, remodelled to form lobby-entry to left adjacent to jettied wing. C20 door. C19 mullion and transom windows throughout, square bay to ground floor of jettied wing. 2 gabled dormers. Upper part of ridge stack rebuilt. Gabled added cross wings are jettied to front and have similar detailing. Bargeboards to gables. Rear section of right wing has mansard roof. Interior: Little Gothics now occupies the hall range and ground floor of service
- 72
- Grade 2
- C15 House, now split into 3 dwellings
- 51.972287, 1.012694
- Historic England Reference: 1286137
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