Lancelot 'Capability' Brown
Person Male Born /8/1716 Died 6/2/1783
Landscapte architect. Baptised in Northumberland. The 'Capability' came from his habit of declaring estates to have 'capability' for improvement, rather than being a description of his skills. Nowadays it would be 'Potential', or Potty to his friends, possibly. Worked on hundreds of gardens, turning down work in Ireland because he had not yet finished England. A skilled user of the ha-ha. The gardens at Blenheim Palace are a good example of his work.
Worked with the architect Henry Holland and then from about 1771 with his son, also Henry who, in 1773 married Brown's daughter,Bridget (1744–1828).
Lived at The Mall, Hammersmith from 1751 - 1764 when he moved to Wilderness House, where the plaque is, and where he died, possibly. Reading Wikipedia and the Oxford Dictionary of National Bigraphy one gets two stories of his death. The other being that he died at Bridget's house in Hertford Street.
2016: English Heritage's post - Capability Brown: the man who changed English landscapes forever.
Go to map of other memorials in this area
