'Not only is it a jewel in Stockport's crown, it's a national treasure - we must protect it'

It's earliest incarnation as a manor house was valued at 5 shillings (5p) in the Domesday Book of 1086. By the late 14th Century the land owning family, the Davenports, had built a magnificent timber-framed home there.

The family remained lords of the manor for 500 years before it was sold to a Manchester property firm, and then a Victorian industrialist and in 1925 the president of Manchester United, John Henry Davies, for £15,000 (the equivalent of £910,000 in 2024).

Davies lived in the house until his death in 1927, and his widow Amy remained there until 1935, when she sold it to Hazel Grove and Bramhall Urban District Council for £14,360 (worth about £1,061,000 in 2024) with the intention that the house and park be open to the public. In 1974 it was taken over by Stockport council.

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The beautiful Bramhall Hall, once described as ‘one of the four best timber-framed mansions of England,’ will now benefit from £1.6m worth of tender loving care, it was announced today. It is the first major cash injection for the Grade I listed building since 2013 when £2m, made up of £1.6m from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the rest from the council was spent on repairs to a highly decorative 16th century Venetian plaster ceiling, and Victorian Boiler room, and improved visitor facilities.

The latest grant will be used to restore the roof of the Tudor manor house. Urgent repairs, are needed to the building as its collections are at risk from the elements, with climate change making the situation critical.

The funding awarded to Stockport Council through Arts Council England’s Museum Estates and Development Fund (MEND) is intended for vital work