The house was designed in 1870 by Richard Norman Shaw for the Victorian era painter Frederick Goodall, who had purchased of land at Harrow Weald in 1856, but he did not begin to build until a lease on the property expired. Shaw's design for the house included aspects of Gothic revivalism, added to a late-Elizabethan style, which included high red-tiled gables, tall clustered chimneys and leaded lights. To the north of the house, Shaw built a small lodge, a walled garden and various outhouses and a stable block, later converted into garages by W. S. Gilbert for his collection of motorcars. Over the dyke (now a duck pond) Shaw built two stone bridges, which incorporated flint from the ruined church at Stanmore. Construction on the house was completed in 1872. Goodall's ground-floor studio was built on a north-south axis in order to catch the light. Goodall sold the property in 1880 to Robert Herriot of Hambros Bank, who added a billiard room in 1883. Windsor Castle is visible from the house.