Hounslow, London: Chiswick House, Syon Park, Osterley, Gunnersbury and the Kew Bridge steam museum

Sixteen of the borough's thirty-two Grade I list entries stand inside the grounds of a single villa at the Thames-side eastern tip of the borough, and Chiswick holds two more of them, at Hogarth's House and Walpole House. North of the A4 the ground changes to a garden suburb of the 1870s, laid out around an Underground station.

Chiswick House, on Burlington Lane, W4 2RP, was listed Grade I on 21 May 1973 as NHLE 1079607 and is separately scheduled as a monument, NHLE 1002010, which carries no grade; the landscape around it is a Grade I registered park and garden, NHLE 1000111. Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington (1694-1753), designed and built the villa, completed in 1729, and William Kent laid out the garden in the English landscape manner. The operator gives the house and garden as 26.33 hectares (65.1 acres) and states that the gardens hold more than 1,600 trees. Twenty-one list entries fall inside the registered park, sixteen at Grade I and five at Grade II, so fifteen Grade I entries stand apart from the villa itself: among them the Ionic Temple and Obelisk, NHLE 1188839; the Cascade, NHLE 1188850; Inigo Jones's Gateway, NHLE 1294560; the Classic Bridge, NHLE 1358665; the Deer House, NHLE 1079610; the Doric Column, NHLE 1188858; and the Conservatory, NHLE 1079611. The 9th Duke of Devonshire sold the house to Middlesex County Council in 1929 and it became a fire station; a V-2 rocket damaged one of the two flanking wings in 1944 and both were demolished in 1956. The house opens Thursday to Sunday, 10.30am to 3.30pm, and the gardens daily from 7am until dusk all year, closing at 7.30pm in September.

Hogarth's House stands on Hogarth Lane, W4 2QN, hard against the A4 Great West Road, with the Hogarth Roundabout immediately south of it. It was listed Grade I on 11 July 1951 and amended on 21 May 1973 as NHLE 1358340, under a register name that covers the house together with its wall and gate. It was built between 1713 and 1717 in the corner of an orchard, and its first occupant was the Rev George Andreas Ruperti, pastor of the Savoy Lutheran church; William Hogarth bought it from Ruperti's son in 1749 and used it as his country retreat until his death in 1764, extending it in 1750, and his widow added a single-storey extension in 1769. The London Borough of Hounslow owns it, entry is free, and it opens 12 noon to 5pm Tuesday to Sunday and on Bank Holiday Mondays, last entry 4.45pm, closing on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day.

Hogarth is buried about 600 m south-east, in the churchyard of the Church of St Nicholas on Church Street, W4 2PH; his tomb is listed Grade II, NHLE 1260811. The church was listed Grade II on 11 July 1951 and amended on 10 August 1988 as NHLE 1189405, under the name "Church of St Nicholas and attached walls". Its tower was built between 1416 and 1435, and the body was demolished and rebuilt in 1882-84 at the expense of the brewer Henry Smith of Fuller, Smith and Turner. A church has stood on the site since at least 1181, and an inventory of its ornaments survives from 26 June 1252. Sixteen further list entries fall in the churchyard or immediately around it: fifteen at Grade II, including the Whistler memorial, NHLE 1260809, and the Ugo Foscolo memorial, NHLE 1334318, listed 25 July 1989, and one at Grade II, the tombstone to Sir Percy Harris, Bart, NHLE 1096142, listed 28 February 2003. Foscolo's remains were repatriated to Italy, and the Italian government added an inscription to the surviving monument. Frederick Hitch, a Victoria Cross recipient of the defence of Rorke's Drift, is also buried here. No source states the church's opening hours, so none are given here.

Gunnersbury Park Museum occupies Gunnersbury Park House on Popes Lane, W5 4NH, listed Grade II on 21 May 1973 as NHLE 1358312. The 72-hectare park is a Grade II registered park and garden, NHLE 1000808. The park straddles the Hounslow and Ealing boundary and the two councils manage it jointly; the mansion and the registered park sit on the Hounslow side. The park was bought for the nation from the Rothschild family and opened to the public by Neville Chamberlain, then Minister of Health, on 21 May 1926, and the museum opened in 1929 with a collection the operator gives as around 50,000 museum and archive items. Twenty-two list entries fall inside the registered park, four at Grade II* and eighteen at Grade II, so twenty-one stand beyond the museum building: among them the Temple, NHLE 1080331, listed 11 July 1951; the Conservatory, NHLE 1294227; the East Stables, NHLE 1358316; the West Stables, NHLE 1096950; Gunnersbury House, NHLE 1080330; the Gothic ruins on the borders of the former Japanese Gardens, NHLE 1080335; and the six iron lampstandards in front of the mansion, NHLE 1358315. Museum and shop open Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 4.30pm, and close on Mondays except for booked school visits; the Historic Kitchens open Thursday to Sunday, 10am to 4.30pm. The park opens daily from 7am until dusk, and museum and park entry are free.

North of the A4, Bedford Park is a garden suburb the developer Jonathan Carr began in 1875 on 24 acres (9.7 ha) north of Turnham Green station: red brick Queen Anne Revival with tile-hung walls, varied gables and white-painted balustrades, by Richard Norman Shaw, E. W. Godwin, E. J. May, Henry Wilson and Maurice Bingham Adams. It is read from Bath Road, Priory Gardens and The Avenue, W4 1LW, and the houses are in private occupation. The Tabard, the estate's inn, and the Church of St Michael and All Angels stand together on Bath Road at Turnham Green and were both listed Grade II* on 11 July 1951, NHLE 1079594 and NHLE 1079622; the Bedford Park War Memorial on the same green is Grade II, NHLE 1422868, listed 7 January 2015. The suburb is split between two conservation areas, a larger one in Ealing and a smaller one in Hounslow, and Hounslow applies Article 4 directions to its Gunnersbury and Bedford Park conservation areas, so works normally allowed as permitted development need consent. W. B. Yeats, the actor William Terriss, the actress Florence Farr, the playwright Arthur Wing Pinero and the painter Camille Pissarro all lived on the estate in the 1880s.

The Brent meets the Thames at Brentford, with the 1920s and 1930s arterial road behind it. Five places sit along that stretch: a ducal estate, a steam museum, a museum of self-playing instruments, a Jacobean manor in a public park and a Premier League ground.

Syon House, in Syon Park, TW8 8JF, with its vehicle entrance on Park Road, Isleworth, was listed Grade I on 15 June 1951 as NHLE 1080318, and the park is a Grade I registered park and garden, NHLE 1000148 — the second of the borough's two Grade I registered landscapes, with Chiswick House. The site was Syon Abbey, a Bridgettine monastery founded by Henry V in 1415, which moved here in 1431 and was dissolved in 1539. The exterior was erected in 1547 for the 1st Duke of Somerset, and the estate has been in the Percy family since 1594 as the London residence of the Duke of Northumberland. Robert Adam began the interiors in 1762, and five state rooms on the west, south and east were finished before work stopped in 1769; the central rotunda he intended was never built, and the Long Gallery runs 136 feet. Capability Brown laid out the park and lake from 1760, and the operator gives the park as 200 acres (80 hectares) holding more than 200 species of rare tree. Charles Fowler's Great Conservatory, of metal and glass, was completed in 1827 and listed Grade I on 15 June 1951 as NHLE 1358328. Fourteen further list entries lie in the park, including Flora's Column, NHLE 1080321; the Gate Lodge, NHLE 1358308; the boathouse known as The Pavilion, NHLE 1080282; and the entrance lodges and gates on London Road, NHLE 1190136, all at Grade I. The season runs March to October: the house opens Mondays and Tuesdays for guided tours of up to 90 minutes, first tour 10.30am and last tour 2pm, and Sundays and Bank Holidays for self-guided entry from 10.30am to 3.30pm, last entry 2.30pm. The gardens and Great Conservatory open Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays, 10.30am to 3.30pm.

The London Museum of Water & Steam occupies Kew Bridge Pumping Station on Green Dragon Lane, TW8 0EN, which opened in 1838 for the Grand Junction Waterworks Company and supplied Paddington and Kensington, and by the twentieth century much of west London. Seven list entries cover the site. Three are Grade I: the main building, NHLE 1358343, listed 21 May 1973 and amended 18 October 1990; the Great Engine House, NHLE 1080311; and the standpipe tower, NHLE 1080310, the landmark from Kew Bridge. Four are Grade II: the range of ancillary buildings including forge and workshops, NHLE 1074198; the boiler houses, coal store, steam engine house and link to the Great Engine House, NHLE 1189859; the railings, two sets of gatepiers and wall fronting Kew Bridge Road, NHLE 1189883; and the gatehouse and boundary wall, NHLE 1245023. The Grand Junction 90 inch engine of 1846 stands over 40 feet high and weighs about 250 tons, and Dickens called it "a monster"; the last steam pumping of drinking water on the site was a demonstration run of the 100 inch engine of 1869, in 1958. The museum was founded in 1975 as the Kew Bridge Steam Museum and rebranded in early 2014. In term time it opens Thursday to Sunday, 10am to 4pm, last entry 3pm, and closes Monday to Wednesday; from 21 July to 2 September it opens daily, 10am to 4pm. An adult day ticket is £12.00 and a child ticket for ages 5 to 16 is £4.00, with under-fives free. The operator lists the 90 and 100 inch Engine House as closed for renovations under the Great Engine House Project.

At 399 High Street, TW8 0DU, the Musical Museum holds self-playing pianos and violins, pipe organs, music boxes, gramophones, synthesizers and a Mighty Wurlitzer cinema organ, with over 20,000 paper music rolls and a Korg Gallery covering the history of music synthesis and Korg electronic instruments. Frank Holland MBE founded it in 1963 and volunteers run almost all of it; the concert hall seats 250. It opens Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 10am to 4pm, with guided tours at 10.30am, 12.30pm and 2.30pm, and the tour takes just over an hour. Adult admission is £15.00, concession £12.00, child £5.00 and Hounslow resident £12.00. The building carries no entry on the National Heritage List for England.

Boston Manor House stands in Boston Manor Park on Boston Manor Road, TW8 9JX, and was listed Grade I on 11 July 1951 as NHLE 1079603, under a register name covering the house and the park together. The Jacobean house was built for the newly widowed Lady Mary Reade; Hounslow Council dates it 1623 and other accounts give 1622 or 1622-3. The estate passed to the Clitherow family, who held it for roughly 250 years, and John Bourchier Stracey-Clitherow was the last private owner. A restoration begun in 2018 was funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Historic England, the GLA Good Growth Fund, the Wolfson Foundation, the Pilgrim Trust, the Heritage of London Trust and the John and Ruth Howard Trust. Three further Grade II entries stand in the grounds: the stables, NHLE 1358662; the garden wall with two sets of iron gates and gateposts, NHLE 1079604; and a gateway about 100 yards south of the house, NHLE 1188767. Two more Grade II entries are houses on the road outside the grounds, Nos. 69 and 71 Boston Manor Road, NHLE 1079605, and Nos. 73 and 75, NHLE 1079606. The park around the house holds a lake and ancient cedar trees. The house opens Tuesday to Sunday, 12 noon to 5pm, and entry is free.

The Gtech Community Stadium, formally the Brentford Community Stadium, is on Lionel Road South, TW8 0RU, 82 m from Kew Bridge station, and is Brentford FC's home ground in the Premier League. It holds 17,250 and was built to take both association football and rugby union. The club bought the 7.6-acre (31,000 m²) site from Barratt Homes on 28 June 2012; Hounslow Council approved the stadium in December 2013, with the Mayor of London and the government confirming approval the same month. Site clearance began on 24 March 2017 and main works in spring 2018, and the club confirmed the stadium complete on 30 August 2020. It was used during UEFA Women's Euro 2022. The London Museum of Water & Steam closes its car park on Brentford FC home match days.

Old Isleworth sits on the tidal Thames at the point where Church Street turns inland toward Syon Park. Osterley is three miles inland across the A4, reached from a 1934 Underground station that carries its own list entry.

All Saints Church, on Church Street, TW7 6BE, stands directly on the tidal Thames beside the London Apprentice at the head of the slipway, and was listed Grade II* on 15 June 1951 as NHLE 1358287 under the register name "CHURCH OF ALL SAINTS". The parish is pre-Norman, and a vicar replacing its rector is recorded in 1290 in documents associated with Syon Abbey. Sir Christopher Wren was approached at the end of the seventeenth century to design a new body for the dilapidated church; his scheme was thought too expensive until Sir Orlando Gee left £500 towards the work in 1705, and a modified rebuilding followed in 1705-06. In 1943 two boys set fire to the church — days later they burned Holy Trinity, Hounslow — and the interior was destroyed. Michael Blee built the present inner body in 1970 with glass by Keith New, retaining the fourteenth-century Kentish ragstone tower, and it won a Civic Trust Award in 1973; the tower and the foundations are the fabric that survives from before the twentieth century. No source states the church's opening hours, so none are given here.

The London Apprentice, at 62 Church Street, TW7 6BG, was listed Grade II on 15 June 1951 as NHLE 1189443, under the register name "THE LONDON APPRENTICE PUBLIC HOUSE". Greene King is recorded as the operator, and a lamp column outside the pub carries a separate Grade II entry of its own. Isleworth War Memorial, Grade II, NHLE 1380571, and the Grade II Gumley House convent, NHLE 1261056, both stand within a few hundred metres up Twickenham Road.

Osterley Park and House, on Jersey Road, TW7 4RB, with a sat nav postcode of TW7 4RD, was listed Grade I on 21 May 1973 as NHLE 1080308, and the park is a Grade II registered park and garden, NHLE 1000287. The original house was built in the 1570s for Sir Thomas Gresham, founder of the Royal Exchange, and completed in 1576; his Elizabethan stable block survives with a Grade I entry of its own, NHLE 1358341. Robert Adam remodelled the house between 1761 and 1765 for Francis Child and, after Francis's death in 1763, for his brother Robert Child, and Horace Walpole called the drawing room "worthy of Eve before the fall". The estate straddles the Ealing and Hounslow boundary, and the house and the registered park sit on the Hounslow side; the National Trust has held the property since 1991. Eleven list entries fall inside the registered park — four at Grade I, one at Grade II and six at Grade II — so ten stand beyond the house: the Elizabethan stables, NHLE 1358341; the Aviary or Little Orangery, NHLE 1080309; The Temple, NHLE 1189780; the Roman Bridge at the park's northern edge, Grade II*, NHLE 1079401; the entrance lodges, NHLE 1358342; Osterley Park Farmhouse, NHLE 1240735; the garden walls north and south of the farmhouse, NHLE 1240736 and NHLE 1240723; a bridge within the park, NHLE 1390982; and gate piers within the park, NHLE 1391000. In the autumn season, from 25 August to 1 November 2026, the house and the "Journeys" exhibition open Wednesday to Monday, 11am to 3.30pm, closing on Tuesdays; the garden opens daily 10am to 5pm until 25 October and the park daily 9am to 5pm until 31 October. From late October the garden opens daily 10am to 4pm and the park daily 9am to 4pm, and from 7 November the house opens Wednesday to Monday, 11am to 3pm. The shop and Stables Café open 10am to 5pm on weekdays and 9.30am to 5pm at weekends, the second-hand bookshop daily 11am to 4.30pm, and cycle hire Thursday to Sunday 10.30am to 3.30pm. Car parking is £7.00, and free for members, Blue Badge holders and motorbikes.

Osterley station, on the Great West Road, TW7 4PX, is 860 m from the house and is the practical arrival point for it. It was listed Grade II on 26 May 1987 as NHLE 1240806, under a register name that covers the platforms as well as the building. It opened on 25 March 1934, replacing Osterley & Spring Grove of 1883 about 300 m east on Thornbury Road, whose buildings and platforms still stand. Stanley Heaps designed it following a preliminary plan by Charles Holden, in the modern European idiom Holden used along the Piccadilly line: brick, reinforced concrete and large areas of glass. Its brick tower is topped by a concrete obelisk, possibly taken from the De Telegraaf building in Amsterdam that Holden saw on a Netherlands study trip. Frank Pick, Chief Executive of London Transport, thought stations designed by others in Holden's manner lacked attention to detail and dubbed them "Holdenesque".

The western half of the borough holds four places of a different kind: a surviving heath, a working farm on the Heathrow fringe, a medieval church on a village green and a pumping station at Hanworth.

Kempton Steam Museum occupies Kempton Park Pumping Station on Snakey Lane, Hanworth, Feltham, TW13 6XH. Its Triple Expansion House with two attached chimneys was listed Grade II* on 21 March 1995 as NHLE 1260598, the Lilleshall Engine House separately on 9 July 1998 as NHLE 1375631, and the Primary Filter House at Grade II on 30 July 2003 as NHLE 1390540; the site is also a scheduled monument, NHLE 1001977, over 0.235 hectares, and a scheduled monument carries no grade. The museum's triple-expansion steam engine and its identical twin pumped London's drinking water from 1929 to 1980, and the operator says the engine stands as high as four stacked double-decker buses. The engines are close in design and size to those of RMS Titanic and stand in for them in films and documentaries. The museum opens March to November on selected days and most Sundays: Steaming Weekends 10.30am to 4pm, and Static Viewing Sundays 11am to 3pm as a free drop-in, most Sundays March to October. On Steaming Weekends, guided tours of the static Lady Bessie Prescott Engine number 7 run every 20 minutes from 1.10pm for up to six people at a time; the operator's visit page gives the last tour at 3.30pm and its prices page gives 3.10pm. Self-guided access runs 10.30am to 1pm, last entry 12.30pm, with a maximum of 30 people on the engine, and there is a 1.4 m (4 ft 7 in) minimum height requirement because of the historic railings. The Kempton Great Engines Trust Ltd runs the museum. The adjacent Hampton & Kempton Waterworks Railway runs on steaming weekends and is a separate organisation with its own ticket.

The Church of St Mary the Virgin fronts the green off Staines Road at Bell Lane, East Bedfont, TW14 8JR, and was listed Grade II on 14 August 1953 as NHLE 1360959, under the register name "CHURCH OF ST MARY". Six further Grade II entries stand in the churchyard in their own right, all listed on 19 February 2003: the Gates monument, NHLE 1096132; a brick chest tomb south of it, NHLE 1096133; Captain Miller's headstone, NHLE 1096134; a group of three eighteenth-century headstones, NHLE 1096135; an eighteenth-century headstone, NHLE 1096136; and the headstone to Mary Taylor, NHLE 1096137. A Romano-British site 1,000 yards west of the parish church is a scheduled monument, NHLE 1002042, over 10.10 hectares, and part of a causewayed enclosure 632 m north-east of Mayfield Farm is another, NHLE 1002043, over 4.73 hectares. No source states the church's opening hours, so none are given here.

Hounslow Heath Local Nature Reserve is entered from Staines Road, TW4 5EQ, and covers 82 hectares (200 acres). A survey of 1546 gave the heath as 4,293 acres (1,737 ha), 6.71 square miles. It is bounded by the A315 Staines Road, the A3063 Wellington Road South, the A314 Hanworth Road and the River Crane, and it touches Richmond upon Thames at one point. Staines Road, its northern boundary, follows the Roman road, and there are several historic references to Roman camps on or near the heath. Oliver Cromwell stationed an army here at the end of the Civil War in 1647, and James II camped his army here and staged mock battles intended to intimidate London; in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the heath was known for highwaymen. Hounslow Barracks was built north of Staines Road in 1793 against a possible French invasion, and ten of its buildings carry separate Grade II entries: the Barrack Master's House, NHLE 1375623; the former Hospital, NHLE 1375624; the former Married Quarters, NHLE 1375625; the Hardinge Block, NHLE 1375626; the Medical Centre, NHLE 1375627; the NAAFI, NHLE 1375628; the Keep or Armoury, NHLE 1240633; the former chapel, NHLE 1240631; the former Officers' Mess and Quarters, NHLE 1240579; and the former coach houses to the stable ranges, NHLE 1260922. The barracks are a working Army site and not a place a visitor enters. The heath itself carries no entry on the National Heritage List for England.

Hounslow Urban Farm is on Faggs Road, Feltham, TW14 0LZ, on the A312 on the Heathrow fringe, and covers 4.6 acres. It keeps five types of pig alongside sheep, goats, cows, rabbits, ducks, geese, alpacas, rheas, llamas and peacocks, and runs animal-handling sessions and owl flying displays every day. It also runs the Environment Concern Organisation, charity number 137733, which provides accommodation for rescued animals. It opens all year round except Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day, from 10am, with last entry at 4pm and closing at 5pm; general-admission tickets are valid for 12 months from the date of purchase, so no date needs to be booked.

Hounslow is a Piccadilly line borough with a South Western Railway spine. Sixteen rail or Underground stations lie inside the boundary. The Piccadilly line serves Boston Manor, Osterley, Hounslow East, Hounslow Central and Hounslow West, and calls at Turnham Green only before 06:50 Monday to Saturday, before 07:45 on Sunday, and after 22:30, plus Night Tube; at all other times its trains run through. The District line serves Gunnersbury, Turnham Green and Stamford Brook. The Overground is present at exactly one station, Gunnersbury, on the Mildmay line. National Rail is South Western Railway throughout, on the Hounslow Loop at Chiswick, Kew Bridge, Brentford, Syon Lane, Isleworth and Hounslow, and on the Windsor lines at Feltham. There is no Elizabeth line station, no DLR station and no tram stop inside the borough. The nearest Elizabeth line platforms are at Heathrow Terminal 4, Hayes & Harlington, Southall and Hanwell, all outside Hounslow: Heathrow Airport in its entirety is in Hillingdon, and so are Hatton Cross and every Heathrow terminal station. Kempton Park station is in Spelthorne, Surrey.

For Chiswick and Bedford Park, take South Western Railway to Chiswick: 712 m from Chiswick House. Turnham Green is 1,019 m from Hogarth's House and 1,373 m from Chiswick House, and Bedford Park was laid out around it; Stamford Brook, on the District line, is the next stop east and sits on the borough boundary, 1,183 m from Hogarth's House. For Gunnersbury Park Museum, Acton Town on the District and Piccadilly lines is 593 m away but stands in Ealing; Kew Bridge, on South Western Railway, is 1,059 m and Gunnersbury, on the Mildmay line, 1,102 m. The E3 serves the Popes Lane entrance to the park and the 65 runs along South Ealing Road.

For Brentford and the Great West Road, take South Western Railway to Kew Bridge: 208 m from the London Museum of Water & Steam and 82 m from the Gtech Community Stadium. Brentford, on the same line, is 661 m from the Musical Museum on the High Street, 695 m from Boston Manor House and 1,295 m from Syon House. Boston Manor, on the Piccadilly line, is 705 m from Boston Manor House, and the station building is itself listed Grade II, NHLE 1063901, a 1934 design by Stanley Heaps in consultation with Charles Holden with a tall tower lit by glass brick. Syon Lane, on South Western Railway, is 1,099 m from Syon House, and there is no Underground station within 1.5 km of it. The 65, 237, 267 and 110 all serve the Kew Bridge and Brentford High Street corridor.

For Isleworth and Osterley, take the Piccadilly line to Osterley: 860 m from Osterley House. Isleworth station, on South Western Railway, is 1,899 m from Osterley House and 1,310 m from All Saints Church and the London Apprentice; Syon Lane, on the same line, is 1,267 m from the church. Richmond, taking the District line, the Mildmay line and South Western Railway, is 1,498 m from the church across the river in Richmond upon Thames.

For Hounslow, Feltham and Bedfont, take South Western Railway to Feltham: 434 m from Feltham town centre, the nearest station inside the borough to both Kempton Steam Museum and East Bedfont, and about 20 minutes on foot from Hounslow Urban Farm, which the 490 and 285 buses also serve. Kempton Park station is 599 m from the steam museum but stands in Spelthorne, Surrey. At East Bedfont, Heathrow Terminal 4 rail station on the Elizabeth line is 893 m away and Heathrow Terminal 4 Underground station on the Piccadilly line 928 m, and both are in Hillingdon. For Hounslow Heath, Hounslow West on the Piccadilly line is 1,315 m from the reserve, Hounslow station on South Western Railway 1,368 m and Hounslow Central on the Piccadilly line 1,488 m. Every distance above is a straight-line measurement, not a walking route.