Bishops Knoll

Bishops Knoll is comprised of two blocks of woodland on the eastern slopes of the Avon Gorge, Bristol directly opposite Leigh Woods. Bound on the east by Sneyd Park, an affluent residential area, and the west by a railway line, and a local nature reserve to the north. The wood forms an attractive component of the local landscape. The site is rich in history. The first known recording refers to the area as part of a medieval deer park, when the site was thought to be wooded. It later became the grounds of The Knoll, a large estate house, in the late nineteenth century where it was developed into a series of terraced gardens, a sloping arboretum, orchards, lawns and paddocks with a network of 'pleasure' paths. The mansion was demolished in 1970 and the site of the house developed into flats in the mid 1980's. The Trust acquired the grounds as a condition of the development proposals and planted the paddock with mixed broadleaves in 1986. Numerous features from the garden remain, including terraced gardens, an iron pergola and significant large specimen trees. The northern block is mature mixed woodland which was either planted or developed naturally over the last 200 years. Earlier maps and paintings of the area show this area as parkland with no significant woodland cover. However, a number of old oak pollards dating back to the deer park remain. The wood has a number of well used paths which fit into a wider network of access in the area.