The two gate piers which greet visitors to the PoloFarm Sports Club complex may often go unnoticed, merely regarded as a slight eccentricity to the modern facilities they usher within - and as "fair game" targets by visiting dray vehicles and coaches! In fact, their very existence dictated the way the club layout had to be planned initially.

The gates were the portal to a mansion which was pulled down in 1785 and they were close to sharing a similar fate as the grounds in general degenerated over the years. One of several interesting legends accompany - one is that the 'Apple Puddings' change place when the cathedral clock strikes midnight on Midsummer Eve. Nowadays that appears to happen only after one too many at the clubhouse bar!

John Finch, Lord Fordwich, a Speaker of the House of Commons lived at the mansion..

The gate piers are Listed Grade II and are recognised as having charm, beauty and architectural significance, being described by Nathaniel Lloyd in his "must have" book The History of English Brickwork (1934). He dates them as late seventeenth century.

The gates were the subject of enthusiastic and intense local restoration campaigning when the idea of Polo Farm's creation was first mooted with the purchase of the gates and grounds by Canterbury Hockey Club.

An appeal committee, chaired by Brigadier JH Slade-Powell, had representatives from the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, the Committee for the Protection of Rural England, The Canterbury Conservation Advisory Committee, Canterbury Hockey Club, The Canterbury Society, and the Ickham Littlebourne & Wickhambreaux Conservation Society.

The appeal raised £10,000 for the gates' restoration, including applicable grants, enabling work to commence alongside early development of the grounds and clubhouse within. .

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