1719-1775 - Little Stanmore (Middlesex)
Painter Francesco Sleter called himself a Venetian, but little is known about his life and background. He is first recorded in England as working for the James Brydges, Duke of Chandos, at Cannons in 1719. He probably decorated the state rooms at Grimsthorpe Castle for Peregrine Bertie, 2nd Duke of Ancaster, after Vanbrugh completed the building in 1724. Sleter is later documented in 1731, painting murals based on Edmund Spenser’s Faerie Queene for the Temple of Venus at Stowe, Buckinghamshire, while in 1732 he provided grisaille decoration for Benjamin Styles at Moor Park, Hertfordshire. In the mid- and late 1730s he was paid for ceiling decorations at Mereworth Castle (Kent) for John Fane, later 7th Earl of Westmorland. Sleter died at Mereworth in 1775.
