Author: Editor

Folly, West Yorkshire

Triumphal Arch and Sham Ruin, Parlington Park, Aberford, West Yorkshire

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Photo courtesy of Brian Hull

In the later decades of the 18th century Parlington, near Aberford, was improved by Sir Thomas Gascoigne, 8th Bart, and it was he who built this arch to a design by Thomas Leverton. Construction was underway in 1781 when the Leeds Intelligencer reported that ‘some evil-minded Person or Persons’ had maliciously damaged the partly- built arch and destroyed two capitals and other mouldings in the mason’s shed. A reward of £10 was offered to anyone who approached Sir Thomas or his Head Gardener with information.

Grotto, West Yorkshire

Bellman’s Castle, West Nab, near Meltham, West Yorkshire

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Courtesy Kirklees Image Archive

In 1920 the Yorkshire Post published a letter about a mysterious cave, or grotto, at West Nab on moorland above Meltham on the western edge of Yorkshire. The correspondent believed the structure had been built around 1500 years earlier as the dwelling of the pagan god Baal – hence it’s being known as ‘Bellman’s Castle’.

Dovecote, Scotland, Tower

Place Makers

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Saltoun Doocot. Courtesy of Ed Kluz

Recently opened at The Scottish Gallery, in Edinburgh’s handsome New Town, is Place Makers, a new show featuring the work of artists Ed Kluz and Vicki Ambery-Smith.

Folly, Grotto, West Yorkshire

Happy 65th anniversary ‘Follies and Grottoes’

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A great stumbling block in the understanding of follies is the attempt to define what exactly one is. Must it be useless? Wildly expensive? Weird? One of my favourite summaries comes from Barbara Jones, the first person to study the genre in depth in Follies and Grottoes, published by Constable 65 years ago today 

She wrote that a folly ‘is built for pleasure, and pleasure is personal, difficult to define.’

Grotto, Shropshire, Temple

Badger Dingle, Shropshire

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The Temple, now in the care of The Landmark Trust

Badger Dingle, north east of Bridgnorth in Shropshire, was created by Isaac Hawkins Browne in the 1780s and ‘90s. He constructed a new mansion, Badger Hall (demolished 1950s), to the designs of James Wyatt whilst at the same time employing William Emes, and probably his associate John Webb, to create a pleasure ground. Lakes were created in the valley bottom and a circuit walk took visitors through the ‘ornamented cultivated side’ of the valley, which looked across to the ‘purely sylvan’ scene of the opposite bank. An early account describes a picturesque scene of  alpine planting and colourful shrubs.

Folly, Obelisk, South Yorkshire, Temple, Tower

Wentworth Castle, South Yorkshire

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Some great news. A joint statement from Barnsley Council, the National Trust and the Northern College was issued early this morning announcing that the future of Wentworth Castle now ‘looks more secure’. The three bodies have been in discussion since the site closed in April 2017, and now plan on ‘working collaboratively’ towards a reopening in 2019. Wentworth Castle is the only Grade I listed Park in South Yorkshire and has an outstanding collection of follies and landscape buildings, including Stainborough Castle pictured here. The house (which houses the Northern College and is not currently open to the public), the gardens and the landscape buildings were restored at great cost, largely thanks to the Heritage Lottery Fund, to secure their future. This new alliance must build on that work to ensure that Wentworth is enjoyed by the people of South Yorkshire and beyond.

The full press release is here:

https://www.barnsley.gov.uk/news/new-partnership-set-to-secure-the-future-of-wentworth-castle-gardens-in-south-yorkshire/

 

Folly, North Yorkshire

Polly the Folly, Studley Royal, Ripon, North Yorkshire

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Charlotte Graham Photography

The Folly Flâneuse can’t take the credit for this wonderful photograph but she can encourage you to get to Studley Royal before 4 November to see Folly!18, a collection of new follies dotted around the estate and complementing the Aislabie family’s 18th century towers, tunnels and grots. This is Polly by architect Charles Holland, a tongue-in-beak tribute to the Georgian mania for housing exotic birds within a landscape garden

https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/fountains-abbey-and-studley-royal-water-garden/features/folly-in-the-water-garden-at-fountains-abbey-and-studley-royal

Derbyshire, Grotto

The Hermitage, Kedleston, Derbyshire

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Having fallen in to serious disrepair, the Hermitage at Kedleston was restored by the National Trust in 2016. The project was made more difficult because a large, and very lovely, plane tree has established itself alongside the building, which also makes (non-professional) photography something of a challenge.

Folly, Monument, Temple, West Yorkshire

The Monument, Whitley Beaumont, West Yorkshire

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The Monument c.1900

Capability Brown drew up a plan for the landscape at Whitley Beaumont which was implemented by Richard Beaumont in the 1780s. The Monument was probably built as an eye-catcher from a new carriage drive, and existed by 1822 when it is shown on an estate map, but not named. It is marked as ‘The Monument’ on the 1850s ordnance survey map but no-one remembers why it was given this name, or what it might be a monument to.

Built of fragments of masonry, probably rescued from a remodelling of the hall, and embellished with battered statuary, this is a fabulous folly and was surely designed by the family themselves. It’s unlikely an eminent architect would wish to take the credit.

The monument fell into disrepair during the two world wars when the park was used for army training and mined for coal as part of the war effort. Today the fragments survive as a forlorn and overgrown pile of stones.

The park at Whitley Beaumont is strictly private.