architecture, belvedere, Dorset, eyecatcher, Folly, landscape, Observatory, Tower

Steeple Folly, The Black Tower, & Clavell Tower, Dorset: fiction and fact.

Photo' courtesy of W. Sweeney/Landmark Trust.

In the middle of the 20th century books featuring the adventures of the Lockett children captured the imaginations of young readers. One title in particular appealed to the Folly Flâneuse: what ghastly goings-on could have taken place at the ‘half completed and abandoned tower’ known as Steeple Folly? And which real clifftop folly might have been the inspiration for it?