A prominent feature in the extensive demesne of Alnwick Castle is the Observatory on Ratcheugh Crag, a ‘stupendous and romantic rock’. The building was one of a number of landscape features planned by Hugh and Elizabeth, 1st Duke and Duchess of Northumberland, in the 1770s, but the sham-ruined eye-catcher was not completed until after her death.
Tag: Duke of Northumberland
The Clock Tower, Airmyn, near Goole, East Riding of Yorkshire
In the first half of the 19th century the Airmyn estate, on a bend in the river Aire, was owned by George Percy, the 2nd earl of Beverley (1778-1867), a grandson of the 1st duke of Northumberland. He was admired as a benevolent landlord who took care of his tenants, and in 1834 he endowed the village with a Sunday School. In the mid 1860s the tenants ‘unanimously decided to erect a testimonial’ in honour of his ‘kindness and liberality’. This tribute took the form of a charming clocktower, far from folly, but an ornament to this tranquil and very pretty riverside village.
Brizlee Tower, Alnwick, Northumberland
Brizlee Tower. Photo' courtesy of Robin Kent Architecture and Conservation.
Brizlee Tower* stands high on Brizlee Hill, near Alnwick, and overlooks Hulne Park, a detached pleasure ground close to the Duke of Northumberland’s principal park at Alnwick Castle. It was built in the late 18th century as a prospect tower and eye-catcher, and also as an object to be visited on a drive from the castle through Hulne Park. The park was designed by ‘the inimitable Brown’, aka Capability, working with local engineers and designers, and was also home to the ruins of mediaeval Hulne Abbey, embellished and repurposed by the Duke and Duchess as a banqueting house, pleasure garden and menagerie for exotic pheasants. This is one of The Folly Flâneuse’s favourite follies: the detail is just so joyful, or as historian Alistair Rowan so wonderfully put it: ‘at Brizlee there is fantasy and flamboyance’.