In 1828 Henry Nevill, 2nd Earl of Abergavenny, built a tower on high ground at Eridge Castle, on the extensive Nevill Estate in East Sussex, close to the border with Kent. The elegant tapering tower was both belvedere with ‘magnificent’ prospect and eye-catcher. It echoed the architecture of the multi-turreted mansion begun in about 1787 with work continuing well into the nineteenth century. After falling into decay the tower found a new purpose in the last years of the twentieth century.

In October 1828 the newspapers reported that the Earl of Abergavenny (1755-1843) had recently completed work on a tower which stood fifty feet high on Saxonbury Hill. A number of the earl’s friends had been invited to climb the stone staircase to the viewing platform to admire the panorama.

All of the best folly towers compete to have a view over the most counties or landmarks, and in the case of the Eridge tower the boast was that sixteen parish churches could be seen.

A year after it was built the ‘Saxonbury Tower’, as it had been named, was noted in a guide to the fashionable spa town of Tunbridge Wells, a few miles away. No architect is recorded, but archives reveal the builder was J. Card and the total cost was £295. Above the door is the date 1828 and the initials HA for Henry Abergavenny. No architect is named, but it was most likely John Montier of Tunbridge Wells, who was described as ‘the Earls Architect’ when he died in 1837.

In 1862 William Nevill, 4th Earl of Abergavenny (1792-1868), decided to add a flagpole to the tower, but once it was in place he was unhappy with the proportions and decided to increase the height of the tower. £120 was spent on raising the tower by 21 feet until it stood 67 feet tall. The flagstaff stood a further 34 feet high and the finishing touch was a huge flag bearing the Nevill arms which was hoisted whenever the earl and his family arrived at Eridge. Both of the postcards shown here date from after this work was completed.

The tower stands on the site of a ‘military station of the Saxon invaders’ from which it takes its name. The ancient remains were well known, which might account for a misunderstanding in 1878 when, at a mere 50 years young, the turret was described as the tower ‘from which the Nevills of old, in more troublous times, kept watch and ward as far as the eye could reach.’

The ‘conspicuous object’ was admired by visitors and was illuminated to mark Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887. It became more prominent still in 1888 when it was limewashed (since faded/peeled). The deer who were described as ‘quietly browsing the scene’ presumably took themselves off elsewhere on the evening of Queen Victoria’s 80th birthday in 1899, when the fireworks set off from the top of the tower could be seen as far away as Lewes.

Records show that the tower was given a new iron platform and roof in 1896, but by the time Barbara Jones was researching for the first edition of Follies and Grottoes, which would be published in 1953, it was in a dilapidated condition. Only the ‘intrepid climber’ could make it to the top to enjoy the ‘most sublime views’ as some of the stone stairs were missing.

The folly remained in a poor condition until the 1990s when it was restored, minus the battlements, and given a new purpose as home to antennas for a mobile ‘phone company. Listed at grade II, the tower has continued to earn its keep in this way until the present day.

Eridge Castle was pulled down in the 1930s to make way for a more manageable residence (‘almost blatantly modern’ thought one passer-by in 1937) and remains the seat of the Marquesses of Abergavenny.

Saxonbury Tower stands on private land with no public access. Thanks to Eridge Park Estate Office for help with this post. For more on the estate see https://eridgepark.co.uk

Update August 2024: a few weeks after this post was published, the Folly Fellowship held there annual Garden Party at Eridge Park, courtesy of the Marquess of Abergavenny. Member Peter Godfrey modelled the celebratory cake on the Saxonbury Tower http://follies.org.uk

Thanks for reading, and as ever do get in touch if you have any thoughts. The comments box can be found at the bottom of the page.

For centuries tall towers have been used for communicating: first via flags, beacons and semaphore, and then later by radio waves. In the late 20th century came the rapid expansion of mobile phone technology, with the service providers keen to find lofty locations to mount masts. Most are a simple metal pylon, whilst others are disguised (with varying degrees of success) as trees. And some have found a home in a folly – ancient or modern.

Horton Tower in Dorset, was built by Humphrey Sturt in 1750 as a belvedere. It stands 43m tall and the very fine tower is listed at grade II*. Vodafone paid for some restoration work when they installed masts in the early 1990s.

The Saxonbury Tower on the Eridge Park Estate in Kent was restored in the last years of the 20th century as part of a deal to install One2One equipment. The tower was built in 1828 and is grade II listed.

But what if a such a convenient folly tower was not available? Elevated sites which had once been home to Royal Observer Corps posts were also a popular choice of site. The posts were used for monitoring nuclear activity during the Cold War, and became redundant when the R.O.C. was stood down in the 1990s.

One such site was at Inkberrow, in Worcestershire, where an observer post had been built in 1962. In 1995 Mercury Communications approached Gabby Allison, who owned the field in which the remains of the post stood, and asked permission to build a mobile phone mast. Mercury sent Mrs Allison a design showing a bog-standard metal pylon, and unimpressed she countered with a sketch of a folly tower, which she thought would be more suitable as an object in the landscape. To their great credit, Mercury thought this was a wonderful idea: their draughtsman turned Mrs Allison’s sketch into a formal design, and Inkberrow Folly was born.

Not everyone agreed that a folly was an asset to the area, and there was some opposition to the structure. The local planning department was baffled, calling it ‘a most unusual proposal.’ For a brief period the tower became known as Moone’s Folly in ‘honour’ of a councillor who was initially against the scheme; happily, he came to appreciate the idea of creating a landmark, and planning permission was granted by Wychavon District Council. In November 1995 the remains of the observatory were demolished and work began to erect the tower. The scaffolding came down in spring 1996, revealing the new folly. Again, top marks to Mercury, because the tower is constructed of a mellow brick, with a lovely detail around the blocked windows that could so easily have been plain to cut costs. There are great views of the eye-catcher tower as one approaches the village, and only at close range do the masts on the turrets become obvious. The tower looks as if it has been there for centuries, and as technology inevitably moves on, the tower will hopefully stand long after its usefulness as a mast is over.

Mercury Communications are no more, but their name lives on in the Mercury Music Prize (now Hyundai Mercury Music Prize), which they supported from its launch in 1992. In 1996, when the folly tower was unveiled, the winner of the prize was Pulp with their album Different Class, which title also sums up this particular ‘phone mast.

More recently, Vodafone planned a new tower to be built on the Rushmore estate in Wiltshire, home to William Gronow-Davis. When the mobile phone company pulled out of the deal, Gronow-Davis decided to build it anyway as an eye-catcher from the mansion. He thus follows in a family tradition of folly building, as he is descended from General Pitt Rivers who created the Larmer Tree Gardens on the Rushmore estate in the 19th century. Designed by Walshe Associates, the tower was completed in 2009, and Gronow-Davis thinks ‘it is wonderful and just finishes the garden off’.

All of the follies featured here are on private land – but their elevated position means that they are visible from roads and public footpaths.

Huge thanks to Gabby Allison for showing The Folly Flâneuse the tower on the wettest of days, and getting soaked to the skin in the process. Just look at the sky in the photo’s…

Thank you for reading. If you have any questions or thoughts please scroll down to the comments box – feedback is very welcome.