In 1922 the writer and illustrator Charles George Harper penned a series of three articles about follies for The Architect magazine. Harper was a prolific author and had noted many follies as he toured the nation, often including them in his books on the topography of Britain. The articles were illustrated with his own vignettes of some of the buildings he admired (or censured). As for the foibles, which some may find a rather weak description of the eccentricities of Harper’s character, read on…

As ever in a feature on follies, the author had to deal with the question of a definition. Harper (1863-1943) concluded that a folly was a ‘pleasant fancy’ in the shape of a garden-house, a gazebo or perhaps even a ‘skyline freak’. As he continued, ‘now we have settled the nature of follies, the next thing will be to find some’. This, he thought, would be far from difficult, as the ‘land abounds with them’. Harper was sure that once a folly had been found, ‘the traveller who happens to be of a speculative turn of mind will find his curiosity greatly piqued to learn the story’.

Harper began with the building which he thought was ‘architecturally the most interesting’: the Triangular Lodge at Rushton in Northamptonshire. This was, he wrote, a building in which ‘Sir Thomas Tresham gave full outlet to his peculiar bent of mind’ by building a structure in which all measurements and decorations were governed by the ‘mystic three’.

In Cornwall Harper visited a ‘prime curiosity of the gruesome kind’ in the form of the mausoleum of Sir James Tillie. The monument was then derelict, but peering through a small gap the statue of Tillie could be seen – a ‘ferociously ugly man, with scowling countenance and great protruding paunch.’

Jack Fuller of Sussex (best known as Mad Jack Fuller) was described as ‘one of those squires who could not leave a hill-top alone in its natural beauty, but must needs place on it something in the way of a building, generally something ugly’. This was illustrated with a view of the Sugarloaf, supposedly erected to help Fuller win a bet that he could see Dallington church spire from his home. In fact he couldn’t, and the story goes that the cone was erected in a great hurry to ensure he won the wager.

William Beckford was noted as a man who frittered a fortune building towers, and an elegant sketch of his surviving tower in Bath was included in the article.

Harper was known for his strong opinions, and wasn’t afraid to air them in print. An anonymous review of his The Marches of Wales in The Athenaeum in 1895 noted how he went into ‘rhapsodies on discovering a Conservative cobbler’ but ‘shrieks against Dissenters, teetotallers and Radical politicians’. He was also accused of passing a ‘somewhat unjust judgment on the character of the Welsh people’.

To this list of pet hates might be added the women who were (to his mind) threatening the established order. In particular, Harper was no fan of the increasing numbers of female journalists who had ‘invaded newspaper offices’ and who were all more interested in the ‘cut of a dress’ than the ‘fall of a statesman from office’. He makes this sweeping statement in 1894, in a book that was a curious departure from his usual travelogues: Revolted Women: Past, Present and to Come. After what Harper called Eve’s ‘stupendous faux pas‘, he wondered why womanhood wasn’t content to ‘sit, for all time, humbly under correction, satisfied with her lot’ instead of aspiring to rule men while they had ‘no efficient control over [their] own hysterical being’.

But back to follies…

Harper also noted that not everything called a folly was actually a built structure with an interesting history. As an example, he gave the hilltop clump of trees in Berkshire (now Oxfordshire) which had long been known as Faringdon Folly. One wonders what he made of the tower that Lord Berners erected on the summit only a decade or so later: no doubt it would have fallen into the ‘skyline freak’ category.

All of the follies mentioned are publicly accessible. Most have been covered in these pages – the search function will take you to the relevant posts.

Assuming she can control her own emotions (Harper didn’t think this possible of any females, especially writers) the Flâneuse will be back with another folly story next week. Thank you for reading.

As the festive season approached in 1970, families would have pored over the special edition of the Radio Times to see what treats the three television channels could offer. If on New Year’s Eve had they walked across the room to warm up the set, and twiddled the knob to find BBC One, they would have seen a programme called Follies of the Wise presented by Spike Milligan. The writer, actor and comedian toured Britain looking at follies: ‘strange monuments to our ancestors and their passions’. It must have reached a good audience, broadcast at 6.45pm and sandwiched between Nationwide and The Andy Williams Show.

The programme starts with Milligan on the roof of St Peter & St Paul in Ormskirk, Lancashire. Legend has it that two sisters were unable to decide whether the church should have a tower or a spire, so eventually they built both – it is complete nonsense as the tower and spire were built a century apart, but Milligan liked the tale and composed a limerick which he recited from the rooftop:

A lady in Lancs said a spire
Is what every church must require
But her sis with a glower
Said ‘A church needs a tower’
So they built one with both … and it’s dire.

Milligan then enjoys creating a glorious gallimaufry of characters, real and imagined, to tell the story of folly building, or ‘littering great lumps around the countryside for us to contemplate’, as he calls it. The programme budget must have been generous, as in England Milligan filmed follies as far apart as Somerset and Yorkshire. In Wales he acted out the history of Paxton’s Tower, and in Scotland he visited the monument on Calton Hill in Edinburgh, McCaig’s Tower in Oban and the Pineapple at Dunmore.

At Dunmore a Scotsman (Milligan in the style of Fyfe Robertson) interviews the Earl of Dunmore (Milligan) and asks the question in the minds of all who see the structure: ‘why a pineapple?’. After a pause the earl splutters… ‘well, why not?’.

In Somerset, Milligan became Jack the Treacle Eater, the mythical messenger who climbs down from atop his monument to fortify himself with treacle before running great distances to carry news. Milligan is seen scampering up and down the rocky base to the little turret having gorged on a mug of treacle.

At the Triangular Tower in Northamptonshire Milligan becomes the ghost of Sir Thomas Tresham, and at Dunstan Pillar in Lincolnshire and West Wycombe in Buckinghamshire he plays a troubled Sir Francis Dashwood on the psychiatrist’s couch. In Yorkshire he appears at the top of Wainhouse Tower as the eponymous builder of the huge chimney. And many more follies are visited with the creation of many more characters – the Flâneuse lost count when she reached 36 costume changes.

As one TV critic commented at the time (probably quoting a BBC press-release), ‘Spike’s explanation of why they were built may sometimes be more entertaining than plausible’. Actually, he doesn’t take too many liberties with the truth until he reaches Old John tower in Bradgate Park in Leicestershire.

Here his imagination runs riot, and in the character of a colourful local he tells a gullible American tourist (also Milligan) that the tower is used for ‘fish squirting’, ‘knee-crushing’ and ‘owl riveting’ and also as a ‘nun refinery’. The reviewer for the Leicester Daily Mercury thought the programme ‘delightful’ even though an ‘odd explanation’ was given of the history of the Leicestershire landmark. This is something of an understatement, and in fact a look at the original shooting script reveals that Milligan ad libbed this wacky description.

Bringing things right up-to-date Milligan featured Centre Point, the new 34 storey tower on London’s New Oxford Street. Milligan felt it was a folly as it had cost a fortune, but had stood vacant for some years after completion. The developer was insistent that it should be let to a single tenant, and he could afford for it to sit empty until he achieved this goal. Campaigners thought it would be better used to provide temporary accommodation for London’s homeless: Centrepoint, the charity which supports homeless young people, was named after this cause célèbre. 

Milligan ended the broadcast outside the building dressed as what the BBC called a ‘Hippie’ and singing The Tombs they are a-changing – an adaptation of Bob Dylan’s hit with lyrics about the follies he has visited.

Follies of the Wise was repeated in 1971 and 1972 before disappearing into the BBC archives. The Folly Flâneuse was lucky enough to see the very grainy (hence no stills featured here), and very zany, film.

Follies of the Wise was written by Sandy Brown and Martin Pawley after an original idea by R.G.Payne, and was directed by Jim Franklin. The Costume Designer, Barbara Lane, is to be commended for providing Milligan with outfits for his many characters.

The Folly Flâneuse has made a donation to Centrepoint in recognition of the help she received with this post https://centrepoint.org.uk

A fellow folly fan remembers racing off to visit Jack the Treacle Eater in Somerset after seeing it in Milligan’s broadcast. Does anyone else remember watching? Please scroll down to the comments box to share any thoughts. Thank you for reading.

Late in 1963, a series of books was published with an eye for the Christmas market. Three of the titles featured British landmarks in the form of Bridges, Monuments, and Follies, and they were launched in time for ‘Christmas reading, New Year travelling’. Whilst Sir Hugh Casson, as editor of the series, was the big name to capture the attention of shoppers, the real heroes were Paul Sharp who provided the wonderful whimsical illustrations and bold design, and the writer E.M. Hatt, whose bright prose is a delight to read.

The books (there were eventually 8) were published by Chatto & Windus on behalf of the National Benzole Company, with the stated aim being to ‘stimulate and satisfy the curiosity of the motorist, and thus increase the pleasures of his journey’. Of course the books were the brainchild of the marketing department, and there was an ulterior motive: the more motorists explore, the more petrol they buy. The Follies volume was the first, and understandably it is Casson’s name on the cover, but although Sir Hugh writes in his introduction that the follies are ‘wittily and accurately described and affectionately depicted’, Hatt and Sharp are not mentioned by name until the acknowledgements on the final page of the book. The Folly Flâneuse hopes to give them the credit they are due here.

Ella Mary Thompson (1907-1972) was born in Bristol where her father was a newspaper reporter. She spent some time in Paris at the Sorbonne  and then in 1932 she married her father’s journalist colleague, Richard William Hatt. Hatt came from a prosperous Bath family who had been wigmakers, hairdressers and perfumers, but his career was influenced by the field of his uncle, who was Chairman of the Wessex Associated News. A son was born in July 1933, but tragically Richard died at the early age of 40 in September of the same year. After her husband’s death Ella was offered help and support by his sister, the artist Doris Hatt, and her partner Margery Mack Smith.

In 1939 Ella was working in Bristol as a proof-reader and indexer, but by 1942 she had moved to London and found employment with the publishing house Faber & Faber, working with T.S.Eliot. Alongside her work as an editor, she began to write books for children. A volume of verse, Callers at our House, illustrated by Leslie Wood, appeared in 1945, and three stories were published in 1947: Priscilla the Paddington Mouse, with illustrations by Francis Gower, The Cat with a Guinea illustrated by Leslie Wood, and The House that was No-one’s Affair with illustrations by Margaret Wolpe. The 1947 publications were well-received in the press, and recommended as Christmas gifts. She also translated a wide range of works from French and German – her eclectic list of subjects including cookery, caving, and compost.  The latter had become something of a Faber specialism, as director Richard (Dick) de la Mare was passionate about the organic movement, and this section of the list became known in-house as ‘muck’.

Mrs Hatt, as she was formally known at Faber & Faber, published under the name E.M.Hatt, seldom revealing her gender. But there was one exception: in 1962 ‘Ella Hatt’ wrote the text for the last in a series of books produced by National Benzole on the subject of ‘Our National Heritage’. The foreword to Our National Heritage: Gardens was written by Vita Sackville-West, and again the writer and illustrator were relegated to a note at the back of the book. The delightful illustrations and design were by Paul Sharp, and as Vita wrote ‘How delightful it is to come across such a series in a world which tends more and more towards cheapness and vulgarity’. The success of this publication probably led to Hatt and Sharp working together on the Follies series the following year. Hatt’s text for Follies is lively and engaging (the Barwick Park follies are ‘the jolliest collection of frolics’), probably because she had a genuine interest in the subject: her grandson recalls car journeys being interrupted to investigate nearby curiosities.

The visual side of the book was the work of Paul Spencer Sharp (1921-1998). He was born in Sowerby Bridge in Yorkshire, and would have been familiar with follies from a young age, as the mighty Wainhouse Tower dominates the view towards Halifax. Sharp studied at Wakefield School of Arts and Crafts, where in 1939-40 he won an award for designing the school Christmas card. His prize was a copy of the recently published High Street by J.M.Richards with the now-famous illustrations by Eric Ravilious – which must have influenced the young artist. He went on to Leeds College of Art before serving with the RAF in the Second World War. He finished his education at the Royal College of Art and then taught at Farnham School of Art, where he rose to become head of the Department of Design. He left teaching in 1960 to concentrate on graphic design, and would go on to work for clients including the Paul Mellon Centre, the National Gallery, Sothebys, Royal Doulton, Spink and the Mermaid Theatre.

The series of books for National Benzole was a major project for Sharp, and his obituary in The Independent reveals that he drove over 150,000 miles ‘to visit some of the most obscure corners of the British Isles’ whilst researching and sketching. The obituary was written by Paul Atterbury, a specialist in 19th and 20th century art, now recognised from his appearances on TV’s Antiques Roadshow. His father, Rowland, ran the Westerham Press where Sharp was a favoured designer and friend, and where the National Benzole books were printed. Paul Atterbury’s draft obituary (not published in its entirety) remembered his ‘calm and well-ordered graphic style’, and his ability to ‘catch in a few lines and a few minutes, the essence of a building […] he could draw through the car window, or under an umbrella in a howling gale. Nothing could stop him’.

In 1967 the three books on follies, castles, and monuments were reissued in a single volume by The Reprint Society, a book club. Top marks to them for righting the wrong and giving Hatt and Sharp full credit on the cover.

The Folly Flâneuse was delighted to be introduced to the work of artist Doris Hatt, whose work often features Cabot Tower and Walton Castle in Bristol as a backdrop https://www.courtgallery.com/artists/210-doris-hatt/biography/

There’s a short film about Sharp’s work here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxMRRKXsJfg

Thanks for reading. If you have any thoughts, or can add any further information, please scroll down to the comments box at the bottom of the page. 

Halifax has been much in the news recently following the restoration of the wondrous Piece Hall, a Georgian cloth trading centre on a monumental scale. But the town is also home to another amazing structure, the Wainhouse Tower, one of the country’s finest follies. Factory chimney turned witness to wealth, it thrusts 253 feet into the sky above the town.

The story of the tower is initially quite straightforward. From the middle of the 19th century various acts of parliament gave local authorities power to prosecute any industrialist whose works caused ‘smoke nuisance’. John Edward Wainhouse owner of the Washer Lane Dye Works, began to build a tall chimney to carry the smoke far away from the factory. Local architect and surveyor Isaac Booth designed this structure, which was always going to be far more than a chimney. The plans were extant in 1912 and showed a ‘handsome plinth round the tower and an imposing entrance to the staircase’.

When Wainhouse sold the works only a couple of years later, the new owner refused to take on the liability of the lofty chimney. Undettered, Wainhouse decided to adapt the structure as an observatory and, let’s be honest, as a statement of his wealth and status.  Booth resigned from the project, apparently because of a conflict of interest with another client: one Sir Harry Edwards, of whom more in a moment. The tower was completed in 1875, at a huge cost, to an updated design by Booth’s former assistant, Richard Swarbrick Dugdale.

What gives the tower its local name of The Tower of Spite is a dispute between Wainhouse and his neighbouring grandee, industrialist Sir Henry Edwards. The two men were forever squabbling on all sorts of matters in the local courts, and Edwards, a Justice of the Peace, had on occasion to stand down from the bench to fight his corner. Newspaper coverage of the time shows that those in the public gallery thoroughly enjoyed these spectacles, and their reaction is scattered throughout the reports in parentheses: (laughter), (groans), (hear hear), (applause).

One exchange centred on an accusation that Wainhouse had said that ‘if he had a knife, he would have plunged it into Edwards’. Wainhouse denied this and was asked to vouch for his honesty:

Mr Bond: will you swear on that? Mr Wainhouse: I will swear on that and he is a —.

Sadly, Mr Berry, acting for Wainhouse, ‘interrupted the last sentence by requesting his client merely answer the questions’, so we will never know what insult Wainhouse had lined up.

During one of these cases it was alleged that the prosecution was brought out of ‘envy, hatred, and malice’, and certainly the two men appear to have gone out of their way to rile each other. In perhaps the ultimate example Wainhouse literally allowed the masses to look down on his enemy. Edwards lived not far from the tower, at Pye Nest, and was said to be passionate about his privacy. Soon after completion Wainhouse opened the tower to the general public at 6d a go: the panorama from the viewing platform would have been extensive, but there in the foreground was the Pye Nest estate for all to see. Wainhouse apparently denied he acted out of malice, but whatever the truth there was enough history between the two men for the nickname of The Tower of Spite to be born, and remain today.

The tower changed hands on a number of occasions after Wainhouse died, until in 1919 it was bought by the Halifax Corporation, which continues to keep it in good repair and allow public access. Pevsner found it ‘flamboyant and fantastical’ and it is loved by the residents of Calderdale and beyond, often appearing in ‘top ten’ follies lists. You can see the exterior at any time or visit on one of the open days. But do limber up first – there are more than 400 steps to climb.

For 2020 tower open days and more on visiting the handsome town of Halifax https://www.visitcalderdale.com/attra-wainhouse-tower

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts are always welcome – scroll down to the comments box to get in touch.