In the 1740s William Kent designed a new garden ornament for Thomas Coke of Holkham. An artificial hillock was constructed on which the temple was to stand, giving it the name the Seat on the Mount. The temple was later pulled down, but fragments of the four busts which once decorated it were salvaged, and incorporated into a cottage in a nearby village. The Flâneuse has written about follies built from the remnants of houses, but a cottage decorated with the remnants of a garden temple is something new.

The ‘New Mount’ at Holkham was constructed in 1742, and the Seat on the Mount the following year. The sculptor Peter Scheemakers provided the four figures, two female and two male, that decorate the front elevation. Coke (1697-1759), created Baron Lovell in 1728 and 1st Earl of Leicester in 1744, could visit the seat and from its elevated site he is said to have watched as his new house was constructed.

The architect Matthew Brettingham Senior, who had overseen building work at Holkham, produced a volume of views which included an engraving of the Seat on the Mount. His text tells us that the temple was home to a ‘small antique figure of the Nile’ and a ‘Coro Marino’ (Sea Chorus) of sea nymphs, centaurs and cupids in alto relievo. The figure of the Nile was added to the earl’s collection in 1752, and the bas-relief panel of sea creatures was bought by Coke in Rome in 1716, and was originally part of a sarcophagus. It was noticed by a visitor in 1767 who saw the summerhouse with an ‘ancient Bass-relief in the wall’.

It would seem likely that the Seat on the Mount was taken down when parts of the garden were remodelled in the late eighteenth century. The figure of the Nile had been moved into the house by 1817, and the summerhouse does not appear on nineteenth century Ordnance Survey maps. The art historian Adolf Michaelis complicates matters by mentioning the ‘Seat on the Mount’ in his Ancient Marbles in Great Britain, which was published in 1882. Perhaps he was using outdated information? What is certain is that by 1907 the heads from the Seat on the Mount had been used to embellish a simple cottage in nearby Burnham Overy Town (actually a village, but thus named to distinguish it from Burnham Overy Staithe).

How the figures came to be moved to Burnham Overy Town to decorate the little cottage remains another puzzle, and many passers-by must have wondered about the history of the carved heads.

One such curious tourist was the late follyphiliac Jeffrey Whitelaw, and in 1960 he wrote to Country Life magazine asking if anyone knew the origins of the statuary. Whitelaw questioned if the busts were artificial stone from the Pulham factory, but the mystery was solved a couple of weeks later when the Duke of Wellington replied via the magazine’s letters page. The Duke confirmed that the ‘canephoræ’ originally decorated the temple at Holkham. Arthur Wellesley, 7th Duke of Wellington (1885-1972) was an architect, and is of course famed in follydom as the designer of Lord Berners’ tower at Faringdon. Canephoræ are caryatids bearing a basket on their heads that serve as a capital (although strictly speaking canephoræ are female, and two of the figures here are male).

In the later years of the twentieth century the fragments were moved to new positions in the tiny front garden, where they remain today. The cottage is now called ‘The Images’ and can easily be seen from the road through the village, and here’s a rather appealing view of it by artist Richard Swallow.

Holkham may have lost the Seat on the Mount, but other fine garden buildings can still be seen including the Obelisk (see the plate above) and the Temple. The latter was built in 1734 after a sketch by William Kent.

And of course there is the mansion itself and the wonderful collection it holds. The statuette representing the River Nile and the bas-relief panel remain in the family collection (not currently on display), although the latter has fallen apart and is now incomplete.

Coincidentally (i.e. the Flâneuse is not on commission) the cottage is currently on the market. There’s more here. Everything you need to know about Holkham can be found on their website.

For information on sculpture at Holkham the Flâneuse is indebted to The Holkham Collection of Classical Sculpture by Elizabeth Angelicoussis.

Further information is always very welcome. You can get in touch via the comments box at the foot of the page (only your name will appear – your email address remains private). Thank you for reading.

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The Allerton Castle one sees today is a great Victorian edifice, created in 1848. But the site has been home to a number of renovations and rebuilds, gone through several changes of name, and seen some colourful owners. On a knoll in the park stands an elegant octagonal temple, which must have attracted the attention of passers-by on the nearby Great North Road (A1), but sadly it is seldom mentioned, and its history remains a little vague.

In the 18th century the estate was known as Allerton Mauleverer, after the family who lived there. In 1713 Richard Mauleverer died without a direct heir, and the estate passed to Richard Arundell. He commissioned a new house from the architect John Vardy, before he too died without issue in 1758. He left Allerton to his wife for her lifetime, before it passed to his cousin by marriage, Viscount Galway.

Galway already had estates of his own, including Serlby in Nottinghamshire, where he was employing the architect James Paine. This connection has led to Paine being credited as the designer of the temple at Allerton Park (as it became known as the century progressed) during Lord Galway’s residence. But although Galway was Arundell’s heir, he did not take control of Allerton until Lady Arundell (born Lady Frances Manners, a daughter of the Duke of Rutland) died on 27 November 1769, and as the temple is shown on Jeffrey’s map of Yorkshire published in 1771 (but crucially surveyed in 1767-70), the evidence suggests it was erected by the Arundells.

There are a number of potential architects of the temple, including Arundell himself. He is known to have given architectural advice to Sir Robert Walpole at Houghton, and was for a period Surveyor of the King’s Works (where he would have known William Kent), so he would have been perfectly competent to design a garden temple. Arundell was a great friend of Lord Burlington and shared his admiration for the Palladian style. He employed John Vardy, a close associate of Kent to design a new church at Allerton, completed in 1748. The work of all of these men may have influenced the design, and especially Kent’s temple at Carlton House in London, c.1735-6, illustrated above. But James Paine also remains a contender: he was at Allerton in 1754, and when Arundell wrote his will in April 1756 it was witnessed by Paine.

Although prominent on its hill, not far from the Great North Road, the temple was seldom noted by passers-by. There is a rare account in 1783: a guest at Kirby Hall, a few miles away, ‘rode through exceeding pretty grounds & a handsome wood’ to Allerton Park. He described the landscape as a ‘collection of little hills’ which gave views of the lakes. Some of the eminences were topped with clumps of trees, but in what he called ‘the crack spot’ was the ‘good Octagon building which looks over a very extensive and rich country’.

A few years later there was great excitement in Yorkshire when it became known that the Duke of York, second son of King George III, had bought the Allerton estate for ‘more than £100,000’. The Duke completed the purchase in 1786, and the following year hosted a grand entertainment for ‘his tenants, their families, and in short the whole neighbourhood’. He was also visited by his brother George, the Prince of Wales, for a weekend of country sports. Although the Duke sold the estate only a few years later, his association with the estate has become legend in the form of a nursery rhyme – it is said that it was on the Allerton estate that the Grand Old Duke of York marched his men to the top of the hill, and then marched them back down again. Readers won’t be surprised to learn that other hills across the country also claim this honour.

During their sporting weekend at Allerton, the Prince of Wales and the Duke were entertained at the home of Colonel Thornton, who lived nearby. Thomas Thornton (1751/2-1823) was a well-known figure, a great sportsman, and is remembered as a rather colourful character. A contemporary believed that ‘There is an insanity in the family of Thornton, which accounts for his eccentricities’.

When the Duke of York looked to sell Allerton in 1788 it was Thornton who came up with the funds to buy the newly-improved property (one lady wrote to a friend that the estate was ‘too far North to be agreeable I imagine’).  With the blessing of the prince, Thornton changed the name of the estate to Thornville Royal. It is probably during Thornton’s time that the little pavilion became known as the Temple of Victory (it is only ever called ‘The Temple’ on estate and OS maps) as it was illuminated to celebrate naval successes, including Trafalgar.

In 1805 the estate again changed hands and became the seat of the Stourton family. This time there would be some continuity and the family still own much of the estate, although the mansion and temple are in separate ownership.

By the middle of the 19th century the Temple’s original role as a banqueting house, or belvedere, had fallen out of fashion. As is so often the case with redundant garden buildings, it was put to work as a dwelling house. Throughout the second half of the century the diminutive structure was a family home for estate workers: first the shepherd was in residence with his wife and 7 children, then later the ‘cow man’ moved in with his wife and 6 children.

In the early 1980s what was by now called Allerton Castle was bought by entrepreneur Dr Gerald Rolph, who wished to restore and conserve a grand mansion. The temple and the land around it came into the ownership of Dr Rolph’s charitable foundation a few years later. In 1993 the grade II* listed temple was made secure at a cost of £85,000, with English Heritage contributing just under half of that sum. Work continues to keep the lovely little structure in good repair, and safe from the ever-intrepid vandals.

There is no public access to the temple, but it can be seen from the castle and from public roads. For more on Allerton Castle, which is a wedding venue and open to the public for tours https://www.allertoncastle.co.uk

Historic England commissioned new photography in 2019, after garden features in the wider (private) estate had been restored, and have kindly given permission for images to be used here.

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In the early 1940s the artist Rex Whistler completed the illustrations for a book in his breaks from training with the Welsh Guards, working on the drawings in the army huts where he was stationed. The book was The Last of Uptake by Simon Harcourt-Smith, and the reviews agreed that here was ‘the perfect blend of artist and writer’.

Harcourt-Smith (1906-1982) was a former diplomat who wrote on a wide range of subjects, but The Last of Uptake is not typical of his work, as it started life as a lighthearted tale to entertain his wife who was in plaster after a car accident. Rosamund Harcourt-Smith (née Miller) was a society beauty, photographed by Beaton when her engagement was announced. She was known for her stylish outfits, so when Whistler (1905-1944) arrived to stay during this period he was offended by the standard crutches she was using to get about, and immediately set to work to design her a ‘princely pair, in a somewhat rococo taste’.

Simon Harcourt-Smith’s book tells the story of Uptake, a decaying stately home where the Ladies Tryphena and Deborah muddle by with a handful of ancient retainers. Their Palladian mansion is surrounded by a pleasure ground designed by perhaps William Kent, or Capability Brown, and dotted with follies and curiosities. These include a stepped pyramidal ice-house, a Chinese pavilion, a shell grotto, a hermit’s cave, sham Roman ruins, and automata such as a woodman who swings his axe at the turn of a key. When the sisters discover that their favoured heir has died, they decide upon drastic action and burn down the mansion.

The book jacket blurb makes clear that the story is a ‘fantastic confection’, dreamt up by Harcourt-Smith’, but he does write that parts are based on ‘legends’ told by his family and friends. One who might have sowed the seed of an idea is Edward Arthur Donald St George Hamilton Chichester, 6th Marquess of Donegall (1903-1975). Donegall sat in the House of Lords as Baron Fisherwick, a title taken from Fisherwick Hall, a former family seat in Staffordshire. Lord Donegall told his friend Harcourt-Smith the tale of how Fisherwick Hall was ‘inhabited by two maiden sisters who fell out and burned the house down’. It is true that the Marquess’s ancestors were forced to sell the Capability Brown designed Fisherwick house and park in around 1800 to settle debts, and it was demolished soon after, but there were no sisters, and no fire – and in fact no-one other than Donegal (who admitted his tale was ‘probably fictitious’) seems ever to have heard this myth.

Rex Whistler was in his element drawing such fantasy buildings. He loved follies and garden ornament, and favourites such as the Boycott Pavilions at Stowe, and the Palladian Bridge at Wilton, made regular appearances in his work. Part of the fun of the book is trying to figure out the British houses and gardens which might have influenced the text and pictures (track down a copy and try it for yourself). One may even have been fictional: Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca had been a huge success when published only a couple of years earlier, with its haunting description of Manderley in flames.

The Last of Uptake was published by Batsford, and as well as the standard copy there was a deluxe version in a limited edition of 100. This was printed on handmade paper, and signed by the author and illustrator. The book was well-received in the press, but the ‘delightful piece of literary embroidery’ was overshadowed by war. In 1967 Solstice Productions of London reissued the book with a foreword by Rebecca West. She wrote that The Last of Uptake ‘has long been a treasure of mine, and I have always thought it a great misfortune that it failed to be recognised as a classic because it was published during the war’.

Of course the greatest tragedy was that Whistler himself never knew how much pleasure his illustrations gave to readers. He was killed in action in Normandy in 1944, and as Harcourt-Smith wrote in July 1945, it was not easy to think of ‘resuming the round of peace without him’.

Rex Whistler’s original drawings for The Last of Uptake are in the collection of the National Trust at Plas Newydd on Anglesey, where the dining room features an enchanting Rex Whistler mural  https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/plas-newydd-house-and-garden

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Writing in Tatler magazine in 1961 the writer, and champion of the British countryside, Ronald Blythe, questioned why follies were common in the countryside, but seldom found in the city. Long before the ‘concrete and glass’ that constituted the cities in Blythe’s mind, costly and extravagant ornamental structures could be found on the streets of the capital. These were the triumphal arches built to celebrate the coronation of a new monarch.

Three arches, created as part of the pomp and pageantry surrounding the coronation of James I, feature in a new exhibition by internationally acclaimed artist Ed Kluz. Facades, his new show at the John Martin Gallery in Mayfair, looks at London and includes ‘reconstructions’, in paper collage and oil, of the arches. Always intended to be temporary additions to the London streets, they were built in wood and then plastered, painted, and peopled with ‘engines’ – automata animated from behind the scenes.

The James I coronation pageant was a cause for particular celebration, as it had been postponed due to an outbreak of plague. The 1603 epidemic, coming soon after James I had inherited the throne, caused devastation in London and further afield. The festivities were held over until the following year, when they also marked the city’s recovery and resilience.

Stephen Harrison, architect of the arches, thought his designs would live on only in ‘the tongues and memories of men’, but he hadn’t counted on London’s flourishing print trade. The James I arches were recorded for posterity in a series of annotated engravings, thus allowing Ed Kluz’s programme of ‘rebuilding’ in 2019.

The tradition of building temporary triumphal arches continued over the centuries, as did the publishing of plates:

©Victoria and Albert Museum, E.424_1898. Triumphal arch designed by William Kent. Erected and painted on the West End of Westminster Stall for the Coronation of his Majesty King George the Second and Queen Caroline. October the 11th 1727.

A new take on the genre was Eric Bedford’s design for illuminated steel arches across The Mall at the coronation of the Queen Elizabeth II.

To see Ed’s vibrant works and learn more, you will need to visit the John Martin Gallery on Albemarle Street before 5 October. As a further incentive other works include palaces, pleasure pavilions and pagodas.

https://www.jmlondon.com/exhibitions/facades-by-ed-kluz/