Hello Sally. Thanks for this great comment and all the info. Yes I saw the arch but didn’t have space to include it (and it was not a good day for photos). I’m so pleased you were able to get involved. The park was busy with people of all ages when we visited – even on a very cold and foggy day.

Good afternoon Digby. I visited Pearson Park for the first time a couple of weeks ago when researching this post. I was pleased to see that the cupola was still extant, and I was very impressed by the handsome villas around the park.

Hello Gwyn. It was only mentioned to me a few weeks ago and I dropped everything else to investigate as it is such a great story. The map is wonderful: the zoo must have been a fabulous attraction in its heyday.

Good afternoon Graham. I really hope someone did salvage the stone in Hull, and that the masonry rests quietly in a garden rockery somewhere in the city. Good luck with your own folly.

Hello Judy, and I’m pleased you found the story of the Ruins interesting, it was great fun following the journey of the stones through time. Think the Ruins in Hull succeeded because they were so clearly just an ornamental hotch-potch, rather than an attempt to recreate a ruin from a foreign land.

What a fascinating article and a great shame the component parts have been lost along with their provenance. Half way through the construction of my own folly. Surprisingly it has similar features and design although on a smaller scale. Have had to use new reconstituted stone features, how wonderful it would have been to salvage and use the stone from Hull