King's Weston House, a recently renovated English Baroque mansion in Bristol

Kings Weston house was built between 1713 and 1719 and was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh in the English Baroque style. It lies to the north-west of the centre of Bristol.

The estate buildings and the mansion are the biggest collection of buildings designed by Vanbrugh outside of the South-East. Bristol is also the only city outside London to have any buildings designed by him. He worked a lot with Nicholas Hawksmoor and was originally a dramatist. Eventually, Vanbrugh would go on to do much of the design for Blenheim Palace, the residence of the Dukes of Marlborough in Oxfordshire. However, that job did irreparable damage to his reputation.

One of the house's main architectural features is the impressive arcade of chimneys, which you can see below:

The mansion is a Grade I listed building and the land around, which is open to the public, is a Grade II listed landscape. The house has recently been bought and renovated and I was lucky to be in one of the first groups to dine inside since the work was completed.

Many of the original features have unfortunately been removed over the years. The house itself was extensively remodelled in the 1760's and then again between 1845 and 1860. It has been through many different uses, having been a family home, a school of architecture, empty for five years, a conference centre, a police training college and a hospital during the First World War. However, there are still a few interesting things still about.

One of the most striking features of the interior is the ornamental plasterwork on the ceilings. Much of this was designed by Robert Mylne and executed by Thomas Stocking in a large-scale remodelling of the house's interior during the 1760s.

Stocking also made plasterwork 'frames' to show the inherited family portraits of Edward Southwell, the man who commissioned Vanbrugh to design Kings Weston house. These frames were also to Mylne's designs. The original portraits have recently been renovated and reinstalled.

In the same large room is a very impressive skull with antlers. It was once an Irish elk, which had the largest antlers of any deer that has ever existed as far as we know.

These creatures were unrelated to modern elk and the most recent remains were found in Siberia and carbon dated to about 7,700 years ago. Many skeletons have been found in Irish peat bogs, hence the name, but the range of this deer was much wider, from Ireland into Russia. Adults were as large as a modern moose (about 2.1m or 6.9 feet at the shoulder) but the antlers were up to 3.65m (12 ft) across and weighed up to 40 kg (88lb)!

One of the Southwell family was a Secretary of State for Ireland and he may have brought the antlers to Kings Weston.

The 'hanging staircase' is also noteworthy, floating in the entrance hall and extending upwards for three stories (sorry for the quality of the photo!). Apparently, the only other surviving example is in St Petersburg, Russia.

There's not a huge amount of carving to be seen, but there are some interesting pieces of furniture in the house:

...as well as a couple of interesting fireplaces. This one, with fighting cherubs on a marble plaque, is in the large saloon with the elk antlers:

It was possibly carved, at least in part, by John Deval to Mylne's designs in the 1760s. Deval certainly carved at least one other fireplace in the building. Most ornamental features were removed during 1938, prior to the house becoming a school, with many of them being stored in the cellar. After the Second World War, much of the ornament was stolen or damaged (even leading to questions in Parliament in 1947, about how best to conserve the building). One of Deval's marble fireplaces was recently rediscovered in 2013, still in the cellar where it had been stored.

This Tudor fireplace stands in the main hall below the floating staircase and near to some interesting trompe l'oeil paintings showing statues and vases. Perhaps it may have come from the building which stood on the site before Southwell commissioned this mansion. Vanbrugh was often keen to conserve and use older features in his buildings (trying and failing to do so when designing Blenheim Palace).

The new renovations look very sympathetic to the heritage of Kings Weston House. It's great to have had the opportunity to see inside.

Two very different castles: Portland and Clun

Portland castle overlooks the harbour on the Isle of Portland in Dorset. It was built in 1539/40, by order of King Henry VIII, to guard the important anchorage there known as the Portland Roads. It only saw real action during the English Civil War of 1642 to 1649.

The building doesn't have the feel of a Tudor building from the outside, probably because the hard-wearing stone hasn't weathered too much. There's no timber framing visible either! The low profile of the fort made it harder to hit with cannon fire and the side facing the sea is rounded, so that cannonballs would be deflected off. 

We didn't have a chance to go inside, but you can and the building is looked after by English Heritage. 

Looking at the castle from the side facing towards the mainland, you can see the crosses in the wall through which defenders could fire towards the sea. The castle looks very small in front of the towering apartment blocks nearby, which were built for the Navy and also to house athletes competing in the sailing events at the recent Olympics.

The Isle of Portland is famed for it's limestone, which has been quarried for use in construction all over the world. The 'island' is connected to the mainland by a tombolo, a causeway of shingle that is part of Chesil Beach. In the photo above, you can see the flat top of the island, from the quarries that covered it.

Many of London's finest buildings are made of Portland Stone. As Portland castle shows, the stone from the best beds is hard but carves well and this is the material of choice for many British stone carvers. These carvings set into the wall by the Chesil Beach Visitors Centre are examples of such work:

This is the address for the English Heritage website page about Portland Castle:

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/portland-castle/#Right

Clun castle was already in ruins when Portland castle was being built. It is situated in the village of Clun in Shropshire, on the Welsh borders. The castle is thought to have been established by Picot De Say not long after the Norman invasion and was owned by the Fitzalan family for many years. 

The Great Hall built by them was impressive, but impractical. It is on the side of the motte, or mound, so would have been very vulnerable to being undermined during a siege. Eventually, the Fitzalans decided to spend their time on their more luxurious Sussex estate at Arundel and by the 16th century the castle was a ruin. 

Visiting Clun castle is still worth it though. The remains have a romantic, ruined grandeur about them and the area around is very beautiful.

The ruins of Clun castle are also looked after by English Heritage and their web page is here:

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/clun-castle/

Woodspring Priory and Tithe Barn. A medieval monastery converted into a Tudor house in North Somerset

Whilst delivering a super-kingsize bed recently (see the previous post!), I had the chance to visit Woodspring Priory. The original monastery on the site was founded in 1210 and housed monks belonging to the Victorine order of the Augustinian Canons. The land would originally have been on an island by the Severn Estuary (although I'm guessing that the ground inland would have been partially if not completely drained by the 13th century). The area is now a National Trust reserve called Middle Hope and is near Weston-super-Mare.

The founding patron of the Woodspring (or Worspring as it was then known) Priory was William de Courtenay. He was a grandson of Reginald FitzUrse, one of the murderers of Thomas à Becket. 

The founding of Woodspring Priory was probably a gesture of penance, especially as de Courtenay is thought by some to have brought his grandfather's remains to the monastery and reinterred them, possibly near the remains of some of the other murderers such as William de Tracey. 

There are regular archeological investigations in the surrounding fields as the grave has still not been found, although other stories claim that FitzUrse was buried in Jerusalem or in Ireland (after founding the MacMahon clan).

Woodspring was converted into a farmhouse in 1536, when king Henry VIII started to break up the monasteries in England during the Dissolution. The house was actually built into the old church. The large monastery windows were filled in with stone walls and smaller mullioned windows as part of this, to reduce their size. 

In 'Church Woodcarvings: A West Country Study', JCD Smith says that some of the misericords (carved wooden rests that folded away, for clergy to lean against during long services) that were originally in the Priory are thought to now be in the nearby church at Worle. They are beautifully carved and one shows a shield bearing the initials PRS, which probably stands for Prior Richard Sprynge who was prior of both Woodspring and Worle in 1443.

You can read more about the history of Woodspring by following this link:

http://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/our-landmarks/properties/woodspring-priory-13260#tabs=1

It is interesting to walk around and see architectural features that have been removed or altered during that time, but it's also important to note that the buildings are on private land. The Priory is now owned by the Landmark Trust who hire it out as a place to stay, so their permission is needed to go into the grounds. There is a small museum onsite that the public can visit, but it has very irregular opening times. 

The 15th century Tithe barn is owned by the National Trust but is a working barn, used by the local farmer to store hay and machinery, Potential visitors should bear this in mind. Luckily, friends of mine live next door to the site and know the caretakers and the farmer, so we visited with them.

A carved figure holds a heraldic shield by a doorway into the garden

Corbels and Gargoyles run along a garden wall

The remains of a circular staircase can still be seen in the wall of the Infirmary

There are some interesting decorative woodcarvings inside the Priory, although I don't know if they were originally part of the Tudor house or not:

 The Tithe Barn

Next door to the Priory is the Tithe Barn, which has some beautiful timber work in it's roof, as does the Infirmary (which unfortunately I don't have photos of). It was built during the fifteenth century, when the monastery was at it's busiest.

Tithes were contributions to the church, usually a tenth of whatever the contributor had. This was often paid in a form that wasn't money, such as agricultural produce, so needed a big barn to hold it. My friends got married in the barn, hence the bales covered in red cloths, but it is still a working barn and usually holds hay and tractors.

If you would like to stay in or by Woodspring Priory and explore it further, my friends rent out a shepherd's hut next door. You can find out more by visiting their website:

http://www.woodspringfarm.co.uk/

The Landmark trust's website can be seen here:

http://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/