Category A-Zchallenge
Wigfair Hall and the wandering architect #atozchallenge
I’m starting at Wigfair Hall in Wales, but I am going to wander off to somewhere else by the end of the blog, just to warn you. But first, Wigfair. The Reverend Howard built this large country house on the River Elwy in 1884. Part of the house is a tower, which was originally a […]
Voewood House – a publisher’s legacy #atozchallenge
Most of my posts have been about old, really old houses, so it’s nice to choose one that is more recent (relatively speaking). Voewood House, near Holt in Norfolk, was built for the Reverend Percy Lloyd, the son of the publisher, Edward Lloyd. Lloyd’s publication, Lloyd’s Weekly, was the only newspaper in the 19th century […]
The tale of two Uffords #atozchallenge
For the letter M I told the sad tale of six houses called Montagu. This time I have two Ufford Halls and thankfully, they are still intact. The youngest Ufford is a Georgian mansion near Peterborough. The house was built in 1734 by the Duke of Rutland’s younger son, Charles Manner. His son enlarged the […]
Traquair House – Scotland’s oldest house #atozchallenge
My family and I visited Traquair House just outside Peebles in Scotland when I was in my teens and two things stick in my head – it’s very white and tall, and for some reason, we nicknamed the place Traquack and that also has stuck in my mind. In England, old manor houses were centred […]
Snowshill Manor – let nothing perish #atozchallenge
The point of having a house is to live in it. Isn’t that its purpose? For Charles Paget Wade that wasn’t the case. In 1919, he bought the Tudor manor house of Snowshill in the Cotswold village Snowshill and restored the property. From 821, Snowshill was a monastic building and under the control of Winchcombe […]
Ruffold Old Hall – a guided tour #atozchallenge
Would you like to join me on a guided tour? Please follow me as we enter Old Ruffold Hall, a timber framed manor house in Lancashire. The Hesketh family had been lords of the manor since 1520 and Sir William needed money, so he and his son managed through marriage to acquire sufficient money to […]
Quarry Bank Mill House #atozchallenge
Up until the Industrial Revolution wealth was generated through land ownership and tenants. The aristocracy had first dabs on most of this due to their titles and rights of inheritance, even lesser landlords could generate sufficient income to keep buying and selling property. Country houses and grand estates are dotted up and down the country […]
Peckover House – the banking house #atozchallenge
My father lived in Wisbech as a child. The market town is on the River Nene in The Fens of Cambridgeshire. The fenlands are reclaimed from the sea. Flat like The Netherlands, whom helped drain it, the region with is rich farm soil is criss-crossed with dykes and man-made cuts (rather like canals). Originally the […]
Oxburgh Hall – one family’s legacy #atozchallenge
Oxburgh Hall in Norfolk has just too much history. It’s bursting at the seams. From 1086 there has been a settlement in the parish of Oxborough (meaning fortified place with oxen), which adopted the shorten version of the name. The land belonged to one family for generations and the current house began life in 1482, […]
The Quiet Writer 