Category: historic houses

Bridgerton settings and the case of the missing hangings

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I had planned to visit Belton House anyway en route to Norfolk, but was even more keen after Ellen told me it was used in the recent Bridgerton prequel about Queen Charlotte and King George.

I loved that series, not only for the costumes, which are always fabulous, but also loved the sets. I am one of those people who always wants to know where things are filmed. Thank God for Google so I can find things and add them to my list of places to visit.

Ellen’s friend, Nancy, was actually there while they were filming as she used to work there. The location they used was the beautiful conservatory, which became George’s observatory.

This is located at the back of the gorgeous Italian garden behind the house.

Inside there were some beautiful examples of furniture, including my favourite, needlepoint chairs, and as is common with these era houses, a Chinese bedroom.

One of the main reasons for visiting Norfolk apart from a reunion with some former work colleagues, was to visit Oxburgh Hall. I have wanted to go for about 20 years, ever since first visiting Hardwick, as this is where the companion stitching to the ones there by Bess and Mary Queen of Scots are. Except ….

I had met up with my friend Linda from Spain, who was staying nearby with relatives. We did have a very lovely day out, despite the lack of hangings! It is a stunning moated property and it has been beautifully restored.

There were some very gorgeous Elizabethan era portraits, I love the lace in these. The whole house was so ornate with painted ceilings and leather wallpaper.

I will have to try and organise another visit to see the hangings, hopefully before another 20 years is up!

The rest of the week at Sandringham was very peaceful, I spent a lot of time with my friends which was lovely and quite emotional. Sadly the School of Education, where I worked for 20 years, has been closed and many people have lost their jobs. I feel so sad for my colleagues, who have always worked so hard and wish them all the best for the future.

I will be back soon with more of lovely Norfolk, it has been so nice to have time to explore and I have been lucky to have mainly very good weather. Until next time have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

Stops along the way

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I like to plan some Trust properties or other sites of interest to break up my journeys so here are a few I have visited recently.

Ellen’s best friend from University, Becky, now manages the Droitwich Spa Heritage Centre, a lovely little museum about the salt industry. The town has lots of left over industrial heritage from those days and some beautiful Tudor buildings.

They had a special exhibition a while ago that I just had to go and see, Lisa- Jayne Smith, a retired theatre costume designer, had decided to make 85 Barbie costumes, representing fashion from 1066 to the 1980s.

Such beautiful details on all of the costumes and such a lot of work!

As you can imagine I was thrilled and the costumes are amazing. I must get on with the Tudor one for my dolls that I have been meaning to make since lockdown.

I managed to make a quick visit to Wollaton Hall in Nottingham the same day. If it looks familiar it is because it was designed by Smythson, who also designed Hardwick Hall. It is now the Natural History Museum so the interior is very different.

I also met my friend Lynne from Spain, at Gainsborough Old Hall, a beautiful building with a very unique kitchen complete with serving hatches.

Apologies for the abrupt ending to the last post, whatever I did I could not get it to save anything, so after a week just gave up. As always I hope you are all well and happy. Have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

Lincolnshire skies

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After the Slumber on the Humber festival I went to stay at Mablethorpe for 10 days. I had a really lovely relaxing time here on the coast and was joined for the weekend by my friend Sharon, from Marsden. She is thinking of buying a campervan so had rented one for the week to get an idea of what type she would like.

The weather was really good and I spent most of the time along the coast, and looking at the clouds. Lincolnshire is very flat and the campsite was next to fields, so apart from the windmills in the distance, all you could see was sky and there were some brilliant sunsets.

I went for a few walks to local beach nature reserves, there are lots of salt marsh reserves here and there were amazing clouds over the beaches.

I particularly love this last picture where it looks like there is a fight between the good and bad clouds with the evil.darkness about the envelop the fluffy white one.

We loved the patterns that the water made flowing through the sand and found shells that had worn away to form beautiful patterns of holes.

We did do a little bit of National Trust visiting, to Gunby Hall, which had the most gorgeous gardens and orchard.

The family that lived in the house in the Victorian era had lots of links with the famous writers artists and thinkers of the era. One of the daughters, Emily Massingberd founded The Pioneer Club in 1892 to support women’s suffrage.

Another daughter, Sybil, was friends with Gertrude Bell, the traveller and Middle Eastern specialist who I have blogged about before.

I really enjoy learning about links between all of these inspirational women. It sets all of their lives into context.

We had a lovely time and Sharon enjoyed her cute little campervan. Hopefully she can find one of her own and we can have more adventures together.

I am very much enjoying my time here in Norfolk, after a busy weekend at the Steampunk Festival in Lincoln after my stay in Mablethorpe and then a week at Ellen’s decorating.

Herefordshire heritage

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I had a lovely time a few weeks back when I was staying at the Hereford Caravan and Camping Club site.

There are lots of Trust properties in that area so I was pleased that I managed to visit two as well as Leominster for the embroidery exhibition.

The first of two that I went to in one day was Croft Castle. Like Dunster, in Somerset, this started life as a castle and was then modified into a family home.

The family had close links with the court of Elizabeth 1st, so there were some wonderful portraits in the entrance hall.

One of the exhibits was a, ‘Croft Cloth’, that was made in 2018 to celebrate the centenary of the Representation of the People Act, which gave more people the vote.

The cloth has oak leaves with the names of staff, volunteers and visitors, this being the symbol of the Trust. I love collaborative projects like these, reminiscent of the signature quilts from Victorian era fundraisers.

There was also some interesting embroidery in the form of a collage featuring the castle done in 1960 by Frances Kay.

There were some stunning ceiling and wall decorations that I will add to my possible future designs for needlework, these would look amazing in white work.

The other visit was to Berrington Hall, a Georgian property with a surprise textile treasure.

A dress owned by one of the Georgian occupants of the house, Ann Bangham, was acquired at auction and there is a display of the dress and its construction.

The dress consists of many parts so the textile historians had to reconstruct it. It dates from the late 1700s.

As well as this very good interpretation there is a room devoted to a display by the needlework volunteers who each created their own version of the missing stomacher.

It is brilliant to see so much information about these wonderful people. Often there is no information and little credit given to the volunteers who also produce such high quality garments for visitors to dress in at the house.

The detail on the embroidered jacket here is wonderful, well done to all who contributed to this collection.

I shall be back as soon as I can as I have lots more to share with you. The app for mobile is very slow and as I have only limited WiFi as well posts take a long time to do. Meanwhile I hope that you have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

Dunster and the delights of Devon….featuring roads I will only ever drive on once!

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I do tend to base many of my holidays around National Trust properties, and although this was primarily booked for the coast and moorland, I have been making good use of my membership again.

A couple of days ago I went to Dunster Castle which has a lovely little village below it, and a very interesting history, having originally been a fortified castle from the time of William the Conqueror and survived the Civil War to now be a very impressive former family home.

There was not a huge amount of textile loveliness but I did find this wonderful quilt, made of silks and satins, probably Victorian looking at the fabric.

As well as the interior, featuring Elizabeth and plaster ceilings, Jacobean carved staircases and all the lovely things you would expect to find in a house in almost continuous occupation for 1000 years, there was an amazing garden and Riverside walk, ending at a working watermill.

I love hydrangeas, the colours and shapes are so amazing, and there were so many of them.in the castle gardens.

I have become slightly obsessed with English cottage gardens as well. All this time amongst the bougainvillea and cactus has made me really appreciate the very delicate flowers that were growing in this memorial garden in Dunster Village.

The garden was in the grounds of the old priory, next to the Tithe Barn and a fascinating dovecote dating from the 13th century that had space for 500 pigeons, all bred for eating.

Yesterday I drove across the border into Devon again, to visit the Valley of the Rocks. The coastal path runs along here and the views are amazing.

The rock formations look like ruins of castles themselves.

There are wild goats that live here, one family of which was perched on a ledge so high above the sea.

To get there I had to put on my big girl pants and drive up Porlock Hill, 25% slopes and so many sharp bends!!! I also happened to be following the coastal bus.

Katy and I did really well but I did opt for the route back across Exmoor with slightly flatter roads, stunning views and only the odd sheep and cow in the road. Since I started learning to drive in Marsden that is something I am very used to.

I only have one more day here before I go to my first festival. A few days of meeting other van people and hopefully chilling listening to blues in a sunny field.

I will be back soon with a new location, spending a couple of days in between festivals at a childhood day out location pretending I am 12 again. Until then good bye from my sunny campsite.

Have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

Clouds, coastlines and cottages

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I have now been in Somerset for nearly a week and am very much enjoying my time here. The weather has been variable, but that has meant lots of opportunity to watch the cloud formations over the sea and moorland so I don’t mind at all.

There have also been some fabulous rainbows across the bay.

I have had various posts from friends who are melting in Spain, so am enjoying my 17 degrees!

Minehead is a very cute little town and is the start of a coastal walk, of which there are many sections. I have only done a bit so far due to the rain, but have enjoyed the sea and pebble beach views, very different to my Spanish scenes.

The harbour at Minehead has some cottages with beautiful little gardens.

Somerset is full of quintessentially English thatched cottages and today I went to Selworthy, a National Trust village.

There are four gorgeous little cottages, grouped around the village green, with gardens with some of my favourite flowers in.

Two are a tea shop and gift shop and I think the others can be rented.

There were lovely views over the valley.

The church there was also very impressive, with stunning carved pews and a ceiling full of carved angels and bosses.

There was also another of the Mother’s Union Virgen Mary banners that I have seen in so many churches.

I would love to know if the patterns were centrally supplied for these, as I have seen so many that are similar on my travels.

I also went to Porlock Weir, for another set of cute cottages and pebble beach, and one of the smallest museums I have ever visited.

This was a packed room of all things sea related.

There was some great stuff, like this set of signalling flags from the 1800s.

I am trying out a new app that allows me to make collages which are faster to upload while on the road so I hope you like the layout.

I have another four days here so there will be yet more Somerset fun to share later in the week. Until then have fun, take care, stay safe, and thanks for visiting.

Venice, palazzos, pizzas and more

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Our recent trip to Venice was very interesting, and not just for all the usual reasons such as the stunning scenery and the delicious food. Yes, there was all that in abundance, however there was also a chance to think about the city in its modern context, not just as a fascinating historical city.

One of the things that I remember seeing in lockdown was photos of dolphins swimming in clear waters in the canals of Venice as the tourists were not there, and consequently there was not the constant traffic of vaporettos, water taxis, ferries and gondolas.

The Grand Canal is amazing, and I loved looking at all of palazzos as we passed and wondering about all the people who had built them and lived in them over the centuries.

Venice is one of the most visited cities in the world, with over 25 million individual visits in 2019 and the pandemic and the restarting of travel has prompted Venetians and others to try and think differently about the city.

There are around 250,000 residents in the greater Venice area and only 55,000 who live on the main island. The population is shrinking by around a thousand a year, partly because properties get sold for tourist purposes rather than being affordable for locals.

I was glad that we had already planned lots of the things that are recommended to make travel there more sustainable. We were staying for a week, when many visits to the city are for just a day, especially from people on cruises.

That makes the central areas, such as St Mark’s Square above, very crowded, and also does not benefit the whole of the city as much. One of the arguments for tourism is always the economic benefit that it brings so I was pleased that we had the chance to visit the more outlying parts of the lagoon in our time there.

I knew that Venice was in danger of degrading, but had not really considered what I as a visitor could do about it. However reading information left at the apartment, and later some websites and books about Venice, made me think about my trip in a different way. I travel not just to look at wonderful things, but also to learn about the places that I visit, and this holiday really made me think.

We also stayed on the outskirts of the main island, a decision made out of practicality for us, as I remember the difficulty of finding our hotel last time, but one which is recommended by those who are trying to save Venice from becoming overloaded.

We had the most gorgeous apartment, Apartment Ganeo, in an area called Sant Elena, situated in a beautiful and quiet wooded area, but still on the main No 1 vaporetto route.

That meant that we could use the local facilities there such as the little shops, and three excellent restaurants and bars minutes from our apartment, that served the most delicious pizzas. I can heartily recommend Vincent Bar for the food, hospitality and the view, as we also got to enjoy some amazing sunsets over the Grand Canal.

We also got a chance to see some of what real life was like for the residents of Venice. Being in a more normal part of Venice, where we were finding out about how the rubbish is collected, (door to door each morning and you sort your recyclables before collection), really makes you think about your individual impact as a tourist.

I came across this book in one of the museums and downloaded the Kindle version when I got back. Reading something like this makes you think far more about the impact of mass tourism, especially in such a small city. I love to travel, obviously, and live in an area of a country famous for mass tourism, so it is good for me to think about what I do, both here and when I go away, so that my travel can be as beneficial as possible for everyone.

I have also ordered Jan Morris’ book about the history of Venice to read, which will be waiting for me when I return to the UK.

One of the things that we did was buy a museum pass, and that meant that we visited museums that we not have otherwise, as there were eleven included. This meant we visited some of the smaller, and less well know ones, as well as the wonderful Doges’ Palace pictured below.

That gave us a really good sense of the history of Venice in many different aspects, as well as the chance to admire some truly splendid ceilings, such as these in the Correr Museum!

On the top floor of the modern art gallery in Ca’ Pesaro is the Museum of Oriental Art , there was an amazing collection of Asian weapons, art and lacquerware. It was fascinating to see this, especially having just visited Japan.

I will share some more of the museums in a future post as there were some really exciting textile finds, as well as wonderful medieval art and maps in the Correr Museum.

I appreciate that by visiting Venice I may be considered part of the problem, rather than part of the solution. However I was glad to know that my impact might have been more beneficial than other types of stay. It is good to be aware of these aspects and was something that I will definitely apply to my future travels.

My friends who were visiting me in Spain have now all left. I have had a brilliant ten days and despite dire forecasts the weather was fine most of the time. It is a really hot day today, so I am getting all of my washing dried and planning an afternoon sewing quilt blocks, possibly followed by another trip to the pool if the forecast rain does not appear this afternoon.

I hope that you have had a lovely week, and are enjoying sunny weather and the Bank Holiday if you are in the UK. Whatever you are doing enjoy it, have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

A wander around Wolverley

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The planned visits to Trust properties didn’t happen due to some heavy rain so instead I have been taking advantage of the time to organise the van and have a walk around the village.

This is what I love about being able to travel with no time restrictions, I can spend my life being able to not worry about seeing everything at once, and just enjoy where I am. I will be back in this area in the summer so will add the properties to my list for then.

Wolverley is a very cute little English village, and had a couple of unusual features that make is special.

The first is a local legend concerning the Lord of the Manor, Sir John Attwood, who went off to fight in the early 1200s in the Middle East. He was injured and captured, but was then allegedly mysteriously returned home by a swan.

The legend is commemorated by a carving near the river and the knight’s effigy can be found in the local church.

The Manor House is now a nursing home, but there are many other beautiful old houses, showing this has always been a place of importance. This one below was built in 1876 and reminds me of Lacock Abbey, another Trust house.

There are also some very cute cottages in the middle of the village, some made even more special by the matching garlands on the doors!

I love the idea of spring or Easter wreaths as well as Christmas ones, these tulips are so pretty. It was lovely to see all the trees in blossom along the river.

The village is dominated by a beautiful church which sits high on the red rock outcrop, with a winding path up to it.

As with all old churches there were some gorgeous headstones.

There was also some beautiful embroidery done by the local Mothers’ Union and WI.

I have seen a similar Mary stitching in other churches so maybe it was a common thing for the Union to make.

In the church there was also this very unusual stitched map. There were cross stitched pictures done from photos of village locations with an embroidered map of the village, and information about the houses.

It was there I discovered that the village had some old Rock houses. Similar to the cave houses in Spain, these are a feature of this area.

There were two old ones in the centre of the village, clearly long abandoned but it looked like one had maybe been used for a Nativity or Santa’s Grotto.

I love little wanders like this, off the main tourist trail, it is so interesting what you find. I ended with a nice pint of cider watching a boat go through the lock, all in the name of canal history research you understand!

The van is now sorted properly, I needed to live in it again for a while to work out where things would be be stored and maximise my space.

I will be going back to my sister’s tomorrow and leaving Katy behind for a few months. I still have lots of adventures planned though so will be back here with more of those soon.

Hope you all have a good week, have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

A little rest stop

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I am currently enjoying a longer than planned visit to my old home village of Marsden. I spent a week at my sister’s getting Katy sorted, and then had a wonderful drive to Ellen’s. It was brilliant to be back driving Katy after 5 months away. At Ellen’s I was able to volunteer at the food bank for a day.

They have so many new projects starting. They have recently set up a mobile supermarket for rural areas. They are also planting an allotment and orchard, and have plans for fixing donated white goods, such as washing machines and fridges, to donate to families in need. Although it is not good that they are still so needed, it is brilliant to see everything that they do.

I drove over to Kerry’s last weekend, and we went to Hardwick for a research visit. I have written most of one character timeline for my first novel, and am now starting on the other, which is set in the 1940s. I wanted to see what interpretation they have for Evelyn, the last owner of the house.

There were some really interesting display boards referring to the notebooks she kept when she started conserving the textiles. I am going to contact Chatsworth, where the archives are held, to see if I can visit in the summer to look at these.

One of my favourite displays was of Evelyn’s reproduction of one of Hardwick’s most famous pieces of embroidery. The original has ES in the centre, for Elizabeth Shrewsbury, Bess’s last married name. Evelyn’s had ED, for Evelyn Devonshire.

What was even more exciting than seeing that piece, was seeing her sewing bag. It is often these little human touches that mean the most when looking at textiles, and that is really what the novel is about. I have always been interested in the people behind the textiles, whose stories are often lost.

The plan was then to do a short tour of friends in Yorkshire before heading off to Derbyshire camping, but snow has altered that somewhat.

My lovely friends had all offered me accommodation for my stays, but when I got to Marsden on Monday it was clear that the forecast was not good for the rest of the week.

Two days of snow later and we were digging the cars out of 14 inches of it. In the picture below you can just see Katy buried in the snow!

So I am still at my friend Jane’s house, where I am house sitting for the weekend, and looking after her lovely Frankie, who is not very impressed by the snow as it is so deep. We have been cuddling up on the sofa in fleecy blankets.

Jane managed to get away to see her family by train, but was delayed by 24 hours. The snow has caused a lot of problems here with road closures, as the village is surrounded by moorland.

This has meant though that I have had chance to catch up with everyone here, and go to the new knitting group, which is located at the new wool shop in the village.

Woolly Tap is a gorgeous place, and they have knitting and crochet groups three times a week. If you are in the area do call in, they have so many beautiful things, including accessories and very cute bags.

The wool shop is located in one of the old mill buildings, very near these original tenter posts in the photo above, which were used to stretch the cloth as it dried. This is the origin of the phrase ‘on tenterhooks ‘ as the woollen cloth was hooked between the posts.

I am currently working on a little dress to go with the rainbow dolls that I shared with you a while ago. This yarn is from a friend and is a lovely variegated denim colour. As I will now be here until next week I am hoping to get the last bits of the other set of reindeer knitted, just the feet to go.

I am still hoping to do one week of camping, further south, weather permitting. I will then be back a Ellen’s for a while so can post the last pictures from Paphos then.

It will not be long until I am back in Spain, where it is currently 24 degrees, rather than 1, but I have really enjoyed being back here for a bit.

I hope you have all had a good few weeks, and have coped with any strange weather. Have a good week ahead, and see you all soon. Have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.

Nicosia, and textiles!

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I decided to make two trips to Nicosia as there were four museums I wished to visit, as well as have a wander round, and thought it would be too much to do in a day.

The public transport here in Cyprus is excellent, with very regular inter-city buses that are comfortable, clean and very cheap, and it is a great way to see the country. The bus to Nicosia takes about 75 minutes each way and only costs 7 euros for a return.

The first two museums were the ones that I was most excited about so I went to see those on the first visit. I use Google maps, both for planning and navigating when I am there and they were very easy to find. I had a good wander around the area as well exploring and it was interesting to see the extent to which restoration is taking place.

As I mentioned in my last post Nicosia is a divided capital, the border only having re-opened in 2008. For a really good overview of the history of this lovely island, as well as more information about visiting Nicosia, please see this very useful post by Helen on her Holidays, which I used to help plan my trip.

As the city was involved in so much conflict, and is still a military zone, I was expecting to see a lot of damage, and there was evidence of that. During the 1974 conflict 200,000 people were displaced from all over Cyprus. That is a lot of empty houses, and like Larnaca and Famagusta, many have been left empty since then. It was heartening to see that although there are lots of bits that still look like the picture below, there are many that are being restored.

I came across this very interesting street, near the first museum. One end of it was beautifully restored and the other, although the doors were still there and lights strung up, the buildings were just shells with no second floor apart from the external wall. I do hope that they will be able to complete this one day as they are such beautiful buildings.

The first museum was the Folk Art one. This is housed in the old Archbishop’s Palace, right next to the new palace.

The collection is not large but was beautifully displayed in all of the small rooms of the palace, and concentrated on the traditional crafts of woodwork, weaving, lace making, furniture making and embroidery. Although there were no pictures allowed I have found a very good explanation of Cypriot textile crafts on this site here.

I also found some shops selling work in the city, although a lot of what was for sale was mass produced machine embroidery, rather than the traditional Lefkara work from that village.

The new Archbishop’s Palace was very beautiful, and had some fabulous doors. I also saw the official cars, proudly parked in a glass walled garage outside, one of which may be a Rolls Royce?

Next to the palace was another one of the stunning churches, this time with an amazing gold painted ceiling, and the most ornate chairs for the priest to sit on.

The chairs for the congregation are equally lovely, look at those beautiful carved eagles, they were on every single chair.

Although there is not much goldwork in some of the churches, unlike in Spain, there is always beautiful crochet on the tables used for icons or during the services.

The second museum was just behind the church, this is the House of Hatzigeorgakis Kornesios Ethnographic Museum. This is a house, built around a courtyard, which was the home of one of the city officials during the Ottoman Empire. It was built in 1793 and has been beautifully restored.

The first floor is furnished with a stunning painted reception room, amongst other treasures.

I loved the painted chest, clock, and the carved wood that was once throughout the house.

There was also a small costume and textile collection, so I got chance to photograph one of the costumes similar to those that had been in the folk art museum.

This really shows off all of the exceptional Cypriot needlework skills, from the metal embroidery on the velvet jacket, to the lace cuffs and embroidered skirt.

I then had a wander back to the city centre and a quick walk up the famous Ledra Street. As well as some more beautiful old buildings, this is where one of the border crossings are, and it is both interesting and quite bizarre.

I knew the crossing was there, but one minute you are walking past McDonalds and Starbucks and the next there is a little building with blue striped awnings that is a police checkpoint.

Just to the left is a bench with a mosaic Peace sign, which lots of people come to have their photo taken with.

It was a very sombre experience to see the checkpoint, after all that I have read about Cyprus and Nicosia, and is one part of the city I hope will not be around forever.

The city is also famous for still having its Venetian walls, they surround the city centre, and you can see the star points clearly on the map. Many of the spaces below the walls have been turned into parks as the walls themselves are enormous. I found this painting from Wikipedia of what they looked like originally. I love visiting the star forts that are found all over Europe so this was fascinating.

Of course there were also lots and lots of lovely doors, but since I am visiting the city again this week I shall save those treats until next time, as I may being adding to my collection! This is my last week in Larnaca, I am off to Paphos next for the final 10 days of my trip, where there will be even older things to marvel at.

Hope that you are all having a good week, whatever you are doing. Have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.