Lacock Abbey
Mar. 6th, 2025 09:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
puddleshark
On the principal that, when on holiday, one must visit at least one National Trust property.
Lacock Abbey in the village of Lacock, Wiltshire, England, was founded in the early 13th century by Ela, Countess of Salisbury, as a nunnery of the Augustinian order. The abbey remained a nunnery until the Dissolution of the monasteries in the 16th century; it was then sold to Sir William Sharington who converted the convent into a residence where he and his family lived.
The house was built over the old cloisters and its main rooms are on the first floor. It is a stone house with stone slated roofs, twisted chimney stacks and mullioned windows. Throughout the life of the building, many architectural alterations, additions, and renovations have occurred so that the house is a mish-mash of different periods and styles.
The house later passed into the hands of the Talbot family, and during the 19th century was the residence of William Henry Fox Talbot. In 1835 he made what may be the earliest surviving photographic camera negative, an image of one of the windows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lacock_Abbey
Architectural mishmash!
"About 1550, Sir William added an octagonal tower containing two small chambers, one above the other; the lower one was reached through the main rooms, and was for storing and viewing his treasures; the upper one, for banqueting, was only accessible by walking across the leads of the roof." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lacock_Abbey
Three sides of the cloisters survive.
If it looks familiar, I believe it featured in the Harry Potter films. (Which would explain why some of the visitors were wearing what appeared to be Hogwarts uniforms. Either that, or I wandered into Hogwarts.)
Shall we head into the house?
Lots of wonderful long galleries, to wander along on a 16th century rainy day.
In this room, William Henry Fox Talbot took what might be one of the earliest photographic negatives.
Latticed window at Lacock Abbey, August 1835. A positive from what may be the oldest existing camera negative.
Still Life with walkie-talkie & dosimeter (little blue fabric slide, used to measure annual light exposure in sensitive areas).
Foo Dog.
Through a glass, darkly. Restoration in progress.
The original Tudor great hall of Lacock Abbey was demolished and rebuilt in the newly fashionable Gothic style in the 1750s, with niches in the walls filled with terracotta statues that were cast on site, of saints and biblical figures, historical figures, and ancient philosophers.
I thought at first that this was a modern addition - part of the Harry Potter connection - but no, it is an original 18th century statue of Diogenes, with his lantern, seaarching for an honest man. The National Trust attendant kindly invited me to sit in her chair and read her folder of notes identifying quite a few of the terracotta figures. There was a very entertaining sentence along the lines of "Sederbach had a habit of putting pointed hats on philosophers". (And now I picture him stalking David Hume, with a pointed hat in hand...) Pointed hats being emblematic of wisdom.
Picture of Diogenes taken by Fox Talbot in 1840. Source: https://talbot.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/2015/12/04/diogenes/
Stained glass dated 1619 in the Great Hall. Recycling old stained glass was popular in Gothic design - Horace Walpole had an immense collection of Flemish glass at Strawberry Hill.
no subject
Date: 2025-03-07 11:32 pm (UTC)When I see something like this, I can't help but wonder how much expenditure of wealth and hours of human labor it represents. And it's an ongoing thing.
no subject
Date: 2025-03-08 07:36 am (UTC)Yes. A vast expenditure of wealth and time. I suspect the National Trust is probably one of the biggest employers of craftsmen/craftswomen, restorers and curators in the country, if not the world.
no subject
Date: 2025-03-09 11:00 am (UTC)Lol, I'm glad we're not the only ones who instinctively adhere to this stipulation!
no subject
Date: 2025-03-09 11:17 am (UTC)And scones should form part of the ritual where possible.
no subject
Date: 2025-03-09 11:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-03-09 11:20 am (UTC)