Tuesday 18 October 2016

Fantasy architecture and cat-shit


I spent one whole Summer restoring this late 18th century shell and crystal grotto in Wiltshire (near Lacock Abbey) for the late Lord Weinstock. I never met him in person, because he would be in London when I was at his house, and everyone had to leave by the weekend when he came home.

He was an avid note-leaver. He would walk around the grounds at weekends, finding things to leave notes about. One memorable note: "I have noticed cat-shit on the path between the rose gardens. Please clear it up immediately."

This grotto cost around £15,000 when it was built - a colossal sum in those days. Only the rich could afford to display all their minerals, fossils and shells - collected from Grand Tours - in this way, before what we now think of as modern museums were conceived.

The ceiling with the stalagtites was somewhat fucked-up by an amateur restorer in the 1960s, but I think the stalagtites themselves are original. They are made from shards of gypsum crystal, built-up like chandeliers against wooden staves and lime-plaster. Gypsum is easily available and easy to split, so restoring those was no problem.

The real stalagtites and mites which are set into the walls are not so easy to acquire. The original bits were obtained by going down into the Cheddar Gorge caves with a black-powder gun, and shooting them off the roof. They take a dim view of this practice these days.

Many of the missing shells were brought back from the now protected sea-beds of the West Indies and similar places (along with sugar, spice, slaves and all things nice) and cannot be bought legally unless you know a registered dealer with a licence. I found a registered dealer with a licence, in Bristol - where all the sugar, spice and slaves arrived in the 18th century. Licences to deal in slaves are no longer issued, but I am told you can still get one under the counter if you know the wrong person.

Just as with rebuilding car-engines, when you rebuild a few square yards of this sort of wall, you are always left with quite a few bits and pieces for which you could find no home - you simply run out of space. So I have a couple of boxes of rare and irreplaceable (legally) minerals and crystals, sitting around in my workshop, waiting to find a home in a different grotto.

These grottoes are rare, and their restoration is becoming rarer due to the huge costs. Maybe I have technically stolen the bits and pieces?

31 comments:

  1. What will they come up with next? Must have had deep pockets though it is a nice idea. I guess the legends about English eccentrics is true. I love crystals.

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    1. He sat on a cash-mountain all his career in GEC, much to the irritation of the shareholders. When he died, they reversed the policy - and went bust. He was right all along. He bought the grotto with the huge house, and it was damaged in a rare hurricane.

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  2. I clicked on the grotto photo, and seeing the enlarged picture truly reveals what an incredible place it is. I cannot imagine what restoring it must have been like. The results are dazzling. Somehow I
    picture a classical ballet taking place there...dancing on air, of course.

    Best wishes.

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    1. I carefull photographed and drew the damaged section of the wall before it was dismantled, and then the idiot builders not only demolished the rest of it, but they built the backing wall in the wrong place.

      The only other person to have photographed it was Lord Snowdon, but he had destroyed the negatives by then, so I had to use my imagination.

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    2. P.S. Each piece is tied to the backing with a stainless steel wire. I employed 3 people as well as myself, and it took us around 6 months to rebuild about 12 running feet.

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    3. PPS - I lost about £12,000 on the job...

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    4. Wow! I am flabbergasted at the challenge of this project. Sorry about the loss though. That seems very unfair.

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    5. Yes, especially since it was an insurance pay-out for one of the richest men in Britain!

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    6. That's how they roll...as I hear the young folks say.

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  3. I love shell grottos & , as I've mentioned before, there's one near us. Rather a romantic practice ..... I bet many a dalliance & more occurred in them !!!

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    1. They're a bit hard and damp for a dalliance, but if you are enraptured, a bed of nails could be tolerated I suppose.

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  4. Years ago, in my first house, my neighbor summoned me to her yard and pointed out my cat's shit in her rose garden. "But, Mary, cat's bury their leavings." I touched one of the piles and it exploded into fungus pores. She was very embarrassed and apologetic. In further years my cat saved her little dog, tied to a tree, from a huge rat. Her husband came out to see the cause of the commotion, and dispatched the rat with a shovel. They never became cat lovers, but were nice to mine thereafter.

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    1. Sounds as though you have a maligned super-hero for a cat! I think I would have shrieked like a girl if a cat turd exploded into a cloud of sporse when I touched it.

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    2. With a stick. Actually, a twig.

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    3. Ah, now you tell me. Even I would have poked it with a stick.

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  5. It is hard for me to imagine having the money or the imagination, indeed both, to have a grotto like that ...

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  6. My father used to work at Stanhope Gate for Arnie W. during Monday through Friday. My dad was always there, Himself being around except when the horses were running!

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  7. I had a sweet but very damp little grotto in the garden of my house outside of Bath. I wish I had gotten you to restore that one when your skills weren't fetching such high prices.

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  8. I am pretty sure that the farmer and I have visited a grotto but I can't for the life of me remember where.

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  9. First of all, congratulations on your recent blog titles! So enticing! I have only ever seen one grotto. It was the one at Arundel Castle. Did not Prince Charles have something to do with it? It is small, but beautiful.

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  10. The grotto looks beautiful in a very dazzling, weird way. Seems that - when you lost so much money doing the work - the minerals are a only a small compensation.

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