a Grand Tour in Surrey [pt 3]
When we last left Painshill Park, we were standing in the Gothick Temple, taking in the view across the lake.
In the middle of the lake is a funny little grotto. It's rather remarkable, although a very difficult structure to photograph. It sits on a tiny island in the middle of the lake - or rather in the island, as part of it acts as a sort of cave-bridge, with the lake running beneath it - filled with stalactite crystals that show up as all sorts of pretty colours when photographed. It was damaged by Canadian soldiers billeted at Painshill during WW2 and left to fall into further neglect after that, but is now being painstakingly restored, using limestone from the Cotswolds, fitting the pieces together like a jigsaw puzzle. There's an on-site workshop at the top, where you can see people carving up huge chunks of limestone and trying to fit them together.
The grotto is only open at weekends, but there are still enough places where you can peer inside, and parts where you can stand and be surrounded by walls. It's a slightly eery experience, as it looks like a cross between a natural cave and an ossuary. The pieces of holey limestone look a lot like bones, and in many places almost like skulls. It seems to serve as the nightmarish counterpart to the fairy-tale dreaminess of the two hillside pinnacles, and it's not hard to imagine some sort of witchy goings-on happening there. I also discovered, looking at this picture on my computer later, that there are all sorts of funny faces to be found in the rock (link to them here because the image doesn't seem to show up when it's embedded)
There were two pretty bridges connecting Grotto Island with the mainland. The Chinese Bridge (above) has already been replaced, but the five-arch Palladian bridge that was made of wood and plaster rendered to look like stone has yet to be rebuilt, and the bridge that stands there at the moment is wholly unremarkable.
A popular design in folly-building is the sham ruin, and Painshill has two of them, both of which have the ironic history of having been built as a fake ruin, left to fall into neglect, and been partly restored. One is a ruined Roman Mausoleum, which really could do with a full restoration, to return the arch which joined the two pieces together. As it stands, it's not a very interesting building at the moment, but could be quite pretty if it more resembled the ruined triumphal arch that was originally there - even if the votive spaces could no longer be filled with Italian antiquities, as they were during Hamilton's time.
Following the path westwards takes you to a nice cast-iron Bramah waterwheel, which is still in working order. It was installed installed by a later owner of Painshill, William Cooper, High Sheriff of Surrey. (He also employed Bramah to build a suspension bridge over nearby Portsmouth Road.) The waterwheel sits by a lovely-smelling timbered shed, looking incongruously modern compared to the pastorally romantic visuals of the other structures; although it wasn't in use when we were there.
At the other side of the lake, The Turkish Tent (designed by Henry Keene) looks like something from a fairy-tale; with its white drapes and golden finial nestling in all the greenery, it looks far too exotic to appear in such eminently English surroundings. It's also reminiscent of a medieval tent, and one could almost imagine it to be possible to look out of it and see people jousting below (which is highly unlikely, as the lake is right underneath it).
The tent is - and always has been - a solid building with additional drapes. The original drapes were made of canvas and papier-mâché, but have been replaced with fibreglass to last longer, although they still look exactly like a tarpaulin. Like the Gothic Temple, the Turkish Tent sits on the tip of a hill, and and the view from it is rather lovely, with a long vista across the lake, with the Gothick Temple and the Grotto in sight below.
Leaving the Turkish Tent, we crossed the Elysian Plain, which is a peaceful garden, full of amazing colourful flowerbeds, to find the site of the Temple of Bacchus. Originally, this contained a statue of Bacchus that stood two metres high. There are no remains of the temple at the moment, but you can see what it looked like here. Although there's no structure at the moment, there is a spectacular hilltop view across the Surrey countryside. From there, we discovered a long walk to the Gothic prospect tower. It's not the most exciting building, but it was a nice surprise to suddenly come across it, looming out of the trees unexpectedly. (It's also the only site apart from the visitor centre which has toilets, which were much-needed by that point!)
There's a 99-step walk up the narrow spiral staircase to the very top, which can seem a little daunting after walking so far already. There's a small room on the third floor with a little exhibition about the tower, which suggests that, although built in imitation of a medieval watchtower, it was never used as one, and was probably used to house artwork from Hamilton's collection. It was accidentally burned out by some reckless schoolboys in 1974, and finally restored with the help of local artisans 15 years later. There are some nice views of the Alpine Valley from the top, although one side is less pastoral as it's filled with pylons marching across the countryside. I like the structure of pylons, though, so that was okay with me. Out on the roof you can't see so much because of the high castellations which protect you from falling off, which is a good thing, because it's a long way down. It would make a very nice private roof terrace if you lived in the building, though. In fact it would be a nice little building to live in, if it wasn't for the A3 motorway thundering past right outside, or all the steps, which weren't a problem to climb, so much as they made me slightly dizzy when I was going back down in circles.
We didn't make it to the Hermitage, which is quite nearby, but photos show it to be a tiny wooden cabin, barely big enough to live in. During Hamilton's time, it was briefly home to a real hermit who was contracted to stay there for seven years with "a Bible, optical glasses, a mat for his feet, a hassock for his pillow, an hourglass for his timepiece, water for his beverage, and food from the house. He must wear a camel robe, and never, under any circumstances, must he cut his hair, beard, or nails, stray beyond the limits of Mr. Hamilton's grounds, or exchange one word with the servants."
For this hardship, said hermit was engaged at £700 a year (a fairly enormous sum at the time), but was caught sneaking off to the village inn, and the contract was severed.1
The last folly we did make it to was the ruined abbey, right next to the vineyard we'd seen when we first set out on our perambulations. It's the second of the sham ruins which has been restored, and as a result works better at a distance, as the white exterior is too bright and new-looking to work convincingly with the ruined edges, and it's a bit disappointing to see the supporting brickwork on the interior wall, because it reminds one too easily that the whole thing is a fake (which was a problem with the Roman Mausoleum, too).
Perhaps by this point, we'd also become a bit jaded by seeing so many wonders, or just tired from walking so far. Also, to be honest, after the magical romance of the Gothick Temple and the creepy mystery of the grotto, everything else felt a tiny bit like a letdown. (Which is not to say I didn't enjoy seeing them all, and all the lovely views, because I did!)
We managed to make it back to the visitor's centre just in time to order something before the cafe closed, and had a lovely restorative cream tea with a generously huge portion of clotted cream, and a handsome red-eyed pheasant wandering around the tables. A charming end to a charming afternoon.
More photos here and here.
1It turns out that someone else tried to live in the Hermitage recently; in 2004 artist David Blandy spent two weeks living there as part of his Barefoot Lone Pilgrim project. He even created a minicomic!2
2Speaking of Painshill and minicomics, I got a nice comment on my first Painshill Park post, from someone I met at Caption who said they worked on restoration of the grotto - but I have no idea who it was! Do you?