The Elysium Fields...

In Greek Mythology the Elysian Fields were a separate realm of the underworld reserved for mortals related to gods, the righteous, and the heroic. It was a place of splendour and beauty to eek out eternity. I thought this would be a great name for the field we have set aside for our Wildflower Project.

Above: The field created between the farm and the bell-shaped lawn.

Below: A map to where the sculptures and pyramid folly are planned, and where the mown allees through the flowers are planned...

The Stags...

We have sourced some magnificent stone stags with bronze antlers from the UK. They are duplicates of ones at Raynham Hall, Norfolk.

They will flank the entrance to the farm...

we did look at getting more life-like bronze stags...

but settled on the more heraldic poses of the stone ones.

The Pyramid

Pyramids and obelisks are shapes that appealed to the Georgians strong sense of geometry, which stood out as clearly neoclassical. Young gentlemen would have come across plenty to marvelous examples on their grand tours and then wanted to recreate them on the country estates.

They are simple enough to build, and I am going to have a go at creating one out of wooden framing with concrete board cladding, which I shall then have plastered when the manor house is having its exterior done. It will be much easier to move and much less expensive to construct than a stone one, but will still be the same size - one that you can walk through with an arch similar to The Needle's Eye of wentworth Woodhouse

Balmorality....

Balmorality: Abstract noun; an enthusiasm for a stereotyped Scottish aesthetic.

I was prompted to do this post after being given several well chosen gifts from my mother for the Balmoral / Billiard room at Willowbrook - A large set of pewter deer antlers, a pair of pewter stag book ends, and a pewter sculpture of a stag and a doe.

They reminded me of a documentary I had seen about Balmoral Castle, and the Victorian aesthetic movement known as Balmorality. Victoria and Albert were enamoured with a very romantic ideal of Scotland, the sort portrayed by the Scottish poets and novelists, such as Sir Walter Scot. They made their castle a concentrated pastiche of this stereotyped 'scottishness'. 

Photo: Stuart Yeates

Above and Below: Balmoral Castle

Balmoral Castle was first leased by Prince Albert in 1848 and subsequently purchased in November 1851. The 15th-century house was soon regarded as inadequate and was replaced by an entirely new, larger building. Prince Albert helped with the design, and Queen Victoria wrote proudly, ‘all has become my dearest Albert’s own creation, own work, own building, own laying out’.

The interiors of Balmoral were given a strong Scottish flavour. The carpets, curtains and upholstery were in a range of tartans, including ‘Hunting Stuart’ and ‘Balmoral’, designed by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Wallpaper incorporated patterns of thistle and heather, and the walls were hung with drawings by Edwin Landseer and prints of his paintings, mostly Highland scenes. In the Drawing Room there was a remarkable set of 12 candelabra in the form of Highlander figures holding deerstalking trophies, a collaboration between two British manufacturers, Minton and Winfield. Furniture was made by the London firm of Holland & Sons to simple but high-quality designs, mostly in light woods, such as satin birch or pine. Pieces for the most important rooms were embellished with silvered mounts, decorated with the royal couple’s ciphers or Scottish symbols.

Every year the Queen and the Prince travelled north for their autumn Highland holiday, enjoying the home of their own making and the freedom they found there. Prince Albert made his final visit to Balmoral in 1861, just months before he died. The Queen continued the tradition of the annual Highland stay following Prince Albert’s death, making her last visit to the Castle in 1900.

Stag heads and tartan abounded. Unsurprisingly, this style has continued to be popular periodically, with ever changing contemporary twists.

Taxidermy in general has a sort of Baronial style about it, though not always tasteful...

 I very much like the stag wallpaper. No animals harmed in the making thereof...

Tartan of course figures heavily in the Balmorality movement. Tartan was briefly outlawed with the 1746 Dress Act after the Jacobite Rebellions (with the exception of the black watch Regiment).

Photo: eclecticrevisited.com

Photo: interior-freedom.blogspot.com

Photo: Alkemie.blogspot.com

Here is the vintage documentary about Balmoral, including a good explanation of Balmorality...

For those interested in tartan decor and scottish themed style, you might like to check out Tartanscot's blog.

For those interested in Taxidermy, see our previous posting.

The Boys' Weekend...

Well, I finally took a weekend off work, my first in 6 months, and went on an overnight tramp with some mates...

We started off from Hamilton in the early hours and spent the morning fishing in the Tongariro River, which is famous for its trout...

Despite seeing quite a few fish in the river, we didn't catch a thing. - but then it was midday. Not having time to stay for a twilight fish we carried on south towards Tongariro, parked up, and set out on the Urchin Trail up over the Kaimanawa Ranges.

Dominated by the Kaimanawa mountain ranges, the Kaimanawa Forest Park encompasses a vast (77,348 hectares) largely unmodified expanse of native forest, shrublands and tussock grasslands. It was gazetted in 1969 and is managed to protect and conserve soil and water, native vegetation, wildlife and scenic values.

It lies south-east of Taupo and extends from Tongariro National Park in the west to the Kaweka Ranges in the east.

It was a blisteringly hot day.

Below: Lake Taupo in the distance, from the first summit.
The trail starts near to lake level.

It then winds its way up through stunning native bush...

before breaking out of the bushline into rocky alpine terrain...

from the first summit we hiked over the ranges below...

to the Waipakihi Valley river flats below...

After a long day's tramping, and a futile effort at stalking deer on the river flats, we settled down to a roaring camp fire and a rough meal of Fillet Mignon with seasonal vegetables and a bottle of Shiraz before scoffing down some creme brulee and settling in for a night of port and cigars under a cloudless sky enblazoned with stars (talk about slumming it!).

We forgot the marshmellows though!

The state forest is home to much wildlife, including Sika deer

and wild horses, known as Kaimanawa horses, which are protected.

for more information visit the Department of Conservation website.

Deer Parks, Bowood House, & The Queen's Corgis...

Deer, and especially stag hunting has been a part of English country life, and in particular, Royal life, since time in memoriam.

Royal herds of red and fallow deer have been maintained in Richmond Park (above) (2,500 acres of wild woodland) since the time of Charles I and their bloodline is said to go back to the middle ages. The other park where the queen has herds of deer is Windsor Great Park ( below).

Below is a photo of a stag taken near our estate in the Scottish Highlands near Fort William, and some other pictures of the surrounding countryside during Winter and Spring.

It would be nice to place some life-sized bronze sculptures of a stag and a doe on the park somewhere, as an homage (because having real deer is a very complicated matter, when one 's estate is not set up primarily as a deer farm).

Perhaps a pair of subtle pillar caps, like these ones below, would be nice?

Or perhaps something larger: The stone stag below is a copy of a lead stag at Bowood House in Wiltshire, England.

The Stag is one of a pair which takes pride of place on the steps leading from the formal gardens to the Orangery, originally laid out by Capability Brown.

Bowood House

Bowood House was purchased by the 1st Earl of Shelburne in 1754, and remains the family home of his descendants, currently the 9th Marquis and Marchioness of Lansdowne.


The House and Gardens have been improved by successive generations up to the present day. Many great English architects and garden designers have been employed, including Henry Keene, Robert and James Adam, ‘Capability’ Brown, C.R. Cockerell and Sir Charles Barry.

Today Bowood boasts fine 18th-century architecture and splendid interiors: the Adam Orangery, the Chapel and Library by C.R. Cockerell, the New Hall, the Sculpture Gallery and the Laboratory where Dr Joseph Priestley discovered oxygen in 1774. There are also a series of exhibition rooms displaying fine furniture, costumes, pocelain, jewellery and paintings.



Outside, the house is surrounded by ‘Capability’ Brown’s stunning park; there are formal gardens, a ‘Picturesque’ rockwork garden; and the renowned pinetum and arboretum

The first house at Bowood was built c.1725, on the site of a hunting lodge in the former Royal Forest of Chippenham. The house and park were bought by the 1st Earl in 1754, who employed architect Henry Keene to extend the house, including an imposing portico, and to build an extensive E-shaped service wing behind it. Soon after his father’s death, the 2nd Earl (1737–1805) commissioned the Adam Brothers to decorate the important rooms and to screen the service courts with a grand orangery. An Adam mausoleum for the 1st Earl was also constructed in the park. At the same time, ‘Capability’ Brown was employed to remove the earlier semi-formal gardens and create an open, gentle landscape, with a sinuous lake and belts of trees, all typical of his style. A ha-ha was constructed near the house and a ‘pleasure ground’, for interesting trees and shrubs, was formed behind the house. In the 1770s, the two parts of the house at Bowood (the ‘Big House’ and the ‘Little house’) were joined together by the building of an enormous drawing room. During the following decade, a ‘Picturesque’ rockwork garden, with a beautiful cascade, grottoes and a hermit’s cave, was formed at the head of the lake.


The 2nd Earl, Prime Minister from 1782 to 1783, was created Marquess of Lansdowne for negotiating peace with America after the War of Independence. He furnished Bowood and his London Home, Lansdowne House, with superb collections of paintings, furniture and Classical sculpture. His father having died deeply in debt, the 2nd Marquess (1765–1809) stayed away from Bowood after the contents were sold. It was the 3rd Marquess (1780–1863), Chancellor of the Exchequer at 25, who restored the house, commissioning C.R.Cockerell to design the chapel, and alter the library, and Sir Charles Barry to build the clock tower.

The famous terrace gardens also date to this period as do the pinetum and arboretum in the Pleasure Grounds and the first planting of rhododendrons.

A distinguished statesman, the 3rd Marquess served in the House of Lords under eight prime ministers, and formed another great collection of paintings and sculpture, rivalling those of his father.

The 4th Marquess (1816–1866) married Emily de Flahault, granddaughter of Prince Talleyrand and daughter of the Comte de Flahault who was Napoleon’s aide de camp; and it was through this connection that the fascinating Napoleonic Collection at Bowood came into the family. The 4th Marquess was responsible for having the small Doric Temple removed from the Pleasure Grounds to the far side of the lake.

When the 5th Marquess (1845–1927) succeeded, the family fortunes were again in decline. He became Governor-General of Canada and Viceroy of India. On his return to Bowood in 1894, the Big House was used only for entertaining and the family lived in the Little House. The situation remained unchanged during the life of the 6th Marquess (1872–1936) and up until the Second World War.

Both the 7th Marquess and his brother were killed in action in 1944, the title and property passing to their cousin. During the War, the Big House was occupied by a school, then by the RAF. Afterwards, it was left empty, and by 1955 it was so dilapidated that the 8th Marquess decided to demolish it, employing architect F. Sortain Samuels to convert the Little House into a more comfortable home.


The grounds encompass almost every phase of English garden design from the early Georgian period onwards. The present Marquis of Lansdowne opened the house and gardens to the public in 1975. He has maintained and improved Bowood’s many magnificent features over the last 30 years, initiating major replanting schemes and introducing new plantings, such as the daffodils in Lake Field and the tree ferns in the Rhododendron Walks.

The park remains much as ‘Capability’ Brown intended, with a fine lake, gently sloping lawns and drifts of trees. The late 18th century ‘Picturesque’ rockwork valley remains below the lake dam, incorporating the cascade and caves. Closer to the house are the great 19th-century Italianate terraces: originally lying in the angle between the Big and Little Houses, they now form the south front to the house.

And now I digress further...

Above: Random picture of QEI depicted with a stag's head. Odd the sort of things one comes across!

I thought of the movie, The Queen, when I was writing this post, recalling the scene in the middle of the movie with the Queen and the stag:

Which reminded me of the corgis...

Note: The staircase Mirren is standing on is not the staircase in Buckingham Palace, but the staircase in Halton House, one of the many homes of The Rothschilds, which is currently used by the R.A.F. (Note the '5 arrows' monogram of the Rothchild's in the iron work at the top of the bannister...

Back to those corgis, who in real life get to travel all over the world with ER.

A friend of ours used to be the Vet to The Queen's corgis, particularly her corgi Ranger.

Here endeth my flight of thought.


The Trailer for The Queen