Willowbrook Christmas Update...

Well, last week I had a quick trip back to NZ, just for four days, to see how everything was going, and to catch up with friends and my Dad who was back in the country for Christmas. Everything was doing pretty well out at WBP...

Above and below: The entrance to the Bluebell Walk. It has come on quite quickly since it was planted 2.5 years ago.

Below: The grass knoll behind the lake where the Temple Folly is going.

Below: The plans for the Temple Folly

Below: The view down the south avenue of The Lime Walk from the upper balcony.

Below: Same view from the start of the avenue. Note where the statue of Bacchus is currently shall be the position for the Roman Rotunda.

Below: The plans for the Roman Rotunda

Below: The view from the Rotunda back to the Manor

Below: The view down the east avenue of the Lime Walk from the Rotunda to the Urn en Flambeau

Below: The view from the Rotunda down the north avenue towards the farm...

Below: A panorama from the farm gate at the end of the north avenue, with the new barn on the left and the large piles of mulch ready for use.

Below: View of The Nymphaeum from the upper balcony.

Below: The Vineyard, which has come on in at a great rate since it was created just over 12 month ago.

Below: My friend Gaynor at the entrance to The Vineyard from The Potager.

Below: Some of the berry beds in The Potager. The one in the centre is full of black currants.

Below: Blackberry Blossoms...

Below: Raspberries

Below: The Dovecote with the entrance to The Orchard from The Potager behind it.

Below: Willoughby decided he was too tired to shift when Daddy was trimming the hedge.

Below: The Orchard, with a view of The Manor rising in the distance.

Below: One of the Horse Chestnuts. They are the slowest growing of all the trees that we have planted, but they have still grown about 3 feet over 2 years.

A view over to Spencer's corner and The Nymphaeum...

Manor House Progress...

This week the block work was finished for the second floor, ready for the trusses to go on hopefully by Friday. Then the builders will be having two weeks off for Christmas, before getting back into it (which is really neat, as most builders would take a month off over this period). We are tracking on time and on budget so far. At this rate the roof should be on early February, with lock up not too far behind that. They are also planning on starting construction of the Carriage House and Chapel in the new year, then the huge job of the interior fit out will start.

Above: A view of the Manor from the West.

Below: A view of the Manor from the South.

Above: A view of the front portico forming, with the balcony above.

Below: A view inside The Manor from the front door.

Above: A view inside The Ballroom. It looks small inside until you have something to give it scale, such as in the photo below, where Peter is standing in one of the arched doorways...

Below: A view of Badger's Wood and The Serpentine Walk from the upper balcony.

And finally, a view of the sunset from the Master Bedroom...

The Roman Rotunda...

I just love this picture (above) from the archives of Country Life magazine, of a classical rotunda of decent proportions. Following on from our previous post on the Lime walk going to the rotunda, I thought it would be apt to do a post on rotundas and the sort of rotunda that we will have at Willowbrook.

In Classical architecture, a rotunda was a building (or room within a building) that was circular in plan and covered with a dome. The ancestor of the rotunda was the tholosof ancient Greece. They differed in as much as a tholos was shaped more like a beehive rather than a dome.

One of the better known examples of the rotunda is the Pantheon (pan-theos meaning all-gods), a temple started by Marcus Agrippa in 27 BC. However, he did not live to see it completed, and it was finished by Hadrian in 126 AD. Like many buildings, it has been rebuilt at times, and in its current incarnation is a Catholic church (the many alcoves once filled with statues of every god of Rome are noticeably empty).

Above: Picture taken of altar inside Pantheon last year.

The Latin inscription on the front of the pediment reads "M·AGRIPPA·L·F·COS·TERTIVM·FECIT" (Marcus Agrippa, Lucii filius, consul tertium fecit), which translates as "'Marcus Agrippa, son of Lucius, Consul for the third time, built this".

Still nearly 2000 years later, it remains the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome.

It is highly coffered on the inside, up to the large oculus at its zenith.

The dome is also noted for its perfect hemisphericism - its diametre at the base of the dome is twice as wide as the height.

It was built by building a huge mound of dirt, then creating the dome over the top and excavating the dirt out again.

The Villa Rotunda at Vicenza is an Italian Renaissance example, designed by the influential architect Andrea Palladio (post to follow).

It was begun in 1550, and features a large central hall that is circular with a low dome. For further information on Villa Rotunda, have at look at Architect Design's post about it here.

It was later copied by English architects in houses such as Lord Burlington's Chiswick House, which also features a rotunda pavilion in its gardens:

I am leaning more towards the styles of rotunda below:

The plan below (from Haddonstone) shows a rotunda without balustrading, like the picture above.

The plan above (from Haddonstone) shows a rotunda with balustrading, like the picture below:

Above and Below:
The Queens Theatre from the rotunda at Stowe House,Buckinghamshire.

More examples of charming rotundas: