the grange, Ramsgate - gate handle

i have just returned from a week in Ramsgate staying at a Landmark Trust property called the grange (see below) so here begins a period of the grange/Ramsgate rust photographs – the first one is the handle on the entrance gate to the Grange

 

 

Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812-52) was one of the most influential and prolific architects and designers of the 19th century. only 40 years old when he died died in 1852, just two years after the interiors of the Grange were completed, worn out by his pace of work and unbalanced and poisoned by the mercury prescribed to cure recurring eye inflammation. Pugin spent his life trying to revive medieval gothic architecture and design as the only fit architecture for a Christian society - he considered ‘strawberry hill gothic’ as frivolous and the baroque and classical revival styles as pagan. he looked back wistfully and sometimes whimsically to medieval society, which he thought morally superior to the increasingly mechanised and secular society he saw around him. a devout convert to English Catholicism, Pugin built many churches, schools, convents, monasteries and country houses, he also designed the interiors for the Houses of Parliament. as a man, Pugin was passionate, intense, naïve, impatient, combative and funny (no wonder i admire him so much). he worked ceaselessly to recreate, in his own life and works, the medieval life that he idealised, supported by a loyal team of craftsmen and builders who translated into reality his countless designs.

Pugin built few domestic houses and the site in Ramsgate is particularly important because here he was building for himself, to create his ideal setting for his family. he wanted to bring Catholicism back to this part of Kent and so a church and monastery were also part of his plan, to recreate the medieval social structure that he so admired. here he was able to build according to his own true principles, imposing ‘no features … which are not necessary for convenience, construction or propriety.’ built of yellow stock brick and surrounded by walls of knapped flint, the Grange was not an inherently extravagant house despite the richness of its interiors. however, it is quietly revolutionary in the arrangement of rooms and their outward expression in architecture. Pugin was reacting against mainstream classical architecture, which had been the most popular style for the past hundred years and which he considered pagan. Pugin’s starting point for The Grange was not outward symmetry but internal function - how he and his large family were to live in the house. windows, roofs and chimneys were placed to suit life inside rather than external appearance. this cheerful and uncontrived asymmetry became and remains such a familiar feature of English domestic architecture that it is easy to forget how radical it was after the formal terraces of the 18th century. the principle it reflects, that form should follow function, remains central to much of today’s architecture.

Augustus Pugin is regarded as being one of Britain’s most influential architects and designers and to stay here in the home he designed for himself and his family was a privilege (thank you Graham and Brenda) and a unique chance to step into his colourful and idiosyncratic world.

the house was rescued by the Landmark Trust (http://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/)  in 1997 and restored by them to its condition in Pugin's day it was opened in 2006 for up to eight temporary residents at a time. in October 2010, the Grange was awarded the Restoration of the Century award by Country Life magazine