East Cowes Castle
| Location | East Cowes |  Gallery |
||
| County | Isle of Wight | |||
| Year demolished | 1960 | |||
| Reason | Unknown | |||
East Cowes Castle was a fairytale vision and home of the renowned architect John Nash who designed and built it himself. The Castle was an important building in it's own right as part of architectural history for its role in the spreading of the nascent Gothic revivalism movement both in the UK and abroad.
Nash had been visiting the Isle of Wight since 1793 and in 1798 he bought some land in East Cowes overlooking the bay and started building. The castle was a typical John Nash 'Gothick' country house of which he had designed and built several including Luscombe Castle in Devon and Lough Cutra Castle in Ireland - the design of which gives an impression of what East Cowes may well have looked like.
The resulting house was noted for its towers, turrets and extensive crenallations. In 1868 the National Gazetteer1 wrote "...its picturesque turret, rising boldly over the wooded screen which embosoms it, forms a pleasing addition to the scenery of the coast" and in Mason's Guide2 of 1876 as "...a large castellated mansion and when beheld from the sea, or the opposite banks of the Medina, with its towers and battlements rising above the luxuriant plantations around, [it] has a fine and pleasing effect". According to George Brannon, who wrote a famous travel guide to the Isle of Wight in 18493, East Cowes Castle "...enjoys a truly enviable site (for it combines an uncommon degree of shelter with the most extensive and animated prospect)". The house he described as having "...three handsome fronts of varied elevations, with a tasteful diversity of towers, mantled more or less by the most luxuriant ivy...". Brannon in his earlier book, 'The Vectis Scenery'4, had decided that "The west or Conservatory front is perhaps the most beautiful: opening upon a bowling-green terrace —and through the graduated tints of several vistas in the luxuriant plantations, are some very pleasing catches of the more distant objects."
Brannon also wrote that Nash would occasionally make additions and alterations as the whim took him. Though this was usually to the benefit of the overall Picturesque look, the result was also that the changes "...certainly [are] not calculated to insure the greatest amount of domestic convenience (as regards the size and arrangement of the rooms)". These changes no doubt contributed to it's eventual demise as an inconveniently arranged house was seen as more of a burden.
Nash died in 1835 and the Castle was sold the same year to the Earl Shannon. Following his death it was bought by one N. Barwell esq. in 1846 and the furniture and art collection sold. The house was demolished in 1960 and the site is now covered by a housing estate though the ice house and Lodge remain.
1 - 'The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland' (1868)
2 - 'Mason's Guide to the Isle of Wight' (1876)
3 - 'Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight - The Expeditious Traveller's Index to Its Prominent Beauties & Objects of Interest. Compiled Especially with Reference to Those Numerous Visitors Who Can Spare but Two or Three Days to Make the Tour of the Island.' - George Brannon (1849) - n.b: this is a large file, approximately 1.2mb
4 - 'The Vectis Scenery, Part 1' - George Brannon (1848)