Welcome to the country home of Lord Armstrong. Wow, what a country home. While it was built as a two-story country lodge in 1863, it continued to be expanded and improved until Lord Armstrong passed away in 1900. As recently as 2007 - 2008, it was completely refurbished and its famous iron bridge restored to its former glory.
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| The boys and I on the iron bridge with Cragside in the background. The path from the house to the bridge was made up of steep rock stepping stones through one of (said the guide book) Europe's largest rock gardens. |
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| The rock gardens, on a steep slope down to the iron bridge. |
What we already knew about Lord Armstrong is that he was an inventor and major benefactor to industry and philanthropy in England, particularly in the northeast. We learned this when we went to Bamburgh castle, which he bought when it was only partly renovated and finished the renovation.
Armstrong's country home, Cragside, used hydroelectric power to run a laundry machine, a rotisserie, and a hydraulic elevator. It later installed the first hydroelectric power station in the world, which powered a single (!) arc lamp in the gallery.
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| Mike and Ollie in the art gallery. |
One thing I loved about the interior of Cragside was how it was obvious that Lord Armstrong was a scientist at heart. Actually, it made me think of our little friend back in NC, Andrew, with his moth/butterfly collection in zip-lock bags. :) Armstrong had cases full of his collection of seashells and insects. There were taxidermied specimens of all sorts of birds (I think he particularly liked owls) under cloche jars.
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| Seashell collection in case, flanked by birds of prey in cloche jars. Marble busts and oil paintings, as well as early photographs and even pen-and-ink caricatures were on display all around the house. |
The other thing I really liked about the house was how it was "staged," if you will...as though someone still lived there; for example, opened newspapers and eyeglasses might be out on the side table in the grand room at the end of the gallery (see below).
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| This impressive Italian marble fireplace was designed, crafted, transported, and installed in 18 months to prepare for a visit from the Prince/Princess of Wales. It weighs 10 tons, and had to be installed directly on top of the mountain bedrock on which Cragside is built to support its weight. |
Examples of this were found throughout the house--wooden toys on the floor in the childrens' rooms, crystal decanters half-full of scotch or some other amber liquid, Armstrong's microscope and specimen slides on the desk in his study--but my favorite signs of life were found in the series of rooms called the plunge bath, which was really about five rooms altogether.
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| Going down the stone steps into the plunge bath. |
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| A sauna with a cot for relaxing and fresh towels at the ready. |
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| I'm reading the information sheet with one hand and keeping Ollie from jumping into the Turkish-inspired bath with the other. |
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| Many of the objects in this room were souvenirs from Armstrong's trip to Egypt. This house was one of the first to have hot and cold indoor plumbing (see faucet on the wall). |
After we toured the house, we walked down through the rock garden,
...across the iron bridge,
...down a woodland path and past sheep fields, where we sat on a bench across from this view (below) and listened to the sound of the wind in the tops of the tall conifers,
...up more stone steps,
...through a rabbit-proof gate,
...past the garden clock tower,
and into the formal garden.
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| What a view... |
It must be said that most of the reason Cragside was so impressive was the weather. After a dreary morning, we packed a car-picnic (which has become our standby rainy day activity) and set off to find a pretty overlook. When we got to the Blyth seafront, the weather sort of lifted and, as we ate hot, sugary donuts from a beachside food truck (what a perfect way to finish off a picnic lunch!), we decided to keep driving north. I used my Trip Advisor iPhone app to see what attractions were nearby. Craigside was only 50 miles northwest. We were off.
The further north we drove, the more gorgeous the day became. We kept going up in elevation as we drove inland until we had just amazing panoramic views of sheep fields, cow pastures, and farmland crisscrossed with hedgerows and the most unreal expanses of sky. These are pictures taken from our moving car:
