In which Sid and Doris visit a fabulous non-ancestral castle home.
If you have ever done a building project Castle Drogo is the visit for you. It is built above the Teign Gorge, melding the look of a mediaeval fortress with all the convenience that 20th century hydro-electricity and a large body of servants could bring. The original design was beautiful but flawed. The National Trust spent £15M restoring it, re-opening in 2022. It is Vaut Le Voyage, from Mars.
It was built for Julius Drewe, 1856 – 1931. Leaving Bedford school at 18 he worked for his uncles as a tea buyer in China and India, later co-founding the large chain of Home and Colonial Stores that sold those teas and other groceries. He had family in Drewsteignton and thought to build a fine house on what he wanted to have been family desmesne.
Rich was good but what about long established and noble sort of fing? He and a wily genealogist believed what they wanted to (and were paid for) and found Anglo Norman ancestors named Drogo and descent from the Royal House of York. (If you send the Silk money for two ice creams he will draw your coat of arms and colour it in.)
In 1910 the go-to architect was Edwin Lutyens who designed a fabulous granite castle for the modern family. The stonework is unfussy, inside and out. The workmanship is beautiful. The family rooms have great light and views. The problematical flat roofs make excellent balconies. The service areas are large, airy and pleasant to be in. Lutyens designed all the built-in furniture upstairs and down. It is a Gesamtkunstwerk, totalartwork.
The design was so fabulous it was cut in half during the build, not least because they couldn’t get the granite. This was the last large granite home built.
Julius bought the first 450 hilltop acres and building started in 1911 when he was 55 years old. From 1914 to 1919 the country had other things do, which is a pity given that those other priorities saw the death of his eldest son Adrian (and another 20 million people). In 1919 Julius sold his shares for £3.5m.
Building restarted. Julius, Frances and the children moved into the house in 1926, better remembered in Britain for the General Strike. Castle Drogo was declared finished in 1930 though the mainly flat roof leaked such that there was no cure until 2017. (Bauder.co.uk) Almost twenty years to build and the roof leaks.
In 1931 Julius Drewe died, one year after the building was finished. His wife Frances and the children used the house and during the next war a good part it was turned over to evacuated waifs, strays and orphans. Frances died in 1954 and the family gave up the house in 1974, the first twentieth century building the National Trust acquired.
Then to the ‘changing rooms’, back into cycle kit and the ride (and short push for Sid) into Exeter, the 16.25 to Salisbury, Adventure Headquarters.