Kelston Roundhill and Roundhill Barn

Daily Telegraph has an article on the “Mirrorcube” room, part of a Swedish hotel in Harads, about 50km outside Lulea in northern Sweden. You wouldn’t notice that on Kelston Roundhill. Perhaps there’s one there already?

Here’s the 2002 English Heritage description of Kelston Park, the estate of which Kelston Roundhill was formerly a part. It offers a thorough and concise description of the history and layout the estate. It’s pretty dry (won’t even stoop to using Lancelot Brown’s more familiar nickname), not big on illustration, but informative (click for more). Continue reading →

Can’t say how much fun this was last year (even though it rained solidly). This year is set to be a complete cracker of a classic village fete. We’ll be there…see you there too!

Photo by Benjamin Ellis

Last Friday our local National Trust Ranger Rob Holden visited Kelston Roundhill.

Rob Holden on the Clump. You can keep up with his Bath Skyline work on Twitter: @NTBathSkyline

The National Trust is the UK’s second-largest landowner (after the Crown Estate) so it has a vast body of knowledge and resources covering every sort of land-management issue from paths, signage,  and public access through leisure, public art to looking after badgers and dealing with invasive species.

It also has a clear policy position and a campaigning role. Among many other things it’s trying to reach out beyond the usual dedicated walkers and ramblers to get the wider public, especially families and children out to discover landscapes, countryside and the spirit of place. So it has placed itself on front line of reconnecting children
with nature, trying to reverse what has started to be known as Nature Deficit Disorder (click for more). Continue reading →

Another nice “Bath skyline” picture showing the Clump. This was published in the Daily Telegraph in March, credited SWNS.com. I can’t find it online; this is taken with a phone of the paper clipping.

Thank you and all due credit to the unnamed photographer who took this lovely shot.

We’re very pleased to announce that from today Kelston Roundhill is an Enlightenment Meadow. We applied to become a Coronation Meadow under Prince Charles scheme announced today, but were edged in Somerset by Chancellors Farm, Priddy Nr Wells (which does look fab btw).

Bath has been a bit unpopular with Royals since a sniffy local article about the young Victoria looking frumpy. No doubt we were also marked down (or even blackballed) because Kelston Roundhill was used as a lookout point for the Battle of Lansdown. Monarchs have long memories and can be unforgiving about murderous popular uprisings. But that was all a long time ago. Kelston is now a place of peace and mature reflection.

NB anyone can use any of our photos for non-commercial purposes. Copyright maximalists such as PA Media Group Ltd are expressly forbidden from using our photos. We may have to take the unusual step of banning PA Media Group Ltd directors, staff and contracted photographers from Kelston Roundhill; this is under discussion.

To dissipate any possible sense of disappointment our side we’ve decided instead to be the first field in the UK to self-declare as an Enlightenment Meadow, a place for free thinking, learning, scientific exploration, and individual self-determination.

Best wishes meanwhile to our hard-working Queen, who has done a terrific job for 60 years. Like all enlightened visitors: welcome.

Last week was hedgehog awareness week apparently. I wasn’t aware of it. Nor, more to the point, are we aware of hedgehogs on Kelston Roundhill. If it’s going to be a place for educational visits we want plenty. But the good folk at the British Hedgehog Preservation Trust advise not to try it near badgers: they eat he same food. Nothing is simple.

The City, the National Trust and others speak of an integrated Bath skyline, and the Clump is clearly part of it.

For example the DTel of 23 May had a lovely Bath skyline pic with the Clump on the horizon. It was credited to SWNS.com, on whose web site it’s impossible to find. But in searching I did come across this on Crysse’s blog:

and this by Chippy1920 on Flickr

Nice pics!

A Friend sends a picture of the Pilton Tithe Barn. So much more spacious than flat beams

That’s how to build a roof. Green oak, done by Peter McCurdy who worked on the Globe theatre reconstruction.

It was newly reroofed in 2005 after a fire 40 years earlier. It was purchased with a benevolent grant from Glastonbury Festival’s Michael Eavis, and the restoration done with funds from English Heritage. See the near-divine Wikipedia for a good story and details.