The joy of follies

Gosford House (1790-1800) from the air.  The follies are found in the woods and in the landscaped grounds behind the house, which looks out towards the coast.

I have this little theory -- explored on previous occasions on this blog -- that powerful men who have the resources (in raw materials and manpower)  will often seek to impress their neighbours by building strange structures which have only the slightest connections with the utilitarian (or spiritual) world.  We can call them works of art if we like -- but some are really rather entertaining, and are clearly designed not just to impress but also to make people gasp or smile.  Stonehenge might well be one such building, but follies came much more into fashion in the 1700's and 1800's, especially on the grand estates of the landed gentry.

During a short visit to Scotland we visited Gosford Estate in East Lothian, very close to the coast of the Firth of Forth. the grand house (designed by Adam and much modified in the nineteenth century) is hugely impressive, but the assorted follies are -- in a bizarre fashion -- almost as impressive!  Here are a few of them:

The pyramidal mausoleum (1795), which apparently only has two people buried in it. A lot of Masonic symbolism was built into the design.

The bathing and boating house (c 1840?)  on the shore of an ornamental lake. A hugely impressive structure, completely out of proportion with the size of the lake or indeed the size of any boats likely to have been used on it.

Another view of the bathing and boating house. Maybe the ladies and gents bathed within it, away from the prying eyes of the servants?

The curling house, used in the mid-1800's by a local curling club, in the days when the lake froze over in the hard winters of the time.  It's on the shore of the ornamental lake.  The rough blocks from which it is made are of heavily weathered and pitted local limestone.

The grotto or ornamental front of the ice house (late eighteenth century?).  It is also called a shell house, but the frontage is made with thousands of pebbles, not shells.