paul smith's Snaps & Bytes e-home - STOWE PIX page: click a passing frame below to visit other pages / see pictures

 paul smith's Snaps & Bytes e-home

TERMINAL PHOTOGRAPHY INDEX OLD STOWE PIX PAGE

MY STOWE PHOTOGRAPHS: A few miles north of Buckingham is Stowe House, a famous public school (Richard 'Virgin' Branson was educated here, for example) with grounds looked after by The National Trust. I've visited (sneaked in) on many occasions and have often taken pictures there, some of which are above. I hope you enjoy them. For more info, please visit the StoweSchool.org web site, or this site which has great interactive panoramic pictures of the garden or else try clicking the National Trust banner below to see their Stowe page.
Click here to visit The National Trust's own Stowe pages.

In May 2001 Paul and Judith jumprd for joy on the Temple of Ancient Virtue. The fun never stops.

• The golf green in front of Stowe House, plus a bit of the lake and me. The bit of Hitler burning books in 'Indiana Jones - The Last Crusade' was filmed here.
• The Temple of British Worthies reflects...
• The Gothic Temple, Lord Cobham's Pillar and the Palladian Bridge make an attractive collection in this view from the Temple of Friendship.
• The Grenville Column is at the top of the Elysian Fields. It commemorates Thomas Grenville who died fighting the French off Cape Finisterre in 1747.
• Built elsewhere in the garden in 1738, the Chinese House was resited in 1992, having been to Wotton and Ireland in the meantime!
• The Doric Arch frames the Palladian Bridge in this often photographed view.
• The Grotto was built c.1739 and has been added to and adapted many times. It is curently (July 2003) kept locked as its interior is in a poor state of repair.
• 'Capability' Brown was married in Stowe Church. It's the only remaining feature of the village which was removed when the grand house was built.
• Originally by James Gibbs, The Fane of Pastoral Poetry featured in the west garden before being moved and re-modeled by Lord Temple in the 1760s.
• Queen Caroline, consort to George I, stants atop four unusual fluted ionic columns at the west side of the gardens.
• The dramatic Temple of Venus is next to the Eleven-Acre Lake and was designed by Wiliam Kent in 1729.
• Originally by James Gibbs for Viscount Cobham, the Queen's Temple was remodelled for the Marquess of Buckingham, probably by Vincenzo Valdré.
• The Oxford Bridge was built in 1761. The Boycott Pavillions were named after a small village which once existed on the Stowe garden site.
• The Corinthian Arch frames the house on approach from Buckingham. Each side is a small house! The Lake Temples date from around 1720.
• Wolfe's Obelisk: General Wolfe died in 1759, having 'got' Canada off the French.
• As above, pictured while I was setting a cache in the area. It's 100 foot high and was placed as the counterpoint to the Cobham Monument.
• Built in 1720, The Conduit house supplied spring water to the house until the 1950's from the vaulted well beneath it.
• This statue of George I is in the north forecout and was cast by John Nost the Elder for Viscount Cobham.
• The Hermitage is rustic. And that's all I'm going to tell you about it.
• Begun in 1746 and originally called simply 'The Greek Temple', The Temple of Concord & Victory was inspired by the Maison Carrée at Nimes.
• The Pebble Alcove was in place by 1739 and may be a design by Kent. It features Lord Cobham's Coat of Arms.
• This Cascade contains a waterwheel and a cave behind it. It's near the Temple of Venus.
• The Congreve Monument was designed by William Kent and was erected after the playwright's death by Lord Cobham, on what I call Monkey Island.
• The Temple of Ancient Virtue was built in 1736-37 and has great acoustics.
• Lord Cobham's Pillar was built in 1749 and was struck by lightning in 1957, distroying the original statue on the top and three of the lions at its foot.
• The Temple of Friendship suffered serious fire damage in 1884, so now it's a romantic ruin.
• Stowe Castle was built before 1738 and is actually a farm house with mock battlements.
• Built between 1728 and 1738, the Octagone Lake Cascade is in rustic contrast to the neo-classical nature of many other of the gardens features.
• Erected in 1805, this fountain has a brass plaque with James Thomson's poem of the same name on it.
• It says here, 'The Rotondo has ten tall Ionic columns above a circular stylobate.' I'm none the wiser.
• The Gothic Temple (where a scene in James Bond 19 - The Word Is Not Enough - was filmed) through a doorway of the ruined Temple of Friendship.
• Judith relaxing in The Pebble Alcove.
• March 31st 2003 - my Jaguar at my favourite point for taking pictures of cars.
• Judith at Stowe, when we first started going out together.
• The Palladian Bridge being beautiful.
• During the Foot and Mouth crisis of 2001, this was as close to the arch as I could get my kit car.
• The Temple of Concord and Victory and the Grecian Valley beyond my kit car.
• You can't tell this was taken at Stowe, but I promise it was.
• Judith and I express ourselves...
• ...and find our daring jolly funny.
• In The Pebble Alcobe I pose.
• A poor quality scanned picture of me taking the picture above, taken by Judith.
• In the Pebble Alcove I pose. Again.
• A dark picture taken with my kit car in front of the big arch I visit so often!
• A semi-negative version of the picture above.
• A picture of me at The Temple of Concord and Victory.
• A negative version of the picture above.
• A nice shot of my kit car in front of a huge arch.
• A negative version of the picture above.
• More of Lord Cobhams Pillar.
• Sarah in The Pebble Alcove.
• Another low-quality picture of me running along between the columns of The Temple of Concord and Victory.
• The golden bottom on show in The Rotondo.
• Another nice shot of The Palladian Bridge, taken from the end on the lake.
• A closer look at one of the golden fishes on the roof of the Chinese House.
• A closer look at me looking Roman(?) next to The Temple of Venus.
• Take a look at the ceiling of The Temple of Ancient Virtue.
• A view of Kent's Shell Bridge which blocks the head of the river which flows through The Elysian Fields.
• The Bourbon Tower is on the far east side of the gardens, and was in a poor state of repair when photographed in early '04. Formerly it was a keeper's lodge.
• This monument (here pictured with my friend Toy, with Stowe Castle in the distance) is sited near the Bourbon Tower (above).
• The famous Stowe Arch in early 2004, undergoing extensive repairs.
• Angel chats on the phone, sitting outside The Temple of Friendship in summer 2004.
A 1.4Mb / 16 second video clip, filmed at The Temple of Ancient Virtue. More videos on my VIDEORAMASCOPE page.

Legal notice - This page, inc. graphics and multimedia features are the intellectual property of Paul Smith and are protected by copyright. Last updated 25/03/04.