Detmar Blow
Encyclopedia
Detmar Jellings Blow was a British
architect
of the early 20th century, who designed principally in the arts and crafts
style. His clients belonged chiefly to the British aristocracy, and later he became estates manager to the Duke of Westminster
. The fiction that he was a descendant of the English restoration composer John Blow
was started in 1910 by Detmar Blow's wife Winifred, a member of the aristrocratic Tollemache family, as a means of obtaining a licence from St. Paul's Cathedral for the marriage of herself and Detmar.
whom as a young man he had accompanied on his last journey abroad. Blow was patronised by the Wyndham
family, who at their country house Clouds in Wiltshire
created a salon frequented by many of the leading intellectual and artistic figures of the day, known as The Souls
, who welcomed Blow into their midst admiring his romantic socialist views.
Blow's architectural work was very much influenced by his mentors Ruskin, William Holman Hunt
and Philip Webb
, the architect of Clouds (1886). In his early career he adopted the role of the wandering architect, travelling artisan
-like with his own band of masons
from project to project. He married the aristocratic
and intellectual Winifred Tollemache, and began to be patronised by the higher echelons of the British aristocracy. While much of his early work was, like that of his contemporary Lutyens
, in the Arts and Crafts
style, his later work was dictated by the whims of his aristocratic patron
s. At one point during his career he and Lutyens contemplated entering together into an architectural partnership.
Amongst the buildings designed by Blow were Hilles, near Stroud
in Gloucestershire
, the mansion he built for himself after 1914, very much influenced by the ideals of Ruskin, Webb and William Morris
(Blow was present at Morris's death and organised his funeral procession, driving the flower-strewn hay-wagon carrying the coffin, dressed in a farm worker's smock). In 1908 he rebuilt Bramham Park
for the Lane Fox family; however, this commission was a restoration of the former Baroque
house which had been severely damaged by fire in 1828.
Detmar Blow's grandson, also Detmar Blow, was married to the fashion stylist Isabella Blow
, and lives at Hilles, Harescombe, Gloucestershire.
, including Château de Woolsack, a hunting lodge in Mimizan, France, near Bordeaux. In due course he became a great friend of the duke, which led to the latter appointing Blow in 1916 to manage the Westminster estates. These covered vast tracts of Belgravia and Mayfair in London, a position given, to which the quixotic Blow was completely unsuitable. As a result of the demands of overseeing the properties, Blow allowed his architectural career to dwindle. This proved to be a catastrophic mistake, when his reputation was later destroyed.
The popular and wholly untrue version of Blow's fall from service with the 2nd Duke of Westminster is that the architect became the target of the jealousy of the duke's third wife, the former Loelia Ponsonby, who convinced her husband that Blow was embezzling money from the estate, a claim Blow vigorously denied. Following a vindictive campaign of hatred by the Westminsters, the architect and his family were shunned by society. He was driven by the scandal to insanity.The truth of the matter is that the Duke tasked a Grosvenor trustee, Sir Vincent Baddeley and a leading solicitor, Arthur Borrer of Boodle Hatfield, to look into Blow's conduct as the Duke's secretary. They found such strong evidence that Blow had been defrauding the Grosvenor Estate that Blow offered to pay some of the money back. He defaulted on this promise and was dismissed.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
architect
Architect
An architect is a person trained in the planning, design and oversight of the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to offer or render services in connection with the design and construction of a building, or group of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the...
of the early 20th century, who designed principally in the arts and crafts
Arts and Crafts movement
Arts and Crafts was an international design philosophy that originated in England and flourished between 1860 and 1910 , continuing its influence until the 1930s...
style. His clients belonged chiefly to the British aristocracy, and later he became estates manager to the Duke of Westminster
Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
Hugh Richard Arthur Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster GCVO DSO was the son of Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor and Lady Sibell Mary Lumley, the daughter of the 9th Earl of Scarborough...
. The fiction that he was a descendant of the English restoration composer John Blow
John Blow
John Blow was an English Baroque composer and organist, appointed to Westminster Abbey in 1669. His pupils included William Croft, Jeremiah Clarke and Henry Purcell. In 1685 he was named a private musician to James II. His only stage composition, Venus and Adonis John Blow (baptised 23 February...
was started in 1910 by Detmar Blow's wife Winifred, a member of the aristrocratic Tollemache family, as a means of obtaining a licence from St. Paul's Cathedral for the marriage of herself and Detmar.
Life and career
Blow was one of the last disciples of John RuskinJohn Ruskin
John Ruskin was the leading English art critic of the Victorian era, also an art patron, draughtsman, watercolourist, a prominent social thinker and philanthropist. He wrote on subjects ranging from geology to architecture, myth to ornithology, literature to education, and botany to political...
whom as a young man he had accompanied on his last journey abroad. Blow was patronised by the Wyndham
George Wyndham
George Wyndham PC was a British Conservative politician, man of letters, noted for his elegance, and one of The Souls.-Background and education:...
family, who at their country house Clouds in Wiltshire
Wiltshire
Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...
created a salon frequented by many of the leading intellectual and artistic figures of the day, known as The Souls
The Souls
The Souls were a small, loosely-knit but distinctive social group in England, from 1885 to about 1920. Their members included many of the most distinguished English politicians and intellectuals....
, who welcomed Blow into their midst admiring his romantic socialist views.
Blow's architectural work was very much influenced by his mentors Ruskin, William Holman Hunt
William Holman Hunt
William Holman Hunt OM was an English painter, and one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.-Biography:...
and Philip Webb
Philip Webb
Another Philip Webb — Philip Edward Webb was the architect son of leading architect Sir Aston Webb. Along with his brother, Maurice, he assisted his father towards the end of his career....
, the architect of Clouds (1886). In his early career he adopted the role of the wandering architect, travelling artisan
Artisan
An artisan is a skilled manual worker who makes items that may be functional or strictly decorative, including furniture, clothing, jewellery, household items, and tools...
-like with his own band of masons
Masonry
Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and...
from project to project. He married the aristocratic
Aristocracy (class)
The aristocracy are people considered to be in the highest social class in a society which has or once had a political system of Aristocracy. Aristocrats possess hereditary titles granted by a monarch, which once granted them feudal or legal privileges, or deriving, as in Ancient Greece and India,...
and intellectual Winifred Tollemache, and began to be patronised by the higher echelons of the British aristocracy. While much of his early work was, like that of his contemporary Lutyens
Edwin Lutyens
Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens, OM, KCIE, PRA, FRIBA was a British architect who is known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era...
, in the Arts and Crafts
Arts and Crafts movement
Arts and Crafts was an international design philosophy that originated in England and flourished between 1860 and 1910 , continuing its influence until the 1930s...
style, his later work was dictated by the whims of his aristocratic patron
Patrón
Patrón is a luxury brand of tequila produced in Mexico and sold in hand-blown, individually numbered bottles.Made entirely from Blue Agave "piñas" , Patrón comes in five varieties: Silver, Añejo, Reposado, Gran Patrón Platinum and Gran Patrón Burdeos. Patrón also sells a tequila-coffee blend known...
s. At one point during his career he and Lutyens contemplated entering together into an architectural partnership.
Amongst the buildings designed by Blow were Hilles, near Stroud
Stroud, Gloucestershire
Stroud is a market town and civil parish in the county of Gloucestershire, England. It is the main town in Stroud District.Situated below the western escarpment of the Cotswold Hills at the meeting point of the Five Valleys, the town is noted for its steep streets and cafe culture...
in Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
, the mansion he built for himself after 1914, very much influenced by the ideals of Ruskin, Webb and William Morris
William Morris
William Morris 24 March 18343 October 1896 was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement...
(Blow was present at Morris's death and organised his funeral procession, driving the flower-strewn hay-wagon carrying the coffin, dressed in a farm worker's smock). In 1908 he rebuilt Bramham Park
Bramham Park
Bramham Park is a country house between Leeds and Wetherby, West Yorkshire, England. The Baroque mansion was built in 1698 by Robert Benson, 1st Baron Bingley. It has remained in the ownership of Benson's descendents since its completion in 1710...
for the Lane Fox family; however, this commission was a restoration of the former Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
house which had been severely damaged by fire in 1828.
Detmar Blow's grandson, also Detmar Blow, was married to the fashion stylist Isabella Blow
Isabella Blow
Isabella Blow was an English magazine editor. The muse of hat designer Philip Treacy, she is credited with discovering the models Stella Tennant and Sophie Dahl as well as the fashion designer Alexander McQueen....
, and lives at Hilles, Harescombe, Gloucestershire.
Patronage of the 2nd Duke of Westminster
Blow designed various properties for Hugh "Bendor" Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of WestminsterHugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
Hugh Richard Arthur Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster GCVO DSO was the son of Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor and Lady Sibell Mary Lumley, the daughter of the 9th Earl of Scarborough...
, including Château de Woolsack, a hunting lodge in Mimizan, France, near Bordeaux. In due course he became a great friend of the duke, which led to the latter appointing Blow in 1916 to manage the Westminster estates. These covered vast tracts of Belgravia and Mayfair in London, a position given, to which the quixotic Blow was completely unsuitable. As a result of the demands of overseeing the properties, Blow allowed his architectural career to dwindle. This proved to be a catastrophic mistake, when his reputation was later destroyed.
The popular and wholly untrue version of Blow's fall from service with the 2nd Duke of Westminster is that the architect became the target of the jealousy of the duke's third wife, the former Loelia Ponsonby, who convinced her husband that Blow was embezzling money from the estate, a claim Blow vigorously denied. Following a vindictive campaign of hatred by the Westminsters, the architect and his family were shunned by society. He was driven by the scandal to insanity.The truth of the matter is that the Duke tasked a Grosvenor trustee, Sir Vincent Baddeley and a leading solicitor, Arthur Borrer of Boodle Hatfield, to look into Blow's conduct as the Duke's secretary. They found such strong evidence that Blow had been defrauding the Grosvenor Estate that Blow offered to pay some of the money back. He defaulted on this promise and was dismissed.
Notable works
- All Saints' Church, Avon Tyrell (for Lord Manners, with murals by Phoebe Traquair, 1906)
- Amesbury AbbeyAmesbury AbbeyAmesbury Abbey, also known as the Abbey of St Mary and St Melor, was a Benedictine abbey at Amesbury in Wiltshire, founded by Queen Ælfthryth in about the year 979 on what may have been the site of an earlier monastery....
, Wiltshire - Billesley Manor, Warwickshire
- Bramham ParkBramham ParkBramham Park is a country house between Leeds and Wetherby, West Yorkshire, England. The Baroque mansion was built in 1698 by Robert Benson, 1st Baron Bingley. It has remained in the ownership of Benson's descendents since its completion in 1710...
, Yorkshire (restoration for the Lane-Fox family, 1908) - Breccles Hall, Norfolk
- Château de Woolsack, MimizanMimizanMimizan is a commune in the Landes department in Aquitaine in south-western France. There are two separate districts of the town: Mimizan-Bourg and Mimizan-Plage .-History:...
, France (a hunting lodge for the 2nd Duke of Westminster, 1912) - Eaton Hall (Cheshire)Eaton Hall (Cheshire)Eaton Hall is the country house of the Duke of Westminster. It is set within a large estate south of the village of Eccleston, in Cheshire, England . The house is surrounded by formal gardens, parkland, farmland and woodland. The estate covers an area of about .The first substantial house was...
(alterations for the 2nd Duke of Westminster) - Happisburgh Manor (St Mary's), Norfolk
- Hatch House, Wiltshire
- Heale House, Wiltshire (for the Hon. Louis Greville)
- Hilles, Harescombe, Gloucestershire (for himself)
- Holcombe House, Stroud, Gloucestershire
- Horwood HouseHorwood HouseHorwood House lies south east of the village of Little Horwood in Buckinghamshire. This mansion is a comparatively modern house, built in 1911, the date being embossed into the gutter hopper-heads...
, Little HorwoodLittle HorwoodLittle Horwood is a village and civil parish in the Aylesbury Vale district of Buckinghamshire, England. The village is about four miles ESE of Buckingham and two miles north east of Winslow....
, Buckinghamshire - Lake HouseLake HouseLake House is an Elizabethan country house dating from 1578, in Wilsford-cum-Lake in Wiltshire, England. It is a Grade I listed building. The gardens are Grade II listed in the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest....
, Wiltshire (1898) - Lavington Park, West Sussex
- Little Ridge (for the Morrison family)
- Schloss Kranzbach, Krün, near Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany (for The Hon. Miss Mary Portman)
- Stanway HouseStanway HouseStanway House is an example of a Jacobean manor house, located near Stanway, Gloucestershire. The manor was owned by Tewkesbury Abbey for 800 years then for 500 years by the Tracy family and their descendants, the Earls of Wemyss...
, Gloucestershire (for Earl of Wemyss) - Wilsford, Wiltshire (for Edward Tennant, 1st Baron Glenconner)
- Wootton ManorWootton ManorWootton Manor is a Jacobean country house in Folkington, East Sussex. The current buildings are situated on the site of a mediaeval manor house. Rupert Gwynne and his wife settled in the house after their marriage in 1905, and later commissioned Detmar Blow to restore and extend the house and add...
, Polegate, Sussex (for the Gwynne Family)