The Bowes Experience…

Tomorrow we are meeting up with our old college friend, Sue, at the Bowes Museum café in Barnard Castle.  Having established that she has been around the actual museum several times in the past, we decided to spend our time today looking around what looked like an extremely interesting collection of eclectic items.

The first building that impresses the visitor to ‘Barney’ is the 12^th century castle – or what is left of it.  It looms over the entry to the town and is looked after by English Heritage.

Then, as you climb the hill lined with tall stone buildings you get a glimpse of the old Butter Market in the middle of the road.

Photo shows it from the other side as there was a yellow grit box in front of it!

This performs the role of roundabout in modern day Barney, beyond it a typical generously broad street of shops and to the right a road which leads in just about 500 yards to a French chateau which could comfortably be situated in the Loire valley.

The chateau, the brain-child of a fascinating couple, John and Josephine Bowes, was purpose built in the 1870s to accommodate their huge collection of furniture, art and curios.  John was the illegitimate son of the 10^th Earl of Strathmore (a distant cousin of the Queen Mother’s family) and a local girl, Mary Milner.  His father married Mary on his deathbed in an attempt to legitimise his son but, although John inherited his father’s estate, the title passed to his uncle.

John, now a rich man, went to France and met Josephine, a Parisian actress.  They married and together lived a wonderful life in Paris.  Her health was not strong and sadly she couldn’t have children so they embarked on a collecting spree, acquiring interesting and fascinating items from around the world.  Sadly, Josephine died before Bowes was finished.

It was new to us of course but it’s impossible to describe the sense of amazement you get from being in the heart of a solid Durham market town one minute to being in the Loire valley the next!

It lies in 22 acres and has grand, but simple, parterre gardens to the front.

The area I was particularly interested in was the Fashion & Textile Gallery with fashions and textiles from 1550 to 1970.  This marquetry hat from the 1920s was rather different.

The picture galleries featured works of art from the Renaissance to the late 19^th century.  These are a few of the painting we admired.

Louise Mauduit’s portrait of Pauline Bonaparte, Napoleon’s youngest sister – looking surprisingly modern in 1806

Vallin’s portrait of Emilie Bigottini, ballerina, as a Bacchante (companion of Bacchus) in 1817

Lefevre’s portrait of Mme d’Arbelles and her son in1808

Levy-Dhurmer’s portrait of Marguerite Moreno as The Autumn Bride in oils and gold

Canaletto’s ‘Regatta on the Grand Canal’ c. 1730

The detail is incredible!

The piece de resistance has to be the Silver Swan automaton, built in 1773, which performs daily at 2pm.

Check out the expressions on the faces of the visitors behind the glass case as the swan does its party piece, looking this way and that before eventually picking up a silver fish and swallowing it!

We found the rooms which told the story of John and Josephine very interesting and loved this room with its table set for dinner.

There was a video presentation showing how the pink dress in the portrait was re-created from scratch by a French couturier.  Fascinating.

We drove out of Barney via the old bridge and back to the campsite after a really interesting day out and are looking forward to returning tomorrow with Sue – even if it’s only to the café!

Back to the campsite after a great day out and at last we have a flat bit of grass to have a game of boules (present from the Ozzies).

It was a close game and even required the measuring device for accuracy!