The Last Castle........ — Steve Chivers Photography

Well dear readers. Following our relocation from Dubai Mrs. C and I have been following up on our pledges to (a) see as much of our family as possible (see recent blog “Pound Farm) and (b) re-start our hobby of traveling to interesting destinations.

This has also allowed me to continue to hone my creative urges by way of my love of photography, whilst combining the resultant imagery with the written word, by way of this Blog.

So, when Mrs. C and Aunty Sarah suggested that we should visit the last castle to be built in the United Kingdom and that it was only an hour or so from Plymouth, then my interest was definitely piqued. So in the spirit of adventure we made a batch of corned beef sandwhiches for our packed lunch (its what English people do), we fired up the Polo and headed up the A38.

By way of background and through my extensive use of google, (oh yes, even men of a certain age have at least a smattering of technological ability) I found out that Castle Drogo is considered to be a “mixed -revivalist castle”, located near Drewsteignton, in the County of Devon. I am also reliably informed that it was constructed between the years of 1911 and 1930, under the design and watchful eye of the famous architect Edwin Lutyens. The end result was indeed a real castle, which in turn became a truly wonderful family home, which was the realisation of the dream of Julius Drewe, an extremely successful and wealthy businessman (of Home and Colonial Stores fame).

I promise that this will not just be a history lesson as I took so many images during the day; many of which you are about to see.

However, in the interest of completeness, the property was given to the National Trust by the Drewe family in 1974 and was the first building constructed in the 20th century that the National Trust acquired. The castle is now designated as a Grade 1 listed building and its magnificent gardens are designated as Grade 2.

Once inside the castle you just have to marvel at the design of Lutyens and skill of the stonemasons who laid each of the granite blocks used in the construction.

The first room we entered was a wonderful drawing room where we were shown a short video on the history of Castle Drogo and already my eyes were being drawn to the wonderful mix off shadows and window light that I just love. So you are about to see my “arty” depiction of our tour of this magnificent building.

This was during the daytime. Can you imagine in the middle of the night!

Having left the drawing room our next stop was the magnificent dining room. The table was fully laid with all manner of Silver and crystalware that would certainly grace any royal palace.

For those of your with a deeper interest in the photographic element, you will notice that all the imagery has a particular rendering. Indeed, I decided to use my Leica SL2 (not usually considered a low light beast but with wonderful image stabilization) paired with the manually adapted light gathering behemoth which is my favorite lens, the Leica 50mm Noctilux F0.95 M series lens. Indeed all the imagery you will see was shot with natural light and mostly wide open at F0.95. This is testament to the superb electronic viewfinder of the SL2, providing a resolution of 5.76 megapixels, which made manually focussing this lens a breeze.

Whilst the living quarters of the castle were lavish, it was also fascinating to see “Downstairs”, the environment in which the many servants lived and worked.

Then all of a sudden we emerged in to the wonderful grounds and gardens of the castle and whilst we took a short break I managed to capture the beautiful (but camera shy) Mrs. C.

Aunty Sarah and Mrs. C on the “Bench of Contemplation”

We then took a walk through the beautifully manicured gardens. I can hear you saying that these should be in colour but I believe I have still managed to capture the essence in my usual monochrome and who knows, perhaps at some point I will go to the dark side and post a colour gallery….just not yet :-)

Just when you thought our visit to Castle Drogo had come to an end, we decided to take the three mile walk through the surrounding forest in order to find a suitable spot to consume those corned beef sandwiches that I mentioned earlier.

The girls seem to be in their happy place

There you have it dear reader. Our day out at Castle Drogo finally comes to a close. Our thanks to the National Trust for making this wonderful destination available to the public and if you are ever down Drewsteignton way, turn right and take a day out at Castle Drogo.

Warmest regards to all and stay tuned for our next adventure.