The Lost House of Carclew

Its memory overshadowed by its still-standing Cornish peers, today Carclew House only occasionally reserves a small passage in historical architectural guides.

Located near Penryn, down the road from the restoration-in-progress Enys estate, what is left of Carclew House sits amongst the trees behind tilled fields. In its day considered one of the great Cornish Country Houses, a fire in 1934 razed the building to a hollow façade of its former glory.

A house has stood at Carclew since at least the Twelfth century but it has taken many different renditions before reaching its current, ruined state.

From the Twelfth century the Daungers, a small Cornish landowning family owned an earlier house at Carclew. Their name was to die out in the fifteenth century through a female heir.

This happened again at the end of the Seventeenth century when the new female inheritor, Jane Bonython, married a merchant called Samuel Kemp. Kemp restructured his wife’s assets, selling land and designing a new house for Carclew with the proceeds.

Clearly not pleased with the designs, when Kemp died in 1728 Jane cancelled the house’s construction.

With her death the house was passed to her relative, James Bonython, who then sold the house to William Lemon.

Lemon had made his fortune through mining; he owned the successful Wheal Fortune and Gwennap copper mines in Cornwall. He was distinguished in being elected Mayor of Truro twice and becoming Sheriff of the county.

Having already had a house built for him in Truro, Carclew was to be Lemon’s attempt at joining the Landed Gentry. Not content the current Carclew suited his grandeur Lemon commissioned the same architect who designed his townhouse, Thomas Edwards, to redesign Carclew.

Edwards built the house in the Palladian style, popular at the time for its classical order and simplicity.

The house continued to be improved on by Lemon’s descendants from the original two-story block with low colonnades.

The Lemon name died out in 1864 with Charles Lemon, but in the hands of his nephew, Arthur Tremayne, refinements to the house carried on.

Before the fire of 1934 the house boasted a clock tower, Doric colonnades and a lush garden.

Since then the house had been abandoned, the ruins left to be inhabited by nature.

Other Cornish country houses have seen restoration and revitalisation in recent times with the help of the National Trust and other private benefactors.

Down the road another neglected house, Enys, has seen its gardens, and their brilliant bluebell fields opened to the public after careful restoration. The house there, where dry rot has ruined the walls now harbours bats and occasionally hosts exhibitions.

Intrigued to see a house left to the elements I got on my bike and cycled out to Carclew.

Getting lost numerous times, navigating across dirt tracks, around tractors and being chased by a dog, stone work started to emerge from the overgrowth.

In its ruined state the central portico could still be seen along the columns. On the east side the clock tower can even be recognised.

Given time and abandonment nature has moved in, ivy climbs the walls and foliage covers the floor plans. In sheds a moth eaten pram lies upturned amongst rusted iron that look to have been left from the time of the fire.

Carclew hides behind its natural protectors. Gone are its days of grandeur, now the house blends with its surroundings, barely noticeable from a distance.

Though long abandoned, seeing Carclew, it seems human activity is once more returning to the house.

The current owners are in the process of restoring the gardens, and besides the portico’s remains, the swimming pool is back in use.

Deck chairs are placed upon the patio and a greenhouse sits where rooms once stood. The remains seem the perfect idyllic summer fairy-tale retreat.

Clearly, Carclew is a private project at this time, with private signs on the gates and farm equipment dotted around the grounds that should have driven me off.

But seeing Carclew, there is a charm that I hope, in time and with loving care, the public will be able to see. Carclew could once again join the ranks of renowned Cornish country houses people from all over the world venture here to visit.