Day 212 - This is Faringdon Folly Tower & Woodland, the bottom picture (which I’ve copied from the information board) shows how the tower looks nestled in the middle of the woodland, some of the trees in the woodland are more than 200 years old.
The tower was built in 1935 by the 14th Lord Berners who commissioned his friend architect Lord Gerald Wellesley to design and build the tower. It was erected on the site of a medieval castle and a Cromwellian battery and is believed to be the last major folly to be built in England.
When asked by the planning subcommittee ‘what exactly was the point of the tower’ Lord Berners responded with ‘The great point of the Tower is that it will be entirely useless’
The tower is 100ft in height and has 154 stairs to the top where The Belvedere Room provides views over the surrounding countryside and is topped off with an octagonal lantern room with 8 slit windows that leads upto the roof.
