Range of Thatched Cottages, Seaton, Devon

 

 

I took a few photos of these cottages when thatchers were working on the roof, then included them in an article about traditional thatching in Devon, which I'll link here. As promised, I finally took more photos recently and can now write a separate post with all the photos and more information about these lovely cottages.

A range of three attached cottages, the building is a Grade II Listed building circa 18th century, consisting of two private residences and a Victorian shop front. They are listed as 'Premises of Neils and Nos 27 and 31'. However, I'm not sure that's right as the shop is No 27, therefore the other two should be 29 and 31. 

I've been meaning to go and check that out but I haven't been able to due to storms and flooding, including a small lake across the path and lawns in front of my block of flats! We just need a few ducks and we'll have a traditional village green with pond. ;)

It's a two-storey range - some of which was altered in the 19th century - with thatching along the whole roof. The central dwelling, seen above, has a splayed bay with ground and first floor windows and a gable, also thatched. The green moss makes it look like a velvet throw over the roof; just the thing to keep warm in winter. ;)

Neils was a greengrocers, which had a great selection of fruit and vegetables, plus jars of jams & preserves and several varieties of bagged nuts and dried fruits. That was when the town was heaving with independent shops and there were four greengrocers, one of which also sold fresh fish. This one's now a hairdressers, appropriately called Salon 27.

 

The photos above were taken when Neils had the shop and the name was on the canopy. Interestingly, the building to the right of it - a ladies & children's clothing and haberdashery called Canns - later on became the library, which itself has recently been moved to another building.

The far left dwelling can be seen across the road above, also a black & white photo, this one taken from Beer Road opposite. And again below, taken from the side.

The terrace is partially attached to the next building along. This creates a small courtyard in front of the shop on the left. And below, some close-ups of the side, where the thatch looks just like a fur collar!

 

Thatch lasts for some considerable time before needing to be replaced, from 30 to 60 years, with regular patching and replacing of the ridge sometime between three and six years. It's the ridge on top of the roof that the thatchers are working on in the photos below.

Traditionally a plain thatch is used in Devon, which fits in well with the style of buildings. The local tradition of Combed Straw thatching (also known as Wheat Reed and Devon Reed) is thought to be unique to the South West, going back at least 600 years and using straw from local wheat. Most thatched buildings are Listed Buildings due to their historical and architectural importance.

Devon is well known for its thatched roofs and, although there are thatched roofs in other parts of England and other countries, Devon has retained the most historic thatch worldwide consisting of around 4,000 examples.

The oldest preserved thatch in Devon is pre-1550 and still has blackened thatch from a time before chimneys were in use. At least 180 examples of these are still in existance and are specifically interesting for studying historical thatching techniques.

This is just one particular style of building with its retained thatched roof, with many others as well as the more traditional, iconic Devon cottages. A large selection can be seen in the Traditional Roof Thatching in Devon article which can be accessed via the link in the first paragraph. 

And one final, slightly different angle of the end buildings to finish off with.

It was so nice to get out and take these photos. There'll be more coming up from this area later on in a couple of posts, plus a few more photos I need to take. However, I'm going to make Part Two of Fore Street in Beer my next priority before adding more from Seaton. 

I've also got a stack of street and building photos taken in Exeter some 35 years ago to sort through. I'm hoping to add some of those in a few articles, which I'm looking forward to doing. I really wish I could get back there as there's still so much of interest to take photos of. 

Meanwhile, it actually stopped raining for a couple of days and there are lovely tiny tete-a-tete daffodils and grape hyacinths flowering in my balcony planters, which feels like Spring is actually on its way.

Cheers everyone! :)

 

Weather Lore: Part Three

 

Part Three brings us up to June and almost midway through the year. June, from the Latin word Iuniores, was the month dedicated to youth by the Ancient Romans.

 

Often called 'Flaming June', it is a time of fresh and bright colours, the hedgerows filled with new growth and the delights of honeysuckle, wild roses, foxgloves, pink campion and also verges full of the white umbellical flowers (wild parsley, hogweed, etc), wild garlic, the pretty lady's smock and the lovely starry greater stitchwort, along with butterflies and birdsong.

This is the time of long, light evenings in Britain, culminating in the shortest night of the year - the Summer Solstice on the 21st - after a long gradual dusk. It doesn't get completely dark until around 10-45pm here in the South-West, provided the sky is clear of clouds, and is a fair bit later the more north you go up to the Hebrides.

These two photos above and below were taken sometime between 9 and 9-30 on the evening of the Summer Solstice in 2009.

In Britain we often regard the solstice as being the beginning of summer rather than midsummer. We do get hot summers but they don't always last beyond two or three weeks at best!

It is often celebrated with bonfires, festivals and special events in some parts of Britain, particularly in Scotland. Here in England, a well known gathering place is at Stonehenge and other places of prehistorical significance.

In Anglo-Saxon, the terms for July were Heg-monath, meaning Hay Month, or Maed-monath, which means Mead Month. Up until recent decades hay fields were cut to produce lovely sweet smelling hay full of nutritious flowers and grass to make winter feed for livestock. This was usually done in June or July.

Plenty of honey was also produced, not only for sweetness but also for making mead, an alcoholic beverage containg honey fermented with water and yeast, sometimes served as a mulled mead heated with added spices for festival occasions.

St Swithun's Day falls on the 15th of July and is another rhyme that was used to fortell the coming weather.

"St Swithun's day if thou dost rain
For forty days it will remain,
St Swithun's day if thou be fair
For forty days 'twill rain no more." 

Having seen some Cumulonimbus clouds in Part Two, some more cloud formations include the Mackerel sky, seen below...

 

 A mackerel sky saying is as follows:

"Mackerel sky and mare's tails make tall ships carry low sails."

"Mackerel sky is associated with altocumulus clouds while 'mare's tails' refer to cirrus clouds. Both could develop before the instance of a storm, which would lead to the lowering of the ship's sails." The Met Office.

...plus this amazing billow cloud seen in the next photo.

One of the rarest cloud formations is called the Kelvin-Helmholtz cloud. Named after two meteorologists, Hermann von Helmholtz and William Thomson Kelvin who studied turbulent airflow, it's a billowing wave pattern caught between two air streams.

I was extremely fortunate to be walking along the sea front when I saw this phenomenon. Looking like a pie crust, I called my photo 'Pie in the Sky'. The photo above was the edge of it on the right and the fuller cloud can be seen below.

A few more rain prophecies that I remember being said when I was a girl are as follows:

"When cows lie down in the field it's a sign of coming rain." 

Apparently there's no scientific reason for it. It was a fairly unusual occurrance to see all the cows lie down however, and often facing the same direction so that it did seem significant.

"Rain before seven, fine by eleven." 

Which can be true, as rain systems coming across Britain rarely last more than four hours. Mind, I've known it to rain all day sometimes, but perhaps there are slight breaks between them which sometimes go unnoticed.

Right, I'm going to leave it there for now as there's still a fair amount to get through so I'm going to do another part. I didn't intend to do four parts but that's how it's working out...so far! Hopefully I can manage without having to do five or more. :)

I don't know what's coming up next. I'm still working on Fore Street in Beer but I've also received my latest photos back from the printers and scanned them. I'm still post editing but I might write up one of those before I finish another long one.

Cheers for now! :)