Snowshill Manor, Gloucs.

The first of my drawings for my book have been delivered and I've been very busy researching the final 30 properties on the list and drawing away!

Today I'm researching the quirky Snowshill Manor, home of the eccentric Charles Paget Wade, architect, writer, poet, painter and passionate promoter of arts & crafts.

Snowshill was the first National Trust property that my grandmother took me to as a child; the house itself is filled with the most diverse collection of beautifully crafted objects from around the world. Charles didn't travel himself very much but an income from a family-owned plantation in St.Kitts enabled him to import unique pieces of interest, requesting his friends and associates source them for him.

My most vivid memory of the place prior to visiting once again several months ago was the rich inviting use of turquoise on the ground floor that was just perfect setting off the most exquisite small laquered chinese cabinets on stands. I remembered the bonkers loft filled with endless penny farthings and the theatrical and slightly disturbing collection of Samurai armour complete with masks staring with large empty eye sockets and snarling mouths covered in coarse-greying beards.

My object of interest at Snowshill right now though is the painted hand-carved statue of St. George & the Dragon which can be found hung on the exterior wall of Charles Wade's cottage in the garden.

An object of patriotism, it sits appropriately surrounded by the vast untouched Gloucestershire hills. Newly restored, its surface is bright and its gilded finish ensures it goes unoticed. Most accounts available regarding the statue state that the piece commissioned by Charles Wade is a larger copy of a carving of a 15th century St.George in the V & A museum. I've studied the small carving in the V & A mseum collection and there are similarities but I'm suspicious. Significantly I have discovered what I believe to be the most likely inspiration for Wade's c.1920 commission, a St George & The Dragon carved in lime wood and held in an important Medieval collection at Bunratty Castle, Co.Clare, Ireland. Its similarities are striking; St george's posture stands in the favoured Italianate contrapposto (thats leaning on one leg more than the other to you and me), he stands triumphantly on top of the struggling dragon mid-slay, a dense-curled mop identical to Bunratty's, his face too handsomley chistled with a noblemans jaw proudly held high, large angelic eyes with aloof-heavy lids, super-cool and far beyond the heroic-chivarlric moment at hand. The arms are different I will admit, the Bunratty carving with an arm held high gripping his spear.

The Bunratty St George measures at 6 ft, I have yet to measure the Snowshill version but it too is large.

To be cont'd....................

AJ