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Today would have been my parent's 61st wedding anniversary. But Mum is nearly six years gone and Dad over 29.

So it goes, so it goes.

Today is Friday: bin day. Gym Day. And the first day of the nine day Heritage Weekend.

I set my alarm for six.

Woke when it went off. Went back to sleep. Twice. Woke at ten to seven to find Cleo snuggled up beside me.

I sigh, and get up. Jools hear me, start boiling the water for coffee, so that once dressed, in my sports shorts, there is a cup of coffee ready.

We talk and then put the bins, put on our pumps all ready for some phys in Whitfield.

Friday is crazy busy on the roads, but we reach the car park safe, walk to the entrance to find IT has crashed again, so we were waved in.

Both bikes free again, I settle down to ride for half an hour in Patagonia whilst listening to some early 21st century indie music.

We do half an hour, coming a day since we were last here, feels about right. So back home for breakfast and another brew, so that Jools could leave the house for her craft meeting in the village library at half nine.

I tidy up whilst se is gone, also have a shower, bring in the bins which have been emptied.

Once she is back we have a rushed lunch of a stale roll and peppered roast beef which I turn into Rubens with mustard and pickle.

Yummy.

And then out for a quick visit to Ramsgate to The Grange and Pugin's church next door.

Augustus Pugin built his family home on a plot of land he had bought, and next door, in time, he built his perfect church.

His home, The Grange, is owned by The Landmark Trust, and is only open to the public on Heritage Weekends, and as it had been a decade since I last visited, it was time to go back to record some details, and then visit the church to take shots of the glass in his church.

We drove to Thanet on the teeth of a squall, dry for us, but looking across Pegwell Bay we could see the sheets of rain sweeping towards us.

I parked the car, leaving Jools to read in the car, so I scampered the hundred yards to The Grange, had my name ticked off and was allowed to enter.

The Landmark Trust helped renovate The Grange, all working hard to ensure that the fixtures and fittings, colours were aligned with what Pugin had installed originally.

I visited mainly to photograph details in the library and Pugin's study, not going back upstairs. I took my shots, talked to a couple of the guides, then walked the hundred more yards to the church.

The Catholic Shrine to St Augustine, as it is now called, is the family church of the Pugin's, with Augustus's tomb in the south chapel.

I had the church to myself for the most part, so snapped a few general views, I concentrated on the glass, all high quality.

Outside the squall arrived, rain hammered down on the roof. Jools texted to ask if I wanted to be picked up: I rode my luck and by the time I left, there was a small break in the clouds and no rain was falling.

I got back to the car just in time, as the rain began as we drove back south to Dover.

We stopped at Richborough for petrol, and ice cream. Then back home as the rain hammered down and the wipers struggled to cope with the volume of water falling from the sky.

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Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1 March 1812 – 14 September 1852) was an English architect, designer, artist and critic, chiefly remembered for his pioneering role in the Gothic Revival style; his work culminated in the interior design of the Palace of Westminster. Pugin designed many churches in England, and some in Ireland and Australia.[1] Pugin was the son of Auguste Pugin, and the father of E.W. and Peter Paul Pugin, who continued his architectural firm as Pugin & Pugin.

Pugin was the son of a French draughtsman, Auguste Pugin, who had come to England as a result of the French Revolution and had married Catherine Welby of the Denton, Lincolnshire Welby family.[3] Augustus was born at his parents' house in Bloomsbury. Between 1821 and 1838 Pugin's father had published a series of volumes of architectural drawings, the first two entitled, Specimens of Gothic Architecture, and the following three, Examples of Gothic Architecture, that were to remain both in print and the standard references for Gothic architecture for at least the next century.

As a child he was taken each Sunday by his mother to the services of the fashionable Scottish Presbyterian preacher Edward Irving (later founder of the Holy Catholic Apostolic Church), at his chapel in Cross Street, Hatton Garden.[4] He soon rebelled against this version of Christianity: according to Benjamin Ferrey, Pugin "always expressed unmitigated disgust at the cold and sterile forms of the Scotch church; and the moment he broke free from the trammels imposed on him by his mother, he rushed into the arms of a church which, pompous by its ceremonies, was attractive to his imaginative mind".

Pugin learned drawing from his father, and for a while attended Christ's Hospital. After leaving school he worked in his father's office, and in 1825 and 1827 accompanied him on visits to France.[6] His first commissions independent of his father were for designs for the goldsmiths Rundell and Bridge, and for designs for furniture at Windsor Castle, from the upholsterers Morrel and Seddon. Through a contact made while working at Windsor, he became interested in the design of theatre scenery, and in 1831 obtained a commission to design the sets for the production of a new opera called Kenilworth at Covent Garden.[7] He also developed an interest in sailing, and briefly commanded a small merchant schooner trading between Britain and Holland, which allowed him to import examples of furniture and carving from Flanders,with which he later furnished his house at Ramsgate.[8] During one voyage in 1830 he was wrecked on the Scottish coast near Leith,[9] as a result of which he came into contact with Edinburgh architect James Gillespie Graham, who advised him to abandon seafaring for architecture.[10] He then set up a business supplying historically accurate carved wood and stone details for the increasing number of buildings being constructed in the Gothic style, but the enterprise soon failed.

In 1831, aged nineteen, Pugin married the first of his three wives, Anne Garnet.[11] Anne died a few months later in childbirth, leaving him with a daughter. He had a further six children, including the architect Edward Pugin, with his second wife, Louisa Button, who died in 1844. His third wife, Jane Knill, kept a journal of their married life together, between their marriage in 1848 and his death; it was later published.[12] Their son was Peter Paul Pugin.

In 1834, Pugin became a Roman Catholic convert,[16] and was received into the Church in the following year.[17] Pugin's father Auguste-Charles Pugin, was a Frenchman who had come to England as a result of the French Revolution. It is probable that he, like many others, converted to the Anglican faith in order to get work (it was highly unlikely that any non-Anglican could obtain a government commission or tender for example).

British society at this time had many restrictions on any person not adhering to the state religion of the Anglican Church. Non-Anglicans could not attend University, for example as well as being unable to stand for parish or city councils, be an MP, serve as a policeman, in the armed forces or even on a jury. A number of reforms in the early 19th century changed this situation, the most important of which was the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1829 which specifically abolished the restrictions on Catholics. After 1829 it became (in theory at least) possible to have a successful career while being a Catholic - this was the background to A W Pugin's conversion to the Roman Catholic Church.

However his conversion also brought him into contact with new patrons and employers. In 1832 he had made the acquaintance of John Talbot, 16th Earl of Shrewsbury, a Roman Catholic, sympathetic to his aesthetic views who employed him in alterations and additions to his residence Alton Towers, which subsequently led to many other commissions.[18] Shrewsbury commissioned him to build St. Giles' Catholic Church, Cheadle, completed in 1846, and Pugin was also responsible for designing the oldest Catholic church in Shropshire, St Peter and Paul at Newport.

In 1841 he left Salisbury,[20] finding it an inconvenient base for his growing architectural practice.[21] He sold St Marie's Grange at a considerable financial loss,[22] and moved temporarily to Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. He had however already purchased a piece of land at the West Cliff, Ramsgate, where he proceeded to build himself a large house and, at his own expense, a church on which he worked whenever funds allowed. His second wife died in 1844 and was buried at St. Chad's, Birmingham, a church which he had designed himself.

Following the destruction by fire of the Palace of Westminster in 1834, Pugin was employed by Sir Charles Barry to supply interior designs for his entry to the architectural competition which would determine who would build the new Palace of Westminster. Pugin also supplied drawings for James Gillespie Graham's entry.[24] This followed a period of employment when Pugin had worked with Barry on the interior design of King Edward's School, Birmingham. Despite his conversion to Catholicism in 1834, Pugin designed and refurbished both Anglican and Catholic churches throughout the country.

Other works include St Chad's Cathedral, Erdington Abbey and Oscott College, all in Birmingham. He also designed the college buildings of St Patrick and St Mary in St. Patrick's College, Maynooth; though not the college chapel. His original plans included both a chapel and an aula maxima (great hall), neither of which were built because of financial constraints. The college chapel was designed by a follower of Pugin, the Irish architect J.J. McCarthy. Also in Ireland, Pugin designed St Mary's Cathedral in Killarney, St Aidan's Cathedral, Enniscorthy (renovated in 1996) and the Dominican church of the Holy Cross in Tralee. He revised the plans for St Michael's Church in Ballinasloe, Galway. Pugin was also invited by Bishop Wareing to design what eventually became Northampton Cathedral, a project that was completed in 1864 by Pugin's son Edward Welby Pugin.

Pugin visited Italy in 1847; his experience there confirmed his dislike of Renaissance and Baroque architecture, but he found much to admire in the medieval art of northern Italy.

In February 1852, while travelling with his son Edward by train, Pugin suffered a total breakdown and arrived in London unable to recognise anyone or speak coherently. For four months he was confined to a private asylum, Kensington House. In June, he was transferred to the Royal Bethlem Hospital, popularly known as Bedlam.[26] At that time, Bethlem Hospital was opposite St George's Cathedral, Southwark, one of Pugin's major buildings, where he had married his third wife, Jane, in 1848. Jane and a doctor removed Pugin from Bedlam and took him to a private house in Hammersmith where they attempted therapy, and he recovered sufficiently to recognise his wife.[26] In September, Jane took her husband back to The Grange in Ramsgate, where he died on 14 September 1852.[26] He is buried in his church next to The Grange, St Augustine's, Ramsgate.

On Pugin's death certificate, the cause listed was "convulsions followed by coma". Pugin's biographer, Rosemary Hill, suggests that, in the last year of his life, he was suffering from hyperthyroidism which would account for his symptoms of exaggerated appetite, perspiration, and restlessness. Hill writes that Pugin's medical history, including eye problems and recurrent illness from his early twenties, suggests that he contracted syphilis in his late teens, and this may have been the cause of his death at the age of 40.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustus_Pugin

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The Grange (aka St Augustine's Grange) in Ramsgate, Kent, on the coast in southern England was the home of the Victorian architect and designer August Pugin. He designed it in the Victorian Gothic style; it is a Grade I listed building.

Pugin bought the land for the site at West Cliff, Ramsgate, in 1841.[2] The house was built between 1843 and 1844 by the builder George Myers. Pugin's second wife died in 1844 and it was only after his third marriage to Jane Knill in 1848 that it became a family home.

The interior of the house was finally completed in 1850. It is built from the inside out in the sense that the layout of the rooms was considered before the outside of the building. This is in contrast to the Georgian style that preceded it. The style was influential on subsequent English architecture designed by architects like Edwin Lutyens.

Pugin died in the house in 1852 at the age of only 40. He is buried in the impressive Pugin chantry chapel in St Augustine's Church, next to the house, which was also designed by him and completed by his eldest son, Edward Pugin, who was also an architect.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grange,_Ramsgate

The Grange, Ramsgate, Kent by Jelltex