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Monday, March 25, 2013

West Stow Hall

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

New Post: Always on the Trail of the Tudors - West Stow Hall. http://onthetudortrail.com/Blog/2013/03/24/always-on-the-trail-of-the-tudors-west-stow-hall/

Sir John Crofts built West Stow Hall - consisting of a gatehouse and house near Bury St Edmonds in Suffolk in the sixteenth century on the site of an earlier moated house.  Today the hall is run as a bed and breakfast.

Photos of West Stow Hall, Bury St Edmunds
(This photo of West Stow Hall is courtesy of TripAdvisor)

Crofts was Master of the Horse to Mary Tudor, Dowager Queen of France and Duchess of Suffolk whose arms, quartered with those of her second husband, Charles Brandon, are displayed above the gateway.

The gatehouse houses Elizabethan wall paintings depicting a hunting scene and the Four Ages of Man: “a young man out hunting, inscribed This do I all the day; a man embracing a woman – Thus do I while I may; a middle-aged man looking on – Thus did I when I might; and a bent old man, leaning on his stick, who says Good Lord, will this world last ever.”

Photos of West Stow Hall, Bury St Edmunds
(This photo of West Stow Hall is courtesy of TripAdvisor)

The gatehouse is linked to the house by a late sixteenth century colonnade of red brick, with a timber-framed upper storey containing a room that may have been intended as a long gallery.

Photos of West Stow Hall, Bury St Edmunds
(This photo of West Stow Hall is courtesy of TripAdvisor)

Unfortunately, nothing remains of the medieval house that once stood on the site.

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