Bristol in the New Millennium

© David Hoey 2002

A view of the Fireplace in the Great Oak Chamber at the Red Lodge situated in Park Row. (The exterior of this building is shown in the forth Millennium gallery on this website.) The Red Lodge was built in the 1590’s, and this magnificent Elizabethan fireplace is said to be the largest one of its type still in situ in the United Kingdom. The Great Oak Chamber still retains its original richly ornamented plaster ceiling, complete with pendants, part of which can be seen in the upper half of this picture. All of the original oak wainscoting remains on the walls, the only alteration being in the early eighteenth century when larger windows were added so as to "modernise" the building to suit the current style of the times. The architect in charge of the alterations was Sir John Vanbrugh (whose magnum opus is Castle Howard in Northumberland), who was also building the nearby Kingsweston House at the time. (Kingsweston House can be seen elsewhere on this website in the first Millennium gallery.)