Brownsea Castle

Details

SZ 08 NW STUDLAND BROWNSEA ISLAND

1/63 Brownsea Castle

GV II

Country House, used as holiday centre, incorporating a blockhouse and gun platform of 1548. This raised and extended c1765. Further extensions early and mid C19. Gutted by fire and part rebuilt 1897 - architect Philip Brown of Southampton (Pevsner). Walls part coursed and squared rough ashlar stone, part brick with stone dressings. Flat roofs with battlemented parapets. Exterior mostly in Victorian Tudor style. Irregular plan and profile, dominated by tower built off original blockhouse. Main building part 2-storeys, part 3-storeys. Tower rises a further 2 storeys. South-west front, facing sea, has a 2-storey building of c1850 in front of the tower. This has angle buttresses with octagonal pinnacles and cornice with carved lion heads. Canted central bay with mullioned and transomed windows. On each side of bay, on ground floor, a pointed arched doorway, and above this a mullioned and transomed window. Tower of brick, with stone mullioned and transomed windows - lower lights blocked. Left of tower a 2-storeyed brick range with moulded parapet and string course. Angle buttress. Mullioned windows on each floor. Right of tower a 3-storeyed stone range, with battlements and moulded string courses. Octagonal turret at right end, with transomed windows. At rear, a single-storey range added on north-east in mid C19, incorporating one circular and one octagonal turret. Internally, walls of original blockhouse survive on ground floor, some with a slight batter, now plastered - no old features visible. Interior largely of 1897. Several rooms have good panelling and ornamental ceilings. One first floor room has C16 stone fireplace surround, reset, with lion head and foot consoles. In another first floor room a fireplace with carved stone cartouches including lion of S. Mark. All this probably from Venice. A National Trust Property. RCHM Monument 3 (Dorset Vol II). (Pevsner - Buildings of England - Dorset, and Brownsea Island - a History (National Trust)).

Listing NGR: SZ0304887646

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

109073

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Brownsea Island a History, ()
Inventory of Dorset, (1970)
Pevsner, N, Newman, J, The Buildings of England: Dorset, (1972)

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.