Colomendy

You go off-piste in the Welsh countryside and you find this - a Gothic folly? a fairy tale castle? an exotic temple? The answer turned out to be more mundane: a pigeon house. Of a grandiose kind however, intended  to accommodate 'ducks and geese on the ground floor wings, turkeys in the centre, dogs between, hens on the first floor and pigeons on the upper shelves.'


It was built in 1835 'to a degree of elaboration unparallelled in Wales' at the behest of the landowner who resided at the nearby mansion. Essentially it represented privilege and power, money no object and a labour force grateful for any possibility of earning.


It stands now among other derelict buildings in the estate farm yard. The mansion itself has become a posh hotel, some of the old stables have been turned into holiday accommodation but this, along with barns and byres galore,  awaits  rescue, or collapse.


Colomendy: pigeon house in Welsh. When at the age of 9 I moved to England from Wales where I had been taught Welsh, I started learning French. In one of my first lessons I exclaimed with surprise on discovering that 'colombe'  was so  similar to the Welsh word 'colomen' for the same thing.
 Dy/ty just means house.