Episode 37

full

Published on:

7th Feb 2025

Follies of Bath

This month join us as we explore the follies of Bath.

They were the thing in the 18th and 19th centuries. If you had cash to splash, why not show it off in the guise of a temple, a tower or a castle?

Dr Amy Frost, Senior Curator, Bath Preservation Trust takes me up to the top of Beckford's Tower and talks about the man himself, William Beckford.

We enlist the help of the Editor of the Folly Fellowship Magazine Jonathan Holt to try and pin down exactly what a folly is.

Finally Fliss Swallow is Head Gardener of the National Trust's Prior Park Landscape Gardens and she shows us around the garden's follies.

Credits

Music: Audionautix

Produced by Pommy Harmar

Links

Beckford's Tower - www.beckfordstower.org.uk

Bath Preservation Trust - www.bath-preservation-trust.org.uk

Prior Park Landscape Gardens, National Trust - www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/bath-bristol/prior-park-landscape-garden

Folly Fellowship - www.follies.org.uk

Map of follies - www.follies.org.uk/index.php/map

Bathscape - www.bathscape.co.uk

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About the Podcast

Footprints

This podcast is designed to inspire you to get out and explore the beautiful natural landscape surrounding the city of Bath, with its hills and valleys, grasslands and woodlands.

Season 1 brought a monthly flavour of the September walking festival through interviews with special guests, a recorded local walk and a 'top-tip' section with festival organiser Lucy Bartlett.

Season 2 delves deep into the rich diversity of the Bathscape, its culture, heritage, landscape and people.

Footprints was nominated for an ARIA (Audio and Radio Industry Awards) in 2023 in the Grassroots category and in 2023 and 2024 in the Best Local Show category!

Hosted and produced by walking and podcasting enthusiast Pommy Harmar. Get in touch with us through Facebook or Twitter, visit our website: www.bathscape.co.uk or email pommyharmar@yahoo.co.uk

About your hosts

Pommy Harmar

Freelance Journalist, radio producer, podcaster and walker. Pommy has been working in radio since 2013. She has produced and hosted podcasts including Sleeping with the Moon, Footprints, The Bristol Walkfest Podcast, The Quarantini, and Follow The Sun.

"It was excellent, really interesting and informative. The details and the way it was done, with three women farmers as key players, was really refreshing. I liked the voiceover and all the interviews." (Footprints, season 2 listener)

"All your topics on the Footprints podcast were relevant and fascinating to me as an older, female solo walker for the first time in the U.K." (Footprints season 1 listener)

Email: pommyharmar@yahoo.co.uk

Lucy Bartlett

Lucy is the Bathscape Community Projects Officer and a keen walker. She organises the annual Bathscape Walking Festival which aims to encourage people to discover the beautiful landscape around Bath.
Bathscape is very grateful to the National Lottery Heritage Fund and players of the National Lottery who fund our work.