feature
Island Life - June/July 2010
Osborne House
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert came
changed dramatically and a tomb-like
setting for the house with its sweeping
to Osborne House at East Cowes as
hush descended on the house and the
view over the Solent reminded Albert
a young married couple. They were
widowed Queen made her country
of the Bay of Naples and he wanted the
both under thirty when they bought
retreat her refuge.
new house with its Palladian windows
the estate of two thousand acres, paid
All that remains of the original
and Tuscan columns, to look like an
for out of the Queen’s private purse,
house that Victoria bought in 1 845 is
Italian villa. The Queen wrote in 1852
to escape the formalities of the court
a Georgian porch set in the nursery
of the “calm deep blue sea, the balmy
at Buckingham Palace. Osborne was
garden wall. Prince Albert co-designed
air, all quite Italian”.
always Victoria’s favourite holiday
the new house with Thomas Cubitt,
home, the country house she called “a
the builder and developer of London’s
a landscape designer. Grand Italianate
little paradise”.
Belgravia and Plimlico, and it was
terraces were constructed in two
decorated by Albert in collusion with
tiers at the rear of Osborne House
his German art adviser, Ludwig Gruner.
with fountains, stone balustrades and
But Osborne is more than a palatial
building set in landscaped grounds,
it’s a house that gives a fascinating
The Prince Consort had real talent as
In 1848 the old house was demolished
circular flower beds. Huge quantities
glimpse of Victoria and Albert’s private
and a new three storey pavilion with
of soil were moved to create a valley
life, a place where they came twice
a flag tower, bell tower, courtyard,
sweeping down to the sea with clumps
a year with their children. But after
balconies and a corridor running right
of oaks and elms, some of which Albert
Albert’s death in 1861 life at Osborne
round the building was built. The
planted himself. Nearer the house there
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