The Bastards’ Showroom

Worry not, this is not some ghastly Victorian workhouse adoption centre, but instead was the place to show off the skills of one of Georgian Dorset’s pre-eminent construction firms.

The unfortunately-named Bastard Brothers was a family firm of builders, carvers, furniture makers (and, as is still seen in Dorset, occasional funeral directors) and experts in decorative plasterwork.

The brothers, John & William Bastard of Blandford Forum, were not illegitimate; their father, Thomas Bastard, who had founded the firm, was married to the sister of Thomas Creech (classicist, sometime Headmaster of Sherborne School, and Fellow of All Souls).  But presumably one of their ancestors had been, and the name stuck.

The brothers’ big moment came in 1731, when Blandford Forum burned to the ground and the Bastards were hired to rebuild most of the centre.  The result forms a delightful town centre, described by Pevsner (generally a hard man to please) as “one of the most satisfying Georgian ensembles anywhere in England”, with a “distinct architectural flavour about the whole … relieved just enough by spirited individual touches”.

Number 73 East Street / 26 Market Place, on the south side of the Market Place, opposite the church, looks like it was once a coaching inn with its large central archway, but although the very similar old Red Lion building just to the west was indeed an inn, this was always designed as a trio of houses.

Number 73, the eastern-most part of the trio, is interesting because it was John Bastard’s own house, and his study is preserved and accessible to the curious public.

To see this marvel, you need to go into the Age UK charity shop (fairly normal opening times), behind the “regrettable” (Pevsner again, and quite right) modern shop front:

Once in there, head to the back of the shop, through an open archway, up the stairs and to the right, into the back, signposted as the “Vintage Room”, to find yourself in what is believed to have been John Bastard’s own study.

Pevsner describes it as “very completely decorated, with carved pedimented doorcases, a frieze carved with masks and drapery, and scrolly plasterwork”.  ‘Completely decorated’ it indeed is; the general effect is of stepping inside a giant piece of ornate Wedgwood pottery.

The theory is that the brothers decorated this to show off their abilities and range, a sort of combined job reference and physical catalogue where potential clients could see and choose designs from life.

This is particularly the case because the two sides of the room are architecturally incompatible.  Look at the two pictures below, and compare the pediments:

The first shows the ‘broken’ (i.e. topless) pediment of the English Baroque style, a lighthearted flamboyant style of architecture associated with the Restoration of Charles II and architects such as Vanbrugh (who also wrote bawdy plays in his spare time, and was a member of the notorious Kit-Cat Club).

The second shows the more austere Palladian style that the Earl of Burlington (who definitely did not write bawdy plays) was making hugely fashionable.  His 1729 design for Chiswick House set the tone for a century of British architecture, but the Bastards, in their rebuilding of Blandford Forum, had largely ignored it, instead keeping with the increasingly outdated but more playful Baroque style.

This might have been mere provincial unfashionableness, but not the Bastards; they were aware of the Palladian style, and put it incongruously into John’s study to show that they were capable of it; they just preferred Baroque.

Anyway, it is a delightful room and a remarkable survival.  Do visit it.  There is no charge, but do try to buy something or pop some money in the charity’s collection box when you visit, to encourage them to keep it so.