I remember the first time I heard about a “weird mansion in Cornwall where artists and musicians and hippies throw big parties.” I had just broken the news to my friend that I would be moving to Plymouth, which is located near Cornwall in southwest England. “You have to get in touch my Grampa,” she said. “He used to go to some sort of artist commune, or maybe it was a government building, and there was a music series, except it was a really odd place….just ask him!”
So that’s what I did. Grampa Jack and I started what’s still a touching correspondence when I queried him about music in Cornish fairy-tale mansions. He deduced that I referred to the estate in the town of St. Germans. Sat on the River Tiddy, St. Germans was originally formed around a priory (monastery) adjacent to the Eliot Estate as owned by the Earl of St. Germans. The 12th century grounds and Eliot bloodline have hosted an eclectic mix of activity since then. A true esoteric, Grampa Jack somehow managed to befriend someone at Port Eliot and was thusly invited to attend a few events on the estate. It was his first story that piqued my curiosity:
“[I attended] the musical series that in the past was going on at St. Germans near Saltash. Peregrine Eliot, the Earl of St. Germans in my younger days, was an entrepreneur of necessity. When his spend-thrift father died and the death duties had been paid, only the estate house with its incredible pictures and the land were left. Peregrine set out to somehow turn the house and land into something productive. He discovered that the 18th c. ballroom had perfect acoustics and established a very successful chamber music series that helped him financially. I have no idea whether it is still going on, but going to the house sometime when it is open is worth the trip just for the Constables in the state dining room. Years ago a few friends and I got a tour of the house and it's treasures and were blown away. It was the place in the West Country where the monarch stayed on progresses, so you can imagine what they had (solid gold plate and utensil service for 30 among other things). The memory of seeing a Yellow Submarine button stuck into the velvet surround of a Rembrandt is still something that sometimes tickles me (Peregrine had three boys). (And last year, I realized that while we were enjoying Port Eliot, the Countess was off having a baby by Julian Freud - of all people!)
After reading this email I immediately Googled “Port Eliot.” Apparently, whatever music series used to be held there had evolved into a literary festival acclaimed by modern families, book nerds, and hipsters. Today’s Port Eliot festival describes itself as:
“…an annual celebration of words, music, imagination, ideas, nature, food, fashion, flowers, laughter, exploration and fun…One of the UK's most original, magical, bohemian, bookish, colourful, musical and comic festivals returns to tempt you with a new adventure… “
By this point I was definitely curious. How was it that someone like Grampa Jack (a classy, wizened old man) had attended a chamber music series in the type of place where Yellow Submarine stickers dot original Rembrandts? The same place where today people pay £50 for a day-ticket to do everything from listen to authors discuss their work, practice yoga, sample foodie delights, and mosh to local punk music? I mean, the estate started as a monastery! Who really belonged at Port Eliot, anyway?
Wanting to know more, I questioned an all-knowing gentleman I’ve befriended in Plymouth. To my surprise, the loquacious history feign went mute. I knew he had visited Port Eliot in the past, so when he told me to “look for information on the internet,” I pressed harder. He replied,
“I prefer to remain publicly silent, please, upon the fate of Port Eliot etc. following all of the problems experienced by the family in recent times – e.g. narcotics, suicides, premature deaths, loss of the family fortune through complex inheritances, now loss of Port Eliot itself, etc…To me, Port Eliot is not special. Rather it is now a tale of woe…”
By now my journalist’s synapses were firing. This story was TOO GOOD. So many angles, with eye-witness accounts, and plenty of controversy. How many people did Port Eliot actually touch? I needed to explore more, and I needed to see it first-hand. I wrote to the Festival, pitching that they offer me a free press pass so I could give them what would surely be the best coverage imaginable. Their response? “Unfortunately all our press allocation has been used up.”
Oh, the horror! There was no way I could afford to buy myself a ticket. It seemed that my grand Port Eliot story was, like so many of its inhabitants, doomed…
A few months later my friend, fellow expat-local, and milliner Trish drove me home from one of Miss Ivy’s Vintage Festivals. Trish is the entrepreneur behind Just Seven, a hat design and vintage collection sold at in British fairs, markets, and online (check out Trish’s Expat-Local Interview HERE). “I am working the Port Eliot Festival,” she confided in me, her voice audibly nervous. “It’s really expensive and long and I don’t have help.” Like a cat on a ball of yarn, I pounced, offering to work Just Seven’s booth in exchange for a camping space. I was more than excited: Trish was another character in the story, another seemingly disparate player in Port Eliot’s reference library. Trish agreed. And so my story was born.
Follow along with Trish and I as we explore Port Eliot Festival this weekend, July 30 through August 2. I’m not exactly sure where Eliot will take me, or how many stories this bemusing adventure will actually result in, but I know it will be interesting. Apparently, Port Eliot has a little something for everyone. Will I, too, become a part of Port Eliot?
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