Dream House | St Ann Georgian country home has quite the history

On the wings of time, let’s together travel back to an era of gracious living in Jamaica, reserved for the rich, the titled and the infamous.

As we inquisitively proceed to find this past, our journey will ultimately permit us to come face to face with our architectural heritage. Every house tells a story, with its past and present occupants providing life to the space and bestowing it with a character of its very own.

A cordial reception awaits our arrival at this Jamaican, Georgian country home, sequestered high on a mountain plateau, 800 feet above St Ann’s Bay, in St Ann. Its undulating 15 acres (reduced from 165 acres) is rewarded with dramatic all-encompassing 180 views of sea and highlands.

Originally a pimento-producing plantation, the symmetrical house was built in the 1780s and first revealed in official records of enslaved people and slave owners of 1789. The cut-stone, block and mahogany wood 9,000 square foot structure is complemented by shuttered sash windows, wood floors, and cedar shingle roof. Ancillary buildings include a nicely tucked away self-contained two-floor cottage, servants quarters and other outhouses.

The stately, two-storey main house incorporates an entry portico, entrance hall, formal sitting and dining rooms, family/TV room, library, and a large kitchen. These areas are accompanied by five bedrooms, five bathrooms, with rooms on both levels having direct access to extensive viewing terraces and balconies.

Do I hear a house phone ringing? Almost beyond belief, we learn that this very house was the first one in Jamaica to have a landline!

The rich interiors parade heavy, carved woodwork throughout. It was previously decorated by the late, famous Paul Mathuen, the highly sought after designer by the rich and famous on the island. He was also a major theatre director for the Little Theatre Movement. We note that he was wounded while in the British army during the Second World War and would later become in charge of the ‘changing of the guard’, where soldiers rotate in protecting Buckingham Palace.

In all its quietude and botanical display, the floral exterior features 23 different species of fruit trees, along with a nursery.

An oval-shaped swimming pool and a hard-surface tennis court grace the immediate, lush surroundings.

My friends, there have been 12 distinguished owners of this treasured estate over the last 200 years, and the one that attracts attention is Lord Brownlow, from 1899 – 1978, cousin to Queen Elizabeth II.

Married three times, he would eventually be good friends with King Edward VIII (the present Queen’s uncle), becoming his lord–in–waiting (member of the Royal Court who is the personal attendant and representative to the British Monarch). Lord Brownlow was quite involved in the internationally broadcasted scandal when the British King abdicated his throne to marry divorcée Wallace Simpson in 1936.

May this 18th-century home continue to be a symbol of successful preservation as it seeks to protect its legacy and our national architectural heritage.

- Barry Rattray is a dream house designer and builder. Email feedback to barry-rattray@hotmail.com and lifestyle@gleanerjm.com.