Swarkestone Pavilion

Here’s another Round on the Links, set by me not James Walton. What is the connection between two Rolling Stones albums, a building in Las Vegas and a 17th Century bowling green? Not hard, the answer is today’s title.

The bowling green is in Derbyshire near Swarkestone village. It is in the grounds of Swarkestone Hall, built by a rich lawyer, Sir Richard Harpur in the 1560s. Swarkestone Pavilion was built by Sir John Harpur in 1630 as a grandstand overlooking the bowling green in the grounds of the Hall. It was a busy year for him: he turned eighteen, was knighted and a marriage was arranged for him to Catherine Howard, great granddaughter of the Earl of Suffolk.

Sir John survived the Civil War, outlived his first wife and his only son, dying in 1679 and left his Swarkestone estate to a cousin. Confusingly his cousin is another Sir John Harpur living a few miles down the road at Calke Abbey. That of course shifted the family’s attention away from Swarkestone and the pavilion fell into disrepair.

Move forward to the 20th Century. There was more to worry about after World War II than propping up dilapidated buildings. Indeed, it was an era when country houses were being demolished in the face of Death Duties and high Income Tax. However, almost exactly 350 years after is was built, the pavilion was bought from the Harpur-Crewe estate at Calke by the Landmark Trust and restored. So that’s a quick potted history of the bowling green and the pavilion. Where are the Stones?

They came here in the summer of 1968 for a photo-shoot for their album, Beggar’s Banquet. The proposed cover (above) wasn’t used but one of the pictures was eventually used as the back cover of their compilation album, Hot Rocks 1964-1971.

Now crack on into the 21st Century. Nevada architect and environmental businessman Scott McCombs is on his annual holiday in Hawaii. He comes across a copy of Hot Rocks and is intrigued by the romantic ruin. It is the work of a moment for a man of Mr McCombs’s calibre to build his riff on Swarkestone Pavilion in Nevada. Rather an extravagant, mad-cap venture? Definitely – but so was Sir John’s plan in 1630 as he commissioned such a fine eye-catcher in his grounds to impress his young wife.

There is something unusual about Mr McCombs’s building. His company, Realm of Design, is super-Eco in a country that was famous for its disposable culture – he made it out of some 500,000 recycled beer bottles in a material he calls GreenStone.