The Bowes Museum

Listen to your footsteps on the gravel drive. The sound is crisp and slow, and it carries a long way in this open, green ground. Ahead, a French château rises above the lawns. It has a steep mansard roof, tall windows and a central pavilion, all built in honey-coloured stone. You are standing in a small market town in County Durham, in the north of England. Still, the building in front of you looks as if it belongs on the edge of Paris.

That contrast is the whole story of the Bowes Museum. It was never a stately home. Nobody ever lived here. From the very first drawing, this palace was planned as a public museum. It was the dream of two people: John Bowes, an English landowner, and his French wife, Joséphine. They wanted to give the people of this corner of England something rare in the nineteenth century: a great collection of European art and craft, close to home.

John Bowes was the son of an Earl of Strathmore. He was born outside marriage, and that fact shaped his life. He inherited great wealth, much of it from the coal fields of the north east. However, he could not easily inherit his father's title. He moved between two worlds. He owned racehorses, sat in Parliament for a time, and spent long years in Paris. There, he even owned a theatre for a period. This was the setting where he met Joséphine.

Joséphine was an actress on the Paris stage. She was lively, ambitious and a talented painter in her own right. After their marriage, the couple built a life around collecting. They bought paintings, furniture, ceramics, textiles and clocks. They bought on a large scale, and often from dealers across France. Joséphine, more than anyone, pushed the idea of a museum. She wanted a building that would show these objects to ordinary visitors, not hide them in private rooms.

For the design, they turned to a French architect, Jules Pellechet. He gave them the château you see now. Look at the roofline — the curved slopes, the small dormer windows, and the decorative ironwork along the ridges. This is the style of Second Empire France. That was the grand look of Paris under Emperor Napoleon the Third, when wide boulevards and ornate façades were being built across the city. Here, the style has been carried almost intact to the hills of Teesdale.

The foundation stone was laid in 1869. Then the story turns sad. Joséphine died in 1874, long before the building was finished. John Bowes carried on without her, but he died in 1885. Neither founder ever saw the museum open its doors. It finally opened to the public in 1892. So, when you walk through these rooms, you are seeing a promise that was kept by other people, after the two founders had gone.

Once inside, most visitors head to one object first: the Silver Swan. This is a life-sized mechanical swan, made in the eighteenth century in London. It sits on a stream made of twisted glass rods, among small silver fish. When the clockwork runs, the glass rods turn and seem to ripple like water. The swan turns its head, preens its feathers and then dips its neck to catch a fish. The performance lasts only a short time, so watch closely.

Here is a detail that many visitors miss. Before John Bowes bought the swan, it was shown at the Paris International Exhibition of 1867. Among the crowds was a young American writer, Mark Twain. He watched the swan and later described it in his travel book, The Innocents Abroad. He admired the living grace in its movements. So, the bird you are watching today also delighted one of the great humorists of the nineteenth century.

The picture galleries sit higher in the building, under long skylights. The collection is wide. There are Spanish paintings, which were unusual in a British collection at the time. Look for the work by El Greco, The Tears of Saint Peter. It shows the apostle with his eyes raised and his hands clasped, in that painter's typical cool, silvery light. There are also paintings by Goya and views of Venice by Canaletto, among many works by less famous artists.

Now for the second surprise. Some of the landscapes in this collection were painted by Joséphine herself. She exhibited her work in Paris during her lifetime. Seeing her paintings here changes the meaning of the building a little. This was not only a rich couple's trophy cabinet. One of the founders was also an artist. She stood at an easel and understood the work that goes into a picture.

As you move through the rooms, the museum shows far more than paintings. You will find French furniture, porcelain, tapestries, and clocks. There are also later collections of fashion and textiles, which have grown well beyond the founders' own purchases. The rooms change in mood as you go. Some are dim and quiet, to protect fragile fabrics. Others fill with daylight from the tall windows, and you can see the lawns and the trees beyond them.

When you step back outside, take a moment in the grounds. In front of the building, a formal garden is laid out in the French way, with clipped shapes and neat paths. Beyond it, the parkland opens up. The town of Barnard Castle is only a short walk away. Its broad main street runs down toward the River Tees and the ruins of the medieval castle that gave the town its name. The château and the castle feel like two very different ideas of power.

Before you leave, turn and look at the façade once more. Notice how the stone changes colour as the light moves across it, from pale gold to grey. Think of Joséphine, who never saw these windows lit, and of John, who kept building after she had gone. Then listen again to the gravel under your feet as you walk down the drive. The town, the river and the hills are all still around you, just as the founders hoped.