Tenby

     Yesterday a respite from the Infernal City and a welcome return visit to Tenby.  Tenby is a small marvel, and one of our better seaside resorts. A 'must visit' sort of a place; with some fine urbanism and architecture.  It is built on a dramatic promontory jutting out into the Bristol Channel, and retains its medieval walls, the result is a tightly packed, and visually satisfying urban environment with all sorts of alleyways leading off the main streets, and the tower and spire of St Mary's church sailing over all, for all the world like an escapee from Ireland or Scotland.  As always, although loving the various colours of the buildings, I'm struck by the use of slate hanging.  There is something rather satisfying in its use.*
     In the original iteration of this post I erroneously stated that Tenby was the birthplace of Myfanwy Piper (nee Evans), critic and librettist (she collaborated with Benjamin Britten, Alan Hoddinott, and Malcolm Williamson), 2nd wife of the artist John Piper and muse to Sir John Betjeman.  She was actually born in London in 1911.  Her paternal grandfather was a minster in Tenby, and she spent summers in the town as a child.  (She had a connection to my own county, Lincolnshire, in her maternal grandfather, Charles Playll, a minister in Louth.)  She really deserves a blogpost of her own.

     Lunch was taken at the atmospheric Plantagenet House Restaurant on Quay Hill.  Delicious food, attentive staff.  In all, very good.

* 6.5.25 A lot of the old town is a fascinating, and piquant, combination of Medieval urbanism and smartest Neo-classicism.