Bryan Browning I The House of Correction

   The bf was sure what to expect when standing in Folkingham church yard I told we should go and see 'The House of Correction'.  I don't whether or not he was disappointed, or perhaps relieved, (what was he imagining?!) when we took the road to Billingborough and stopped on the very edge of the village to look at this.

   What you're looking at this the remaining portion of a gaol built in 1825 by the remarkable local architect Bryan Browning. (I have already mentioned his son Edward in connection with Folkingham church.) Browning was born in Lincolnshire in Northorpe, just south of Bourne, and really not much else is known about him.  He trained in London under, I think, Thomas Hardwick.  He lived in Brunswick Square in Bloomsbury for a while and then returned to Lincolnshire, practicing in Stamford.  He built a small number of powerful buildings in and around south Lincolnshire: Bourne Town Hall, the Stamford Institute, the workhouses in Bourne and Stamford, and a number of rectories such as at Deeping St James, and this 'The House of Correction'.  It shows the influence of Vanbrugh and Ledoux - English Baroque and French Neo-classicism - not a bad mix for a provincial English architect.  It is now a holiday let owned by the 'Landmark Trust'.