Cliffe Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Cliffe Castle stands on the north-western heights of Keighley, in West Yorkshire, in the middle of a public park overlooking the Aire valley. Despite its name, it is not a fortress but a large Victorian mansion with a castle-like appearance, built for a family of textile industrialists at a time when the town was prospering from wool. The present house is the result of a rebuilding carried out in 1875-1878 by the Bradford architect George Smith for Henry Isaac Butterfield, who gave it towers, a crenellated porte-cochère, a music room and conservatories. Although it lost its top storey and several towers in the 1950s, it still retains remarkable interiors: a grand staircase with a painted roof, an octagonal stairwell with a lantern, and drawing rooms with Adam-inspired decoration. Bought in the mid-20th century thanks to the benefactor Sir Bracewell Smith, it has housed Keighley's museum and art gallery since 1959, run by Bradford Museums: furnished Victorian rooms, natural history, local archaeology and Morris & Co. stained glass. The park, laid out from the former private gardens, is open to all.