Four years ago, a defensive sea fort on the Suffolk coast that had once languished on the ‘At Risk’ register sold for £1.26 million.
Imaginative renovators had presided over the addition of a gently undulating roof, creating a remarkable eyrie with sweeping views of the sea and shoreline.
Now a neighbouring tower is for sale for £450,000 — and architectural works are ready to go.
Artist Julian Simmons bought the Martello tower in the seaside village of Bawdsey with his partner in 2011.
“We’d been looking for a practical ground-floor studio with large doors onto a yard,” he explains. “The tower didn’t fit that at all — for a start the entrance was on the first floor! But it did fit something else: a distant dream of owning a tower.
“With the second viewing we were convinced. We’d returned just to walk around the outside and takeour time exploring the coast. We made the decision there and then.”
The discovery of old black and white photographs of his father sitting on the parapet of a Martello tower in Majorca, taken in 1951, added an air of serendipity to the sale.
The couple completed on 4th November, and spent the following night watching fireworks up and down the coast from the gundeck. “It was an unexpected and memorable start”.
The two-storey home, dubbed ‘Tower W’, is one of 103 relatively diminutive 18th- and 19th-century naval forts in England, which now run the gamut from glamorous digs to total disrepair.
“It’s like being in Kubrick’s white rotating space-station.”
The Martello towers were never tested against Napoleon’s invading fleet, instead proving useful in skirmishes with smugglers. The name, somewhat ironically, derives from Martello Point, a cylindrical fortress in Napoleon’s native Corsica.
“The internal vault is unexpectedly cathedral like,” says Simmons. “It has the geometric form of a torus, like a doughnut, with a vaulted top and bottom around a central column. It’s totally symmetrical, with two staircases that curve up to the gundeck like arms.
“It’s like being in Kubrick’s white rotating space-station, from 2001 [A Space Odyssey]. After a week there, returning to normal buildings and rooms makes them seem overly basic and harsh, with their dated run-of-the-mill right angles and awkward corners!”
Last year the couple won planning permission and historic listed building consent to build on the original 1980s conversion, which would turn the Grade II-listed Scheduled Monument into a unique coastal home.
Simmons dutifully studied the remaining Martello Towers in England, found in clusters on the south and east coast, with particular focus on those that had undergone significant renovations.
Favourites include Tower 3 in Folkestone, with its “strikingly angled concrete defensive building, added around 1940”, and Tower 61 in Pevensey Bay, East Sussex, “which has what looks like the captain’s bridge of a battleship placed on top”.
“It’s a great space for a classical musician, or for anyone who likes to listen to music.”
Plans for Tower W propose the addition of an expansive glazed room on the former gun deck, an open-plan living space on the first floor and a bedroom, utility room, shower room and cloakroom on the lower floor.
A galvanised external staircase will connect to a new south-facing viewing platform.
“The previous owner did a great job converting to the tower from a scheduled historic monument to residential, and installing underfloor heating in the lower floor,” says Simmons. “Having that on for a couple of hours every night charges the building up, like a giant storage heater.
“Our expectations were it might be verging on ‘stone cold’, but it’s really surprised us in how it’s maintained a year-round ambient temperature.”
“Of course it’s also been a spectacular location for crazy parties.”
The couple don’t live in the tower full time, but have regularly decamped here for distraction-free toil on creative projects. Simmons, who is currently focused on specialist audio-processing, has produced a 650-page art book and made use of the “exceptional” acoustics by recording a classic guitar album.
“The walls are three metres thick, and once the windows are shut the the only sound is from the chimney. It can act like a periscope, with the occasional sound of waves, brought down on the wind.
“It’s a great space for a classical musician, or for anyone who likes to listen to music. We’ve had some Dark Side of the Moon moments.
“Of course it’s also been a spectacular location for crazy parties.”
Quieter moments include watching the moon rise over the North Sea, which here has an echo of naval history. “It all harks back to looking toward France, watching for Napoleon’s battleships creeping up under the cover of darkness,” says Simmons. “I became quite addicted to the MaritimeTraffic website.”
Work was due to begin on the tower as soon as next month, but the couple are now diverting attention to a newly-acquired project next door.
“We now need to focus our energies closer to home. It was an extremely tough decision to put the tower on the market. We will miss it, and what it gives — it’s a very special provider.”
