Castle | Mark Simms Photography

Picton Castle: Owls

Picton Castle in Pembrokeshire is also home to the Welsh Owl Garden:

Picton Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales

© Mark Simms Photography (2021)

Picton Castle

Built in 1280, Picton Castle has been developed over the centuries into Pembrokeshire’s finest stately home:

Picton Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales

© Mark Simms Photography (2021)

Much of what remains of Carew Castle today was the work of Sir Nicholas de Carew (who died in 1311) although it was slowly adapted over the next 250 years from Medieval fortress to Elizabethan manor.

Carew has a photogenic location situated next to a tidal mill pond.

Carew Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales

© Mark Simms Photography (2021)

Pembroke Castle

There has been a castle on this site in Pembroke since 1093, although much of what you see today dates back to the 12th/13th Century.

The massive 80ft high cylindrical stone keep is a particularly noteworthy architectural feature. Pembroke was also the birth place of Henry Tudor in 1457, who became the future King Henry VII, first of the famous Tudor dynasty of English monarchs.

It was a particularly wet and grey day when we visited Pembroke Castle last October, so I’ve tried to work with that in the processing of the shots below, making them a little darker and more contrasty than I would normally.

Pembroke Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales

Conwy Castle 4

Conwy Castle 3

Conwy Castle 2

An alternative view of Conwy Castle looking along the foot suspension bridge which was added much later:

Conwy Castle 1

A view from the harbour of Edward I’s mighty fortress at Conwy in North Wales built between 1283 and 1287:

Schloss Neuschwanstein

Neuschwanstein Castle (begun in 1868, but never finished) is King Ludwig II’s grand folly, a monument to the Middle Ages and to the chivalric ideals of kingship that he so venerated. If Ludwig could have turned the clock back about 500 years he would have done, instead he tried to recreate the past through lavish building projects like this one.

It’s one of the most magnificent buildings I’ve ever seen………and possibly the most pointless.

Schloss Hohenschwangau

Built by Maximilian II (King of Bavaria from 1848 to 1864) in a neo-Gothic style on top of existing 12th century foundations, Schloss Hohenschwangau is a fantastic homely castle in a stunning location.

Maximilian’s infamous son, Ludwig II (who became known as the Fairy-tale King because of his obsession with chivalric medieval myths and legends, at the expense of his governmental duties) grew-up here and later spent many summers until his death in 1886.