Page "Hunstanton" Paragraph 7

As a mark of his intentions, in 1846 Le Strange had moved the ancient village cross from Old Hunstanton to the new site and in 1848 the first building was erected.

This was the Royal Hotel ( now the Golden Lion ), the work of the renowned Victorian architect, William Butterfield, a friend of Le Strange.

Overlooking a sloping green and the sea, and for several years standing alone, it earned the nickname " Le Strange's Folly ".

In 1850 Le Strange, an amateur architect and painter, appointed a land agent to survey the site and prepare a layout, while he himself drew and painted a map and a perspective of the scheme, showing shops, a station and a church.

He consulted William Butterfield on the design of the development plan.

Their shared passion was for the " Old English " style of architecture for domestic buildings.

This owed much to medieval precedent and to the earnestness of the Victorian Gothic Revival.

Hunstanton is the exemplar of a model 19th century estate seaside town and most of the fabric and character of that original development survives.