In September there was the annual Heritage Open Weekend where buildings of historic interest are opened to the public for a weekend. In 2015 the chosen weekend was 12th/13th of September.

A friend of mine, and one of the seven fellow Alvis Three-Quarter Coupe owners in the UK, whose father used to own Hadlow castle in Kent, decided that as Hadlow Tower was being opened that weekend it would be a good thing to celebrate with a few historic vehicles as well.









Donovan had done us proud as in addition to three Three-Quarter Coupes there were two narrow bodied 12/50 Sports Tourers, a Silver Eagle four seat tourer, a Speed 20, TA14 DHC, TC21 and a beautiful 4.3 litre saloon.











There were of course a few interlopers including Donovan's delightful post-war Slough-built Citroen Traction Avant, shown above at the far end of the row,


The photograph on the left shows the 4.3 litre Alvis trying to hide its bulk behind a tree.










The Tower which has been completely restored is about six feet taller than Nelson's column but there the similarity ends. Nelson's column has standing room on top for just one person whilst the Tower has been beautifully restored with three en-suite bedrooms, dining room, kitchen and all mod-cons including a state-of-the-art lift - slightly incongruous in a 200 year old building.









Photo source: Vivat PR


But I was very thankful for the lift as that only left me another 120 steps to climb to reach the viewing platform 140 feet up. 

This is a view of the Three-Quarter Coupes from that platform.











It was a quintessential English summer's day - an historic building in the Kent countryside, some old cars, some good company, a grass sward and of course some fine drizzle to interrupt the picnic.

Sadly the building is owned by the Vivat Trust which went into liquidation in August 2015, although the Hadlow Tower Visitor Centre is still open until further notice. You can find out more about the Tower in this link.