Drawing Room, Friars Point House

These are some of the photographs from a collection of 26 showing a house called "Friar Point House" on Barry Island near Cardiff in about 1910. Sir William Graham, a well-known shipping engineer and partner in Messrs Bailey, Graham and Co Ltd, dry dock owners, engineers and ship repairers of Cardiff, remodelled the house around 1900 in Arts and Crafts Jacobethan style, especially the interior, and made further improvements to the grounds in 1911. One photograph shows the home's typical turn of the century drawing room. The fireplace is large and uses decorative tiles. It has an elaborate overmantel that is used to display a variety of ornaments. The room has modern chintz covered armchairs, electric lighting and is decorated in the pale colours popular in the early twentieth century. However, the large number of photographs on the walls and the exotic palm plant are more typical of the 1890s.