News in the Bournemouth Daily Echo that Cliff End at Boscombe Gardens might be rebuilt should be good news. But there is still a concern about the historic building.
Bournemouth Council’s development brief expressed a desire to see the historic core of the building preserved.
Paul Hanson of the Meyrick Estate says: “There’s remarkably little left of value that is capable of reinstatement.”
In fact there is still the original frontage and on the extension is the reinstated sundial with the motto ‘We only count the sunny hours’. The the original villa and sundial should be saved since Cliff End was the home of jeweller H Samuel.
Harriet Samuel (1836-1908) took over her father-in-law’s Liverpool clockmaking business in 1862 and called her own first shop, opened in 1890 at Preston, H Samuel.
Her husband Walter was the son of Moses Samuel whose initial appears on the sundial.