Forgotton gem

I was working in Cheltenham today, which gave me a chance to capture one of my favourite places in the town - the Royal Crescent.

It also allows me to put down in writing something that has puzzled me for years.

Cheltenham, indeed Gloucestershire as a whole, is rightly proud of its architectural heritage. The Regency splendour of parts of Cheltenham is famous throughout the world, but Gloucester has its magnificent cathedral and there are many other heritage gems scattered throughout the county.

And the desire to preserve that past is strong - so strong that sometimes resistance to change of even the most minor kind borders on the ridiculous.

Yet, for me, the Royal Crescent, in the town centre, goes against this trend to protect at all costs.

Just think for a second of the glorious Royal Crescent in Bath, just 40 miles down the road. It is a jewel in that city's crown - near-perfection in stone.

Cheltenham's version was one of the town's earlier Regency terraces, built between 1805 and 1825. Princess Victoria visited the Duke of Gloucester at No. 18 in 1832.

But today it is stuck behind the town's bus station, it has a hedge that screens it from view (planted as a memorial to Princess Diana) and the individual occupants have been allowed to tamper with the symmetry by, for example, replacing sash windows that have twelve 'lights' with single panes.

I know this all sounds nerdish, but it is dispiriting to see what could be a beautiful work of art fall short in many ways.

I sometimes dream of what might have been - the Royal Crescent as a centrepiece of a huge square, perhaps, proudly on show in all its glory.

Instead, it is a treasure the town forgot.

* By the way, I was going to correct the camera distortion, but ended up deciding it was quite effective!