An article on the sham castle at Acton Burnell appeared in the Sunday Telegraph on 12th May

Cranmore Tower has been restored and opened to the public - it even serves cream teas!

The restoration of Hadlow Tower features in an article in the Daily Express from 21st April

Caynton Temple at Beckbury near Wolverhampton has been in the news recently.

The BBC programme Countryfile featured a piece on Rushton Triangular Lodge last year -you can still watch it here. It's the first item at 2:30.

A company called Shared Space and Light put on a wonderful sound and light show, projected onto the surface of the Pepperpot in Brighton. There's a great film of it here

The Headington Shark had a party for its 26th year of existence last year -there's short film about it here

Perrott's Folly has been in the news recently -there's a BBC news item about it here

George Clark's Amazing Spaces had a Christmas special on Channel 4, which featured Margate Grotto amongst other things.

Dinton castle is up for sale - a recent article in the Daily Mail tells the story.

A brief article on follies appeared on The Idle Historian's blog recently

Gwyn Headley has been writing a series of short articles on follies on the Dabbler website which are well worth reading. In particular look out for the connection between Gwyn, Fanny Craddock and Clytha Castle, then check out Gwyn's very early folly credentials in the tale of Sway Tower. Health & Safety officers should look away now.

A small tower in Tarring, Worthing has recently become visible after a local cleared the vegetation from it. Unfortunatley is is also unstable so locals are being asked to view it from a distance.

FF member Ann-Marie Nankivell has started a blog about interesting parts of London and of course there are a few follies in there. Have a look at thelondonphile .

Weymouth has got itself a new prospect tower in the form of the Weymouth Sea Life Tower . It's a doughnut shaped observation room which rises up a vertical pole to a height of 165ft. The near identical tower to be built at Brighton has still not even started despite being planned for some years.

A folly called Ozanne Tower in Guernsey (described in Follies , Summer 2008) has recently been in the news as it may become the subject of a restoration project. There's a short video about it here.

I've just come across a site devoted to windmills, but with a page devoted to 'mock mill's' which were built for show or pleasure and were never intended to grind corn. Interestingly there is even one recently built to disguise a mobile phone mast .

Rita Boogaart was on radio 4's ' Excess Baggage' on Saturday 19th Nov, talking about the new version of the book 'A272 -Ode to a Road', which now has 272 pages. You can hear it here - it's the first interview in the programme .

Gwyn Headley was on Radio 4 talking about follies on Monday 2nd Nov. It was very brief, but you can hear it again by clicking on the link. If you're curious as to where the underground ballroom mentioned in the interview was, then you'll be pleased to see that on 8th Nov an article about the it appeared in the Daily Mail, along with a plug for Gwyn's e-books. Further publicity in the form of a blog called 'The Dabbler' has also just appeared.

Greenwich has a unique folly known as The Rotunda which despite being Grade II listed in is danger of decay by neglect. Please write or do what you can to help save this building. Details can be found here and here.

Simon Sinkinson is a builder of Follies and other garden features. He has a major folly being built for next year's Chelsea Flower Show, so keep an eye on his website for details. He has a very curious blog too which is worth a look.

An artist called Ed Klutz is based in Yorkshire and has produced a series of artworks depicting local follies, quite recognisable but painted in a modern, very colourful, style. You can see them all at Hornseys art site and the few that haven't been sold can be found in their gallery at Ripon.

Lucinda Lambton has a new book out called "Palaces for Pigs and other Beastly Dwellings". I suspect its an update of her previous book on buildings for animals called 'Beastly Buildings' but I haven't yet seen a copy.

The magazine English Homes has a feature on follies in its current edition with comments by Andrew Plumridge. Click on the picture and flick through the pages to page 84.

A previously unknown Gothic folly has popped up in an article in the Telegraph recently. It's in a back garden in Ramsgate, Kent.

The ice house at Compton Verney has recently been restored and its a particularly fine thatched example. I found this on the excellent English Buildings blog which has much about it to recommend. There are a few follies in there, but anyone with any interest in any kind of historic building will find something of interest here.

Another interesting blog is Peter Ashley's Unmitigated England . In an article on Landsown Tower he states "Yesterday I discovered Lansdown Tower, William Beckford's 1826 eyrie up on the downs above Bath. I'm keeping the photograph of it for the in-progress folly tower book". Elsewhere he hints that it includes 60 folly towers. The book is expected to come out on Goldmark Books. Watch this space.

I've just come across an interesting site devoted to the US fashion for octagonal houses (and it includes some round ones). Not follies but certainly curious and worth a look.

You can now book a tour of Irelands's best follies with Adams & Butler luxury travel specialists. The itinerary covers three locations in Southern Ireland and if you've got the money you can even have a personal driver/guide.

A tunnel has been unearthed at Larbert House in Falkirk Scotland which links the derelict mansion and an ornamental loch. It look like it may have been used by the family to get to the boathouse on the loch wihtout the staff seeing them. After all the stories of tunnels its good to hear of on e which actually exists.

Things are beginning to stir at Shaw Park in Holywell Green near Halifax. This neglected public park has a number of gothick buildings in need of restoration and a group called The Shaw Park Resoration Group is organizing volunteers to tidy up the park and is preparing plans for the larger job of restoring the buildings. These include a battlemented gateway, an aviary in the form of a tower and a folly consisting of three towers linked by a wall with gothic details.

FF member Karen Lynch has been talking to the Yorkshire Post and has inspired a series of articles about Follies. The first one talked about Karen and mentioned the Temple of Victory at Allerton Park.  The second covers Locke Park Tower in Barnsley. The third is about the Pig Sty at Robin Hood's Bay, the fourth is about Wentworth Castle and the last is about the Druid's Temple at Ilton. There's also an article called 'The Joy of Follies' in Country Life magazine (dated 29th December)

Linda Wade is showing a forthcoming book called Architectural Extravaganzas - the Follies of Eastern Europe on her site.

Nic Barlow is planning a new book on follies in America and he'd love to hear about any you may know about - you can see those he's collected so far on www.folliesofamerica.com. e-mail: nic