Mrs Ramsay The Ramsays' house (Talland House), St Ives
The Window
The first part of the novel unfolds almost entirely at a family's rented summer house by the sea, full of guests and children on a late-September evening. Woolf built it from Talland House, the hillside villa above St Ives that the Stephens took each summer until her mother died, its windows opening on the bay.
The Window
inspired by The novel places the Ramsays' summer house on the Isle of Skye, but it is drawn from Talland House, the Stephen family's real holiday home in St Ives, where Woolf spent her childhood summers. Sited at the listed house on Talland Road; mapped as the model rather than the fictional island.
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Lily Briscoe The garden and the bay
The Window
Much of the evening plays out on the lawn and among the flower beds, where a painter sets up her easel and watches the family, and where the distant lighthouse blinks across the water at dusk. The garden is Talland House's own, sloping toward the bay the children knew.
The Window
inspired by The novel's terraced garden looking over the water is drawn from the rambling garden of Talland House, which steps down toward St Ives Bay. Sited just above the house; mapped as the real garden behind the fiction.
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Lily Briscoe The town of St Ives
The Window
Below the house lies a small fishing town whose harbour and boats supply the errands and small society around the family. Woolf drew it from St Ives itself, the Cornish port that spread beneath Talland House and its garden.
The Window
inspired by The novel keeps the town offstage as the fishing settlement below the house, drawn from St Ives, the harbour town beneath Talland House. Sited at the town centre and harbour; mapped as the real place behind the fiction.
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