#WINCHESTER HOUSE INSIDE WINDOWS#

Away to the south-west, the ridge line of the Santa Cruz mountains is all that remains of the view that would have tempted Sarah to buy the property in 1884. I am relieved to emerge into the afternoon. Not, though, shrieking ghouls in the dark, but the tendrils of her own undying grief. Suddenly a picture solidifies, of a woman trying, via distraction, to escape her demons. When it was opened after the house sale, it was found to contain two obituaries and two locks of hair – one each for Mr Winchester and Sarah’s daughter Annie, who died aged six weeks in 1866. There is special mention too for a room which contained a concealed safe. Sarah, the guide reports, slept here on the night of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake – then, having been trapped as the tremor tore apart sections of the house, had it boarded up. Extra attention is paid to a chamber at the top of the house – an attic space that was apparently only uncovered in 2016. There are exquisite panels of Tiffany glass, including one, set defeatingly into an interior wall, which will never sparkle with the rainbow effect its inlaid crystals were designed to produce in sunlight yet is sumptuously pretty all the same.Īt a glance | More American horror film sites to visitĪnd there are rings of truth. There are gorgeous marble fireplaces – 47 in all. But for all this, there is a beauty to what Sarah Winchester created. The rest of my tour group chatters nervously. The guide suggests that Sarah would sleep in a different one each night, on rotation, to stay a hop ahead of the phantoms who dogged her. There are 161 rooms in total, including 40 bedrooms. There are “early riser” staircases, including one that takes 44 tiny steps to climb 9ft – to ease the burden of the arthritis that afflicted Sarah in her later years. There are 17 chimneys, more than 10,000 window panes.

#WINCHESTER HOUSE INSIDE WINDOWS#

There are steps that go nowhere, doors that open on to bare plaster, windows marooned in walls with no access to the day, passages which end abruptly.

Even in the first few minutes of the tour, it is clear that the structure was crafted as a flight of fancy whose wheels never touched the ground. It is not that the Winchester House is not weird.

Winchester house inside