Tom Nancollas

Tom Nancollas is a building conservationist and writer based in London. Of Cornish ancestry, Tom maintained a love of seascapes during his work in the capital and became fascinated with offshore rock lighthouses, which were the subject of his critically acclaimed first book, Seashaken Houses: A Lighthouse History from Eddystone to Fastnet (2018), pre-empted by Penguin.

The book is a series of journeys to lighthouses around the coast of Great Britain and Ireland, looking at the history and architecture of these most romantic and often enigmatic of buildings, and what they can tell us about our relationship with the sea. The paperback was a Waterstones Non-Fiction Book of the Month in August 2019.

In his latest moving and original new history, The Ship Asunder (Particular Books, 2022), Tom Nancollas goes in search of eleven relics that together tell the story of Britain at sea. The Times called this rich celebration of Britain’s seafaring tradition ‘remarkable and poignant’ and The Spectator described it as ‘a fascinating voyage of discovery.’

Photo courtesy of © Roland Ellis