Drive through the rolling farmland south of Nashville and you expect barns, subdivisions, churches and maybe a tractor slowing traffic.
You do not expect a Welsh castle.
Yet near Arrington in Williamson County, two enormous white towers rise above the trees beside State Route 840. They belong to Castle Gwynn, a privately built home modeled after a 12th-century Welsh border castle. Each of its main towers reaches seven stories high.
And the story gets stranger.
Castle Gwynn was not commissioned by some railroad tycoon in the 1800s. It was not shipped over from Europe stone by stone. It began with a Tennessee teenager drawing his dream house for a school assignment.
Decades later, he was still building it.
A high school drawing turned into the real thing
Mike Freeman first dreamed up Castle Gwynn in 1970 while taking an architecture class in high school. The assignment was simple: design a dream home.
Freeman drew a castle.
For most teenagers, that probably would have been the end of the story. Freeman instead spent the next decade working, researching castle design and looking for property. In 1980, construction finally began.
The project became a long-term labor for Freeman and his wife, Jackie. Tennessee Home & Farm reported that Freeman often built as money became available rather than financing the entire project at once. The home continued taking shape over decades.
That helps explain why Castle Gwynn feels so unusual.
It was not designed as a roadside attraction and disguised as a castle. It is somebody's actual home — one that happens to have towers, arches, armor and the general appearance of a place where someone should be lowering a drawbridge.
The two seven-story towers are connected by a brick cloister with Indiana limestone arches. A sweeping stone-and-brick staircase leads down from the front of the structure.
The Freemans live in the north tower, while other portions of the castle have continued to develop over time.
Then Taylor Swift showed up
Castle Gwynn already had a good story before 2008.
Then it became part of pop-music history.
Taylor Swift's “Love Story” music video was filmed at Castle Gwynn, giving millions of viewers a look at the Tennessee landmark without many of them realizing they were looking at Tennessee at all. Contemporary and later accounts identify the Arrington castle as one of the video's filming locations.
The European appearance was convincing enough for a song inspired by Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Reporting about the production says the team had considered finding a European castle before settling on Castle Gwynn in Middle Tennessee.
That may be one of the better examples of Nashville-area movie magic.
The castle that looks as though it belongs somewhere across the Atlantic was already sitting roughly south of Nashville, surrounded by Tennessee hills.
Swift's video helped give Castle Gwynn attention far beyond Williamson County. But for many Tennesseans, the best-known reason to visit the property comes every spring.
Every May, the castle gets a Renaissance Festival
Castle Gwynn is closely tied to the Tennessee Renaissance Festival, which operates on weekends in May and around Memorial Day.
The festival grounds are next to the castle, and the event turns the area into a temporary medieval village filled with costumes, performances, crafts and other Renaissance-fair attractions.
Castle Gwynn's official website says festival admission includes access to the castle's grounds and gardens during designated hours, weather permitting. Displays may include armor, tapestries and period pieces, along with video showing parts of the interior.
There is one important detail for anyone planning a trip: Castle Gwynn is still a private residence.
The official site says indoor tours are not offered. Public castle access is centered on outdoor grounds and gardens during Tennessee Renaissance Festival dates.
So this is not a year-round museum where visitors can simply pull into the driveway on a random Saturday.
For festival visitors, the official festival grounds are at 2135 New Castle Road in Arrington. Castle Gwynn's site directs visitors there rather than treating the residence itself as a general tourist stop.
It's the kind of Tennessee place that sounds made up
Part of the charm of Castle Gwynn is the setting.
Put the same building in Wales and it might blend into a travel brochure. Put two seven-story castle towers among the farms and hills of Middle Tennessee, and they become something people have to see twice.
That contrast is also what makes Castle Gwynn feel so distinctly Tennessee.
The state is full of attractions that do not fit neatly into one category: caves under towns, giant roadside structures, old amusement parks, elaborate private homes and destinations that began because one person had a very specific idea and refused to let it go.
Castle Gwynn belongs firmly in that tradition.
Except in this case, the idea started on a piece of schoolwork.
More than half a century after Freeman first drew his dream home, the castle has become a Middle Tennessee landmark, a Renaissance Festival backdrop and a tiny piece of Taylor Swift history.
And perhaps the funniest part is that plenty of people can drive through this part of Tennessee without knowing it exists.
Then, through the trees, come the towers.
At that point, “There's a castle in Tennessee” suddenly becomes much easier to believe.
Sources
Castle Gwynn official website: Current visitor information, Castle Gwynn history and Tennessee Renaissance Festival access. Castle Gwynn
Tennessee Home & Farm: Reporting on Mike Freeman, the castle's history, architecture and construction. The Story Behind Castle Gwynn
House Beautiful/Yahoo: Background on Castle Gwynn's appearance in Taylor Swift's “Love Story” video.
IMDb: Filming-location listing for Taylor Swift's “Love Story” music video.
