House by the sea

Burke Devlin and Victoria Winters were engaged to be married. Burke asked Elizabeth Collins Stoddard if he could purchase the house by the sea known as Seaview (298) and persists in this request because he wants this to be the place for Vicki and him to live in after they wed (335).

SEAVIEW. Elizabeth cannot sell Seaview to Burke, per an agreement in an old Collins family will. The last member of the family to live in the house--one Caleb Collins--had a morbid fear of strangers, and made a provision in his will that it cannot be sold to someone outside the Collins family for 100 years. That proviso will be up in 5 years. Elizabeth is deeply sorry over the matter; Burke is angered. She intends to give Seaview to Victoria and Burke as a wedding present as soon as it is legally available.

BLAIR HOUSE. After the disappearance of Cassandra Collins (547/548), Nicholas Blair asked Roger if there was, perhaps somewhere on the Collinwood estate where he could live, close enough that he could be there if Cassandra returned, but out of the main house so that his continued presence would not be painfully felt (549). Roger offered to show Nicholas several family properties for lease and together they toured a house overlooking the ocean, supposedly close enough to walk to Collinwood or the Old House quickly. Nicholas rented it on the condition that Roger include an option to purchase down the road, should Elizabeth agree to sell. Blair House (as it is called in the working scripts and the View Master booklet of the time) contained a large drawing room, a cellar (sometimes called the basement), a second floor, and a third floor. A hallway outside the drawing room led to the front door. Whether or not there were any other outside doors is unknown.

Many fans confuse Blair House with Vicki's Seaview and Eric Lang's house. (See Big Finish Productions' audio drama, Dark Shadows #23: The House by the Sea.) On the original show three distinct exterior stills were used for these three houses. Seaview was a one-and-a-half story Cape Cod style house c. 1700s (see 294) . Its primitive parlor set was previously used as part of Roger's office at the cannery, and later Barnabas' bedroom in 1795 (including his fireplace at stage right). Lang's House (first seen in episode 470) is a three-story Italianate mansion c. 1870 made of brick with stone quoins at corners, a mansard roof, wide brackets, hooded windows, and a large porch at one end. It appears to have a dozen rooms at minimum, plus a large raised basement. Its paneled drawing room was previously the master bedroom set at the Old House in its entirety, as well as Tony Peterson's office. Blair House (549) was a three-story wooden shingled beach house with tall gambrel roof (like a barn) covering most of the second and third floors. It was perched on a steep sandy hill apparently overlooking the beach with balconies at second and third floors and a large porch across the first floor. While the foyer door and trim differ, the drawing room set utilized parts of the Old House master bedroom (window right of fireplace) and the Victorian black marble fireplace from Lang's drawing room. However, the rest of the room was rebuilt (instead of the raised paneling, this drawing room was heavily wallpapered, with different chandeliers and wall sconces, and a door left of the fireplace instead of Lang's built-in bookcase). Several fluted pilasters remained around the walls, but the corner by the foyer door was reworked at a smaller scale.

Blair House also served as a home for Angélique, Adam, and Eve.

Angélique's coffin was kept in the cellar (549/572), where it was discovered by Tom Jennings (554), Angélique's first victim, who was buried under the floor after he was staked by Julia and Barnabas (630). We learn this in episode (630) when Nicholas digs him up. The cellar can be accessed from either the drawing room or the hallway.

The vampire Angélique bites Joe Haskell on the neck in the large drawing room, making Joe her second victim (560).

The Mirror is a tool of Nicholas Blair’s and makes its first appearance in the drawing room when he looks into it to see his own reflection which transforms into a vision of Victoria Winters (558, 559). The mirror was kept in the drawing room until Angélique stole it (622).

Professor Stokes states that "all the sleeping quarters are on the second floor" and that there are three bedrooms. The master bedroom at the end of the corridor belongs to Nicholas, "it is depressingly overdecorated" (605). Two other bedrooms exist. The one on the right belongs to Eve (as it smells of cologne). Adam's is on the end.

Stokes mentions the third floor, but says it is only used for storage.

The House by the sea was also referred to as Seaview, Nicholas' house, and The House by the Ocean. (Please list where these terms might have been used interchangeably.)

Appearances

335, 549, 554, 558, 559, 560, 561, 562, 563, 572, 573, 575, 580, 600, 601, 602, 605, 607, 608, 609, 611, 620, 621, 622, 624, 628, 629, 630, 631, 632, 633/634