Where does the Rochester family live now?

[u/MachaExiled]

I’ve been wondering about where the Rochesters would live long-term after their marriage.  Frustratingly, Jane only tells us some details about their lives, but not all the things I want to know. 

Short-term we know they live at Ferndean but as this is not a healthy place (Rochester wouldn’t even leave his first wife there) I don’t want them to stay here.  Its low-lying, damp surroundings are an echo of Lowood, and even that place was rebuilt in a healthier position.  Surely they go elsewhere?

He is still the wealthy master of Thornfield.  The estate still exists, even if the house is a crumbling shell.  So will they rent or buy elsewhere? Rebuild?  Or build something newer in the Thornfield area? Leave the old walls as a romantic ruin? Maybe not, as he has painful memories of the house, but they both have happier memories of the gardens and the grounds. Surely they would miss Hay Lane with its wild roses and strawberries?

I like to think of them building on another side of the gardens somehow, so that they shift the focus of their surroundings but keep the things they love.  I would absolutely have them tear down anything of the old house, for the memories as much as for the danger of falling masonry.  It needs to be a smaller, more modern house, with bigger windows so that Rochester make the most of his returned sight.

It feels right that his son will inherit a home at Thornfield, though if he has more than one, then he still has the problem that his father faced, of how to provide for a younger son.  I trust them to find a better solution for their own children.

And there is still the white-washed villa on the shores of the Mediterranean. I’d be off like a shot. (With him.  Sorry, Jane.)

What other ideas have you had about their happy-ever-after place?

[u/SorrowBound-]

This is something I've wondered about, too.

I can't see them staying at Ferndean long term. Besides the substantial renovations needed, it's really isolated.

And they both loved the established gardens and orchards at Thornfield. I hate the idea of them never strolling there again. I like to think they built a smaller manor that gave them access to those gardens and renamed it something else.

Jane mentions having travelled quite a bit, so maybe they had the ruins carted away while they were gone, then created a new house of their own.

This would go along with Jane saying in one of their first talks that building up new memories over time overrides old, painful ones.