TWENTY years ago, Escape to the Country arrived on the nation's television screens. It is a longstanding staple of daytime scheduling and, as such, is especially beloved by students: a friend of mine would watch it religiously at university, giving it considerably more attention than they did their degree. Part of the programme's continued appeal it has now clocked up more than 650 episodes -is that, deep down, Britain continues to have a great yearning for the sort of life it professes to show.
The combination of space, privacy, verdant pastures and engaged community living still has enormous currency. A country cottage -or simply an environment in which 'R&R' means a little more than a snatched 15 minutes with a podcast on a packed commute-is high on many people's wish list. Unfortunately, this used to be a pipe dream for young professionals, who would only move when they'd hit one of life's natural turning points, such as the arrival of children.
High house prices, lack of work opportunities and poor transport links have historically meant that even those of us who grew up in the countryside left at some point between the ages of 18 and 30. Indeed, an October 2021 report by the CPRE, significantly titled Outpriced and Overlooked, found that only two in five young people living in the countryside thought they'd continue to do so in the future, with 84% of those considering leaving citing those poor transport links as a key factor influencing their decision (86%), together with a sense of loneliness (84%), lack of affordable housing (84%) and poor digital connectivity (76%).
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 27, 2022 من Country Life UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 27, 2022 من Country Life UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.