COUNTRY LIFE last visited Elton in 1988, when an article by Gervase Jackson-Stops campaigned against a proposed new road. Before that, in 1957, were three fulsome pieces by Arthur Oswald, which ignored the division of half the house into flats. Since 1980, Sir William and Lady Proby have not only reversed that subdivision and restored the complex roof and stonework, but also laid out new gardens, rehung pictures and redecorated the principal apartments (Fig 1). This year, they will hand over to their eldest daughter Alexandra—together with her husband, Rory Aitken, and their children—and retire to a new house on the estate. What better moment to celebrate and record their achievement?
There is also a wider story to tell here. The estate, house and collections, as well as opening to the public, have all provided valuable experience for Sir William and Lady Proby too, which they have readily applied over decades to the public realm. Sir William served as president of the Historic Houses Association in 1994–99 and as chairman of the National Trust in 2003–08; he was also chairman of the National Portrait Gallery from 2011 to 2017. Lady Proby is a Syndic of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, chair of its Development Trust and a member of the Government’s Acceptance in Lieu panel.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der June 09, 2021-Ausgabe von Country Life UK.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der June 09, 2021-Ausgabe von Country Life UK.
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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.
