CATEGORIES

All ages of England

Elton Hall, Huntingdonshire, part II The seat of Sir William and Lady Proby In the second of two articles on this remarkable country house, John Goodall looks at the history and changing face of the buildings from the Middle Ages to the 19th century

An English classic

The recent auction of John Evetts’s Wormington Grange collection is the perfect excuse to revisit the unostentatiously beautiful furniture of Georgian great Gillows, says Rufus Bird

A Shaw thing

It’s a joy to have live performances and richness of text, with a mix of the old and the new, the political and the musical

The Spark In Our Bonfire Hearts

Lit to warn of Viking invasion, to celebrate a Diamond Jubilee or merely to indicate bathtime, beacons are a time-honoured method of sending a message, says Jeremy Hobson

Our Little Princess Lilibet

Fond of dogs, ponies and a tortoise called Madame Butterfly, The Queen has described her childhood as a ‘happy atmosphere of love and fairness’, although, as Matthew Dennison observes, she and her sister were afforded little privacy

A vision in green

Restoration of the historic gardens at Holcombe Court, Devon, has been a slow and thoughtful process that harnessed the individual qualities of the entire garden team to great effect, says Tiffany Daneff

The art of revival

Elton Hall, Huntingdonshire, part I The seat of Sir William and Lady Proby, In the first of two articles, Jeremy Musson looks at the exemplary revival of both a house and its outstanding collections on the eve of its handover to the next generation

Sculpting reality

This year is the tercentenary of Grinling Gibbons, a sculptor whose proverbial skill in wood carving has never ceased to command admiration. John Goodall looks at his career and art

The jeweller, the baker, the bicycle maker

How many times have we repeated the phrase ‘Buy British’ on these pages? Here, the COUNTRY LIFE team recommends its 66 favourite makers and businesses

Come out of your shell

With delicate flesh that’s far harder to extract than that of a lobster, the humble crab is a hard-shelled hero that never fails to delight, says Tom Parker Bowles

Diverse divas of the past

Sopranos tend to attract all the attention, but the operas Handel wrote for London audiences also favoured the richly mellow alto voice, as well as the famous castrati of the day. Henrietta Bredin explores the vocal fashions of centuries past

The great British safari

Overseas wildlife-watching trips to gaze at brown bears or giraffes have become so popular that we forget the rewarding diversity of creatures the British Isles has to offer–if you are patient, quiet and warmly dressed. Kate Green suggests 30 creatures that are thrilling to glimpse

Those gorgeous Georgians

From waterside idylls to the abodes of masquerade impresarios, these are houses to beat

Good For Body And Soul

Two beautiful Suffolk churches prove physically and spiritually nourishing

You either love 'em or hate 'em

Despised by minimalists, treasured by those with more eclectic tastes, Staffordshire figures bring humour and merriment wherever they’re put, believes Catriona Gray

The bigger picture

Grand proportions in Hertfordshire, Devon and Somerset prove that big is beautiful–and elegant, too

Prince or pauper

What happens when the details of listed buildings are inaccurate? Lucy Denton investigates

The tranquil reaper

With the arrival of June, medieval peasants would take their scythes to the long golden grasses, says Amy Jeffs

Free for the nation

The National Gallery, London WC2 To mark the re-opening of museums, John Goodall looks at the architecture of the National Gallery, its interior photographed by COUNTRY LIFE during lockdown

Back to the future

The restoration in tandem of late-17thcentury Urchfont Manor, Wiltshire, and its gardens has resulted in an exceptional creation that unites the formal with the informal in a modern garden that nods to the past, finds George Plumptre

Me old china

The charm and simplicity of English decorative china, loved by collectors, makes it a rich source of inspiration for contemporary artists, finds Arabella Youens

A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

ZSL London Zoo is open to the public once again. Eleanor Doughty was first in through the gates to greet some of the residents and go behind the scenes of the charity’s conservation programs

Over the Blackdown Hills and far away

In the early 1900s, a group of London artists became enraptured by a little-known corner of rolling farmland on the Devon and Somerset borders. Peyton Skipwith explains why they kept returning to paint its patchwork of small fields and hedgerows

Made on Exmoor

Preserving this rare and charming native pony, an emblem of its original West Country home, has been a labour of local love for two centuries, says Kate Green

Return of the inglorious bustards

Once hunted to extinction due to its size and taste, the distinctly aristocratic-looking great bustard is back on Salisbury Plain, as Vicky Liddell reports

Let your love light shine

Occupying a peculiar place in our imaginations, the indefatigable lighthouses dotted around our shores have long been beacons of hope and safety, says Eleanor Doughty

The lure of history - Athelhampton, Dorset The property of Giles Keating

The 1890s restoration of this idyllic Tudor manor house helped kindle an enthusiasm for England’s ancient houses and a new style of formal garden, as John Goodall explains

In pursuit of fishological paradise

Our correspondent David Profumo reflects on fishing with his father, the Proustian quest that is angling and the imminent release of his new book

How now, brown cows?

Organic and compostably packaged ‘cow-to-cup’ milk, sold direct from a family farm in south Devon, is changing the way we buy our daily pint, finds Julie Harding

Following the setting sun

They say the West Country is the best country and, looking at these homes, it’s hard to argue