CATEGORIES

The road to the Isles

Entranced by the purple-shadowed hills and rugged coastlines of the Highlands, earlyand mid-20th-century artists challenged the stereotype of the Romantic North with modern works that deserve to be better known,

Is that a plum in your mouth?

Coe's Golden Drop', 'Valor' or, perhaps, Pershore Yellow Egg'? To taste the rainbow of heavenly British plum varieties, you may well have to get your hands dirty,

Sculpting with plants

The walled garden at Whitburgh House, Midlothian The home of Mr and Mrs Alastair Salvesen

O flowers of Scotland

A million bulbs in one garden are not the only objects of beauty across three Scottish estates new to the market, two with houses

Working their red socks off

Each August, a merry band comes together to help run the Chatsworth Country Fair. Simon Reinhold, who's pulled up his volunteering socks for the past 33 years, explains how the tradition came about

Dive in with both feet

Do you know your great crested grebe from your little grebe? Your red-throated from your great northern diver? Marianne Taylor gets to grips with these masters of the underwater world

Thistle do nicely

The boorish cousin of the dainty daisy, the emblem of Scotland was historically blamed for donkey flatulence and recommended as a treatment for depression, discovers

Building on history

Scone Palace, Perthshire, part I The seat of the Earl and Countess of Mansfield and Mansfield In the first of two articles, John Goodall explains the importance of Scone—and the great abbey that formerly stood here in the grand narrative of Scottish history

Complex parenting

BLACKBERRIES are many people’s first—perhaps only—excursion into the world of foraging.

A new chapter

The British Museum's Reading Room-where Sylvia Pankhurst and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle once workedhas reopened at last

Hotel Casa Lucía, Buenos Aires, Argentina

I’M sitting on the elegant sweep of Calle Arroyo in Buenos Aires.

A tale of two artists

A Christie's sale shows that, but for a disinclination to travel, we might talk of Callot with the same reverence as Claude

Going Dutch

The visual riches of the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg have enthralled visitors since the 15th century. Michael Hall traces the reasons this small slice of Europe has nurtured some of the world's greatest masters

Whimsy in Wales

THE time of year has come for us to pack up the rusty Land Rover Defender and head to north Wales.

The new Olympian standard

Island-hopping in Greece has never been easier, or more desirable, owing to a boom in new hotel and villa openings in the Cyclades and beyond. Rosie Paterson rounds up the best

Presiding spirits

Catherine FitzGerald is the fourth generation of women in her family to put her mark on the gardens of Glin. Caroline Donald admires her subtle tweaks and new additions

A life less ordinary

Unusual properties from North to South, some with inhabitants of note

A family affair

A remarkable Edwardian country house is on the market for the first time and wine, cider and hops spice things up at a manoir estate, both in Herefordshire

Bottoms up

Why do so many animals have such obviously flashy appendages, asks Laura Parker, as she examines scuts, rumps and rears

Up where the air is clear

A shed is merely somewhere to keep tools. A hut, on the other hand, is a doorway to sporting adventure

The secret history of flowers

With no written records, the earliest inhabitants of these isles left a living dossier of cultural history in the folklore attached to our wildflowers

The legacy Sir Henry Tate and Tate Gallery

WHEN Henry Tate, the 11th child of a Lancashire Unitarian minister, had success as a grocer, he branched out into the sugar business (by then less tainted by slavery, which had been abolished in 1833–34).

A consolation and pleasure

Prince Albert took a close interest in architecture and oversaw a series of major building projects. Michael Hall considers his claims to be thought of as an architect

Full steam ahead

The railway may have started its artistic life as a fire-breathing monster that devoured the countryside, but it soon became an emblem of advancing modernity, a cherished memento of the past and even, in the case of one station, the centre of the universe

Stars in the East

Continuing from last week, further East Anglian properties include a moat beloved by wildlife, a Georgian hunting lodge on the site of a Civil War battlefield and a well-restored manor with a Tudor-hall wedding venue

'The oldest Old Thing in England'

Shakespeare was by no means the first to portray the mischievous Puck, a sprite of ancient lineage, with his ass's head, discovers Ian Morton

Coward on a mission

A revival of Noël Coward's final work reminds one of the emotional depth behind the laughs

Having the last laugh

Rotting teeth, modelling woes and an appreciation for solemnity have historically conspired to make painted grins a rarity, but beaming faces never fail to beguile, finds Claudia Pritchard

Mother of herbs

Enjoying a strange association with childbirth, mugwort is of more use in the kitchen and may even induce 'lucid dreams', finds John Wright

Bourne to run

The garden at Emmetts Mill, Chobham, Surrey A flat waterside site has been transformed into a garden full of drama with plenty of delightful places to stop and enjoy the view, writes Kathryn Bradley-Hole