The chairman of the Georgian Group on why the 18th century was best.
I DON’T live in the 21st century,’ declares Christopher Boyle. ‘I never have. Even from the tiniest age, I’ve always been stuck somewhere in the first half of the 18th.’ His religion prevents him from believing in reincarnation, but he’s thought about it. ‘It’s not just the buildings, but music, literature—everything. I’ve been teased for laughing out loud on the Tube while reading Alexander Pope.’
Dentistry left something to be desired 250 years ago and he admits to worrying about the food, but more or less every other aspect of life was better under the Georges. ‘The invention of the internal combustion engine spelled the end of civilisation—that and the 1832 Reform Act, of course.’
The chairmanship of the Georgian Group could have been made for him. After 18 months in post, Mr Boyle is delighting in the conservation charity’s 80th anniversary. I meet him in its elegant W1 Adam town house, 6, Fitzroy Square (Country Life, January 25, 2017), where last month’s exhibition, ‘Splendour!’, centred on restoration crafts: ‘All the things you need if you’re going to look after or adapt an 18th-century building, from lime mortar to scagliola tables. It’s to defeat the notion that, even if you wanted to replicate the best Georgian work, you couldn’t do it. We don’t believe that. We know it’s not true. We can do anything and everything that was ever done before.’
Square of face, with a flush of Cumbrian colour to his cheeks, Mr Boyle even looks the part— it’s easy to imagine him being painted by Hogarth. At Kirklinton, the estate that he bought a few miles south of the Scottish border, he’s proud to be ‘an improving squire. I plant trees. I re-impart my park and put deer in it’.
Denne historien er fra March 08 2017-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra March 08 2017-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Tales as old as time
By appointing writers-in-residence to landscape locations, the National Trust is hoping to spark in us a new engagement with our ancient surroundings, finds Richard Smyth
Do the active farmer test
Farming is a profession, not a lifestyle choice’ and, therefore, the Budget is unfair
Night Thoughts by Howard Hodgkin
Charlotte Mullins comments on Moght Thoughts
SOS: save our wild salmon
Jane Wheatley examines the dire situation facing the king of fish
Into the deep
Beneath the crystal-clear, alien world of water lie the great piscean survivors of the Ice Age. The Lake District is a fish-spotter's paradise, reports John Lewis-Stempel
It's alive!
Living, burping and bubbling fermented masses of flour, yeast and water that spawn countless loaves—Emma Hughes charts the rise and rise) of sourdough starters
There's orange gold in them thar fields
A kitchen staple that is easily taken for granted, the carrot is actually an incredibly tricky customer to cultivate that could reduce a grown man to tears, says Sarah Todd
True blues
I HAVE been planting English bluebells. They grow in their millions in the beechwoods that surround us—but not in our own garden. They are, however, a protected species. The law is clear and uncompromising: ‘It is illegal to dig up bluebells or their bulbs from the wild, or to trade or sell wild bluebell bulbs and seeds.’ I have, therefore, had to buy them from a respectable bulb-merchant.
Oh so hip
Stay the hand that itches to deadhead spent roses and you can enjoy their glittering fruits instead, writes John Hoyland
A best kept secret
Oft-forgotten Rutland, England's smallest county, is a 'Notswold' haven deserving of more attention, finds Nicola Venning
