WHAT is the future for country estates? To be set in the thickest, most gelatinous aspic? Or something more fluid and constantly evolving? Over the centuries, they have been in a constant state of flux, with Chatsworth, in particular, a shining beacon to the exciting possibilities of not allowing time to stand still. Centuries after the Derbyshire house was first built, it still fizzes with the same creative energy required to build it.
At the Chapel Barn estate, the latest addition to the Wilderness Reserve in Suffolk, the focus has been on the highly creative restoration of cottages and farm buildings. Not only have Moat Cottage, The Grange and the Cider House been brought back to life with a structural integrity that they would never have enjoyed when built, but they have also been lent a pared-back aesthetic that couldn’t be further from cottagey pastiche.
The quality of the craftsmanship—from the oak, hewn with extraordinary precision, to the pargeting (an East Anglian speciality) and the decorative brickwork— puts them in a class of their own. There is also a focus on the landscape, from designs that the 18th-century Capability Brown conceived, but never implemented, to interventions by current landscape architect Kim Wilkie.
Denne historien er fra May 26, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra May 26, 2021-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.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
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.
