IN January 1923, Chips Channon, a young American socialite—later a Conservative MP—stayed at Arundel Castle. ‘An enormous party of over fifty here, mostly young, in celebration of Lady Rachel Howard’s “coming out”,’ he noted in his diary. ‘Arundel is so feudal and medieval (although much restored) that one expects beefeaters to bring in one’s tea. There are moats, battlements and portcullis… Somehow it has more atmosphere than Windsor, if less comfortable… A ball this evening in the great barons’ hall to which all the county came… we were over seventy at dinner and assembled in the… Gothic library-gallery and processed in state into the dining room. The castle itself is quite bare of interesting furniture and tapestry and only a few mediocre pictures.’
His account offers a fascinating vignette of how the large public rooms of the castle with their Georgian plan and Victorian archi- tecture worked when en fête for special parties. What he says about the paucity of the contents, however, is surprising. The Barons’ Hall (Fig 2) would, of course, have been cleared for the dance and Channon presumably did not attend the Catholic services in the chapel, so he would have missed the rare quattrocento paintings and carvings there. His comment, however, underlines the degree to which the castle as it is decorated and arranged today in common with other great houses such as Chatsworth in Derbyshire, Houghton in Norfolk, Wilton in Wiltshire or Grimsthorpe in Lincolnshire-owes its modern interiors to 20th-century revival and is much more magnificent and splendid than before the Second World War.
Denne historien er fra September 06, 2023-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra September 06, 2023-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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Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds