CATEGORIES

Growth factors

The kitchen garden at Gravetye Manor, near East Grinstead, West Sussex Mary Keen talks to head gardener Tom Coward about bringing life and produce back to William Robinson’s magnificent elliptical walled garden

Reject tradition, embrace the eccentric

Our nation is built on whimsy and these five properties are all a bit out of the ordinary

The search for a 'forever' house

These ancient Kent houses were built to last

The COUNTRY LIFE Top 100

There are few more rewarding experiences than successfully breathing new life into an old house—or commissioning a new one. For the seventh year, COUNTRY LIFE has compiled its ever-evolving list of architects, interior designers, garden designers and specialists with the experience and creativity required to get it right

Not to be sniffed at

Claire Jackson meets the highly intelligent sniffer dogs that can help to detect invasive Japanese knotweed, even when it lies dormant in the ground

The lord of the books

From a sentence born of an exhausting teaching job, J. R. R. Tolkien crafted a series of fantastical novels that, 50 years on from his death, still loom as large in our imagination as Sauron’s all-seeing eye, says Matthew Dennison

Style with sympathy

Chandler’s House, Alton Barnes, Wiltshire - The sympathetic restoration of a delightful house has created new, liveable and stylish interiors within potentially awkward constraints, as John Goodall discovers

Glass is the word

Contemporary art glass is back in vogue, with Lalique attracting plenty of buyers

To sing like a Byrd

William Byrd not only survived a perilous period of history as a church composer, but his music is still regularly sung today, 400 years after his death, as Henrietta Bredin reports

Wild river yonder

SOMETIMES I claim to be a wild swimmer, throwing caution and everything else to the wind and the weather, and striding into lakes, rivers and the sea whatever the time of year.

To fish or not to fish?

Once the zenith of fly-fishing and little else, Alphonse Island, a tiny speck in the Seychelles, has reinvented itself as a glorious jack-of-alltrades and travellers, finds Mark Hedges

Land of snow and ice

Once-in-a-lifetime encounters and a sense of scientific purpose colour Ben Olsen’s memorable expedition to the world’s last wilderness

Come holiday or high water

The best yacht charters in 2023 offer intrepid travellers access to hard-to-reach destinations or once-in-a-lifetime experiences, says Adam Hay-Nicholls, who rounds up some of his favourites

Step aboard

The cruising news and trends to keep you afloat in 2023 and beyond

Following the sun : Grey Gables, Buckinghamshire The home of Liz Houghton

A contemporary extension to an Arts-and-Crafts house led to a reassessment of the whole garden, rationalising the space and bringing shaded areas back into use, finds Tiffany Daneff

The next generation

From the new homes that are popping up all over the country, we’ve chosen some of our favourites

So very Surrey

Great names of the past are recalled in three magnificent properties

Timeless Chequerboard

Opening up space either side of a chimney breast transformed this kitchen and dining room, designed by Susie Atkinson

I'm all right, Jack

Small, but mighty, the feisty Jack Russell is as popular as ever, not least as it’s The Queen Consort’s breed of choice. Fellow terrier owner India Sturgis recounts why these tiny tearaways remain so perennially appealing

Brave new world? Or same old

The Government’s failure to be bold means that UK farming risks being neither competitive nor green

Farming on the edge

Adapt or give up? Defra’s new post-Brexit payment schemes for farmers seem to offer both hope and dismay. Julie Harding talks to farming leaders about their concerns for the future

In search of desirable residences

New housing is one of the great issues of the present moment. Roger White looks at the example of Dorset, where he lives, and tries to draw some lessons from recent development there

The Chiswick House Camellias by William Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire

CHISWICK HOUSE holds a significant place in British architectural history as the former home of Richard Boyle, the 3rd Earl of Burlington, 18th-century Palladianism's chief advocate.

State of the Arts

London and the South of England have long been the primary beneficiaries of Arts funding, but is the Government’s latest plan to level up’ actually doing the opposite? Claire Jackson investigates

On the market

London's markets—selling all manner of goods from livestock in the east to lavender in the south-west—used to be ubiquitous. Patrick Galbraith visits the ones still soldiering on

Another brick in the wall

In the first of a new monthly series looking back at the people who helped shape London, Carla Passino discovers that despite his unruffled serenity, not all of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott's designs were met with rapt enthusiasm

LONDON LIFE

Your indispensable guide to the capital

Your zest friend

It may look a little dull compared with other fruit, but the zingy orange was once the preserve of kings and nothing beats its sweet and sharp magic when it comes to brightening up a dreary winter day, says Tom Parker Bowles

In search of sacred places

'Farming as the root of all environmental evil is an increasingly adamantine trope'

Will the real Donatello please stand up?

Sometimes obstreperous, coarse and tricky, Donatello-or Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi-was so outrageously talented he could create ingenious figures in marble, bronze, terracotta or wood, observes Susan Jenkins