Innholdsfortegnelse for 14-Feb-18 i Country Life

BADA 2018 brings together the very best in fine art, design and antiques from 100 of the UK’s leading dealers, at Chelsea’s fashionable Duke of York Square. Featuring more than 5,000 objects, all available to purchase and each individually vetted by experts. John Spink Fine Watercolours deal in artists of note from the 18th and 19th centuries, specialising in the work of artists who were members of the Royal Society ofWatercolours.‘View near Loch Maree, Ross-Shire’, watercolour heightened with white, by TM Richardson Jnr (1813-1890), signed and dated 1882 www.johnspink.com ‘Vénus à la Coquille’, black crayon on paper laid down, circa 1925 by Raoul Dufy (French, 1877- 1953), 66 x 50 cm.With over 25 years’ experience, Ottocento take pride in offering rare and intriguing works of art at affordable prices including…

HAVING raised a staggering £11,000 for animal charities in 2017, pet photographer Jonathan Yearsley is determined to achieve as much—or more—this year, with the newly launched edition of his popular campaign, 60 Breeds in 60 Days. From March to May, he will photograph 60 different dog breeds in aid of the Dogs Trust. For a minimum donation of £20, each shoot will include a one-hour professional photo session, a small framed print, a slideshow presentation and the option to buy additional images at a discount. However, only one slot is available for each breed, so interested dog owners should reserve their place early. For more information, contact Mr Yearsley (www.jonathanyearsley.co.uk). Good week for Tracing our ancestors Palaeontologists have painstakingly reconstructed the face of the Cheddar Man, a 10,000-year-old skeleton, and…

THIS Italian mastiff, standing before a mountainous backdrop and newly attributed to the 17th-century master Il Guercino, has been languishing in a Suffolk country house for 167 years. Estimated at between £80,000 and £120,000, it will be auctioned at Cheffins’s Fine Art Sale, which takes place on March 7 and 8 in Cambridge. Bought in Rome in 1850, the work is thought to date from about 1625–30 and is a particularly significant piece, because it’s one of just two surviving animal portraits by the artist—the other is the Aldrovandi Dog at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, USA. For more information, contact Cheffins (01223 213343; www.cheffins.co.uk ).…

A PETITION to save a wildlife haven in the Thames Estuary has gained momentum after Natural England highlighted the ecological importance of the site. For the past two months, Buglife has been campaigning to stop the development of a port terminal on the site of the former power station in Tilbury, Essex. The area is home to almost 1,400 invertebrate species, of which 31 are rare or threatened, such as the shrill carder bee (above), the five-banded weevil-wasp and the sea aster mining bee. Buglife believes that the project ‘would lead to the complete loss of an irreplaceable local wildlife site,’ according to the charity’s Jamie Robins. Last week, Buglife’s concerns were vindicated by Natural England, which not only deemed Tilbury to be ‘of sufficient quality’ to meet the designation…

Quiz of the week 1) The headquarters of the Council of Europe are located in which city? 2) A diptych is a painting consisting of how many panels? 3) Jubilee, Sweet Eve and Elsanta are all varieties of what? 4) The Euxine Sea is an ancient name for which body of water? 5) On a standard London Underground map, what colour is the District Line? The nature of things Doves THE return of the pigeon’s soft cooing in the new year’s burgeoning avian orchestra is always welcome. At once friendly and gentle, the songs of some species may be more monotonous than others, but the arrangement of notes and powdery softness of their delivery is usually soothing—hypnotic, even. More than 300 species of pigeon and dove can be found…

THE battle is on. The Government has declared that Britain is going to be a leader in agriculture, the environment and animal welfare. Michael Gove has nailed his colours to the mast and, whatever the gaps in his 25-year plan (Town & Country, January 17, and Opinion, January 31), it gives the clear direction that Defra hasn’t had for years. We are promised an Agriculture Bill to replace the EU Common Agricultural Policy, there’s already a Bill to protect sentient animals (Town & Country, February 7) and the Food and Drink Sector Council has had its first meeting. Agromenes’s prediction that this was a Minister who’d throw all he’s got into his new job as Defra Secretary seems to have been prescient: Mr Gove is clearly determined to make a…

THERE are at least 57 varieties of adult remorse. A minor, but oddly nasty one, which I experienced last week, is coming out of a West End theatre having sat through a 3 1/2- hour-long play you’ve paid £74.25 each to go to and now wished you hadn’t, as it wasn’t as good as everyone said it was. With that £148.50 and a rare precious afternoon alone with my husband, we could have gone to our favourite restaurant (The Wolseley) and splashed out on a bottle of Champagne to accompany our sublime schnitzels with half a lemon wrapped in muslin. And we could have had a good long chat. What a wasted opportunity! Instead, we’d sat in a stuffy theatre from 2pm until 5.30pm, not even side by side…

THE lure of cosy contentment cannot be denied. Consider the hygge craze that has swept the country, the must-have cashmere throws and the boom in boxsets and Netflix subscriptions. Ticking all the boxes is the wood-burning stove: a focal point and salve to our powerful nostalgia for the hearth. However, it’s not all rustic charm, tea and toasted crumpets. Certainly, there are traditional and country designs aplenty, ready to match all nostalgic needs, but there is a new breadth of choice, from elegant stoves to suit the grandest rooms to sculptural pieces for the most modish of contemporary homes. Of course, the stove is nothing new—history records ceramic examples dating back to 1490, with cast-iron heating and cooking stoves being manufactured from the mid 17th century—but the vogue in the…

‘Once homework had been completed, that simmering stew was all I could think of’ I HAVE a feeling that an Irish cook, when making an Irish stew, would never countenance the inclusion of pearl barley. Starch will always come courtesy of potatoes in that green and pleasant land so famous for them, particularly when turned into two of the most delicious potato dishes ever created: col-cannon and champ. Respectively, these are mashed potatoes mixed with pale-green cabbage, chopped and cooked, or mashed potatoes with sliced spring onions stirred in at the very last minute. Turned out into a warmed dish and with a deep dip pressed into the glorious mound with the back of a great big spoon, a large serving of these will never be complete without a…

THE Grade I-listed Caerhays Castle, ( above ) designed by Nash, dates from the early 19th century, but it was a 20th-century partnership forged between plantsman John Charles Williams (1861–1939) and plant hunters E. H. Wilson (1876–1930) and then George Forrest (1873–1932) that secured rich botanical booty for the gardens. The plant hunters scoured Yunnan province in western China, for new, largely ericaceous, flowering shrubs and trees and, by sponsoring intrepid expeditions, Williams was rewarded with access to the first of hundreds of exotic plants and seeds new to Western eyes. Many thrived in their new Cornish surroundings, as their aspect and climate somewhat resembled the plants’ native conditions and the steeply sloping, coastal site and impenetrable shelter belts of trees protected the precious Oriental specimens from westerly gales. High…

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THIS year, a flurry of exhibitions celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Representation of People Act, which gave the vote to some women across Britain for the first time (February 7). Among the most interesting events is the National Trust’s ‘Women and Power’ programme: ‘A Woman’s Place at Knole’ (May 17–November 4), which features six artists’ response to the theme; ‘Faces of Change: Votes for Women,’ in partnership with the National Portrait Gallery, shows portraits from the Trust’s collection in a touring exhibition; ‘Celebrating the Bluestocking Society’ at Hatchlands, Surrey (June–September) will explore the history of Fanny Boscawen, builder of Hatchlands and founder member of the Bluestocking Society; and ‘Branded: Fashion, Femininity and the Right to Vote’, at Killerton, Devon (until October) features garments and objects associated with the Suffragettes.…

JOHN TIMMS, Smythson’s chief gold stamper, is descended from a long line of London-based print workers—his father was a copperplate engraver, his grandfather a printer and his great-grandfather a typesetter. The luxury stationer was established in 1887 and boasts three Royal Warrants; Mr Timms works out of its New Bond Street store with a machine that uses heat to apply gold or silver foil to an array of wedding albums, visitors’ books, game books and sleek, personalised diaries. ‘It’s very painstaking when you’re learning,’ admits Mr Timms, ‘but it gets easier and a simple job like applying two initials to the bottom right-hand side of a book can be done in 10 minutes.’ Most of Mr Timms’s work is completed on the shop floor while the customer waits. ‘There are…

What is the advantage of a stove over an open fire? The simple answer is heating efficiency-wood-burning stoves are better at heating a room than an open fire. The chimney of an open fire loses much more heat (wasting as much as 90% of the warmth) than the flue system of a wood-burning stove and a stove produces much more warmth than an open fire because enclosed fires burn hotter than those that are exposed to the elements. Modern stoves also offer more precise heat control, so it's easier to maintain a comfortable temperature in the room. Environmentally friendly or harmful? It's a thorny question-last autumn, London Mayor Sadiq Khan called for a ban on wood-burning stoves in some areas, because stoves, used in 16% of households in the South-East,…

RESTLESS and charismatic, the patrician Sir Christopher Ondaatje is no stranger to Country Life , which has variously described him as an ‘adventurer, historian, geographer, author, collector and connoisseur of countless treasures, business magnate, sportsman and philanthropist’—all of which he has been, and at the highest level, in the course of an extraordinary life. Writing in the magazine on August 9, 2001, Sir Christopher reflects on his lifelong love affair with Exmoor and the enduring fascination of his ‘mystical Gothic manor house’, Grade II-listed Glenthorne at Countisbury, near Lynton, north Devon, which he and his wife rescued from dereliction in 1985. With his nearest neighbour some seven miles away, the gloriously secluded house, set in 77 wooded acres overlooking the dramatic west Somerset coastline, has been an oasis of…

WHEN Charles Dickens first crossed the Atlantic in 1842, he had a miserable time. His state room was an ‘utterly impracticable, thoroughly hopeless, and profoundly preposterous box’ in which he was seasick and fearful during heavy seas. That was before the days of the screw propeller: by the end of the century, ships were larger, faster and on the way to becoming the floating palaces of the first half of the 20th century. The V&A’s glamorous exhib ition explores this heyday, less in terms of the social microcosm found on board (our eyes aren’t offended by the bleakness of steerage) than about style, in all its forms. Shipping companies were highly design-conscious—and competitive. In an era of intense patriotism, liners expressed national pride. In France and Germany, they were almost…

WITH a tender look in her eyes, a cow sticks out her tongue and gives Luke Winton, a young farmer from Wales, a good clean, thoroughly licking his head. Mr Winton recently shared a video capturing the hilarious moment as part of a social-media campaign to celebrate milk, butter and cheese production and inform the public about the high standards, passion and hard work that power the industry. Hundreds of people are taking to Face-book, Instagram and Twitter to post facts, figures, quotes, videos and snapshots of life on a dairy farm under the hashtag #Februdairy. The initiative is the brainchild of livestock-sustainability consultant Jude Capper, who wanted to counter the negative publicity that has dogged the sector in the past few months. ‘The concept actually originated in January…

WILD-PLANT conservation charity Plantlife has just launched a guide to help people replace peat with more sustainable alternatives. Available online, it will provide advice on eco-friendly materials such as coir or composted bark and direct gardeners on where to source them. ‘Peatlands are key to keeping carbon in the ground and out of the air, filtering water, lessening the impact of flooding and providing a haven for wildlife,’ says Katie Cameron of Plantlife. ‘However, peat only grows by 1mm a year, so it rarely recovers and its destruction is a very real threat. We are certain that gardeners would not wish its obliteration from our countryside, especially as peat-free alternatives are proven to be just as effective.’ For further information, visit bit.ly/peat-free.…

Each Valentine’s Day, we’re enveloped by the romance of human love, but what about the romance of place? Today, we barely have time to appreciate our surroundings, but, in the 18th century, things were very different. Some of the greatest music, poetry and prose written was inspired by the beauty of the countryside and people flocked to experience it. The reason was the birth of the Picturesque movement, a new way of describing the beauty of England and the marvels it possessed. The ‘father’ of the movement was Rev William Gilpin, a preacher-teacher who developed the principles of the Picturesque by studying landscape (especially paintings) combined with the art of description. He stressed: ‘Observations… through the vehicle of description have the better chance of being founded in truth; as…

AS usual, Shakespeare caught the mood in a moment: ‘In spring time, the only pretty ring time,/ When birds do sing hey ding a ding ding;/ Sweet lovers love the spring.’ Although most birds are quietly procreating in tidy relationships, others are indulging without regard to traditional human notions of one-to-one romance. Indeed, ornithologists have determined that 90% of passerines (perching birds with three forward toes and one rearward)—which account for more than half of all bird species—fight for territory and form monogamous pairings for at least one breeding season. One male, one female: logical, poetic, even, and no hanky-panky. However, scientists admit there’s another sphere of activity that they call social monogamy, where at least one of the pair flits around in search of extra action. The most likely…

POOR Prince Harry. As if facing the world’s press with your new fiancée wasn’t nerve-racking enough, he had to deal with the fact that it wasn’t just his and Meghan Markle’s outfits and body language that were being closely scrutinised—also in the spotlight was the ring with which he had proposed, which he had designed himself. His Royal Highness followed in the footsteps of his grandfather (who gave the then Princess Elizabeth a ring set with diamonds from a family tiara) and went bespoke to create something truly meaningful. One of the three diamonds set in the ring is from Botswana, where the couple had holidayed early in their relationship; the others come from the collection of his late mother, Diana, Princess of Wales. The band itself is fashioned from…

THOMAS CHIPPENDALE, sometimes called the ‘Shakespeare of English furniture’, was born 300 years ago in the West Yorkshire market town of Otley. The enormous growth in furniture studies and the discovery of new designers in recent decades has done nothing to diminish his reputation as the eponymous father of a style of restrained (and sometimes not so restrained) Rococo furniture. The discovery of his bills and other documents has also confirmed him as the author of some of the most outstanding examples of mid-Georgian English furnishings. This year, Chippendale’s tercentenary is being celebrated with numerous events under the umbrella of ‘Chippendale 300’ and a major exhibition at Leeds City Museum. One of the latter’s main themes is his role as a designer and the central importance of his great book,…