Innholdsfortegnelse for 23-Oct-2019 i Country Life

TWELVE top dogs—formerly underdogs—adorn the Kennel Club’s (KC) new Breed Rescue calendar. ‘Pawtrait’ subjects include rough collie Tyler, smuggled into the UK in poor health, but now fit and happy, Tallulah the pug, who had to have surgery to correct her life-threatening brachycephalic disorder, deaf Cavalier Nutmeg, old English sheepdog Truffle and Irish setter Finn (right). ‘Through these beautiful photographs, we can... highlight the importance of the work that rescue welfare organisations do for hundreds of dogs across the country,’ says Steve Dean, chairman of the KC Charitable Trust, to which calendar proceeds go. ‘It’s so important that, when buying a dog, owners do their research thoroughly.’ The KC Charitable Trust’s work ranges from canine-disease research to supporting dog-welfare organisations and training. Breed Rescue calendars cost £5 (www.kennelclubshop.org.uk)…

Quiz of the week 1) Cape Wrath is on the north-westerly coast of which country? 2) Milou is the French name of which cartoon character’s dog? 3) Which major UK racecourse is at Prestbury Park? 4) Oast houses were designed for drying what? 5) In medicine, carditis is inflammation of which organ? Time to buy Unmissable events Exhibition Until January 26, 2020 ‘Making a Masterpiece: Bouts and Beyond (1450–2020)’ (right), York Art Gallery, North Yorkshire. Examination of the necessary steps to creating a masterpiece, inspired by a 15th-century painting by Dieric Bouts, on loan from the Bowes Museum. Includes work by masters such as Hans Memling and Lucas van Leyden. 10am–4.30pm, adult tickets £8 (01904 687687; www.yorkart gallery.org.uk) Until November 16 ‘Personal Space’, Huxley-Parlour Gallery, London W1. Eileen Cooper…

When money grew on trees HAVING enjoyed your article about mulberry bushes (October 9), I thought I would mention the Garden Court at the Bank of England, where four mulberry trees grow. They were planted to symbolise the origins of paper money: the first paper currency in seventh-century China was made from beaten mulberry bark. They were also a practical choice, because the roots grow horizontally into the ground, without disturbing the gold vaults below. Jonathan Notley, London The writer of the letter of the week will win a bottle of Pol Roger Brut Réserve Champagne Very yummy caterpillars I WAS heartened to learn that jackdaws are partial to box-tree moth caterpillars (Town & Country, September 18). We have a sizeable old box topiary, which we would be…

PICI thinks she’s human—I think all Jack Russells do, actually,’ says the London-based little dog’s owner, Elizabeth Johnson. She goes on to explain that Pici (who is named for the local pasta where she was born in Italy, pronounced ‘peachy’) is confident, kind, gentle, a sun-worshipper, slightly territorial with strangers or other dogs, but unbelievably tolerant of children —‘a child in a shop the other day grabbed her tail and just pulled and pulled and pulled. We had to prise its fingers off as she would never snap or growl, she just rammed her tail firmly between her legs for the next half an hour’. Pici, however, is also something of a master criminal. When COUNTRY LIFE announced a new search for Britain’s naughtiest dog, four years after Rabbit was…

A BEAUTIFUL, enigmatic and wild traveller, there is much that sets the woodcock apart from other game birds. Our resident population is boosted each winter by hordes of refugees from the frozen wastelands of eastern Europe, many arriving by the silvery light of the first full moon in November, known colloquially as the ‘woodcock moon’. Falls of ’cock continue to take advantage of our milder maritime climate throughout winter and can number more than a million visitors in a good year, but most will have deserted these shores by the end of March to return to summer breeding sites in Scandinavia, Finland, the Baltic States, Western Russia and Siberia. ‘The crepuscular display is accompanied by a subtle orchestra of croaks and squeaks’ The woodcock’s plumage is the rich tawny hue…

IN the countryside, there are certain items you can expect to find in every wardrobe: a waxed jacket, cord trousers, a pair of wellies. In the past few years, a pair of boots or loafers from Fairfax & Favor has joined that list. Launched by childhood friends Marcus Fairfax Fountaine and Felix Favor Parker in 2013, the company soon made its mark on the collective consciousness with its distinctive, tasselled long boots. The British brand has been worn by the likes of actor Rupert Everett, Olympian Charlotte Dujardin and TV presenter Clare Balding, and the new autumn/ winter collection looks equally sure to be a hit. The ambitious new collection stays true to the brand ethos of mixing classic country and modern city style, remaining a celebration of British culture…

IS everybody burned out? You’d be forgiven for thinking so, as our lives are increasingly squeezed in between news alerts, emails and social-media pings—and that’s before we get into the office. Even on holiday we’re expected to be available 24/7, so it’s hardly a surprise if we’re frazzled. Of course, the most successful among us like to reward themselves with respite from the madding crowds; a country estate offers privacy, peace and quiet and the giddy experience of calling thousands of acres of glorious countryside your own. And as the world becomes increasingly fast-paced, the wild landscapes and sheer scale of Scottish estates can start to look extremely appealing. Evelyn Channing from Savills (0131–247 3704) says she can certainly understand the draw: ‘Losing yourself in the back of beyond…

THE deciduous azalea Rhododendron luteum is one of the most dependable shrubs for late autumn colour, but I’ve never known its foliage flame so brilliantly and persistently as this year. Marvelling at it, I’m reminded of my last encounter with the historian Norman Stone, who died in June. It was at the house of a mutual friend who’d invited us for dinner. As his preparations proceeded, we sat in our host’s garden beside a specimen of R. luteum crowned with deliciously perfumed golden blooms. ‘There’s a lovely thing,’ Norman declared. ‘What is it?’ I told him, adding that it was the right plant to have taken his fancy, being native to his stamping grounds in Eastern Europe and Turkey, and of historical significance. ‘Historical significance?’ he purred, with a…

IF Audrey Hepburn is to be believed, Paris is always a good idea. The line comes from the 1954 film Sabrina, in which Miss Hepburn plays the film’s titular character, who goes to the French capital to find herself and returns self-assured and elegant. I might not have come back transformed, but there’s something about the City of Light that makes you stand a little taller, slow down and savour time and food. In May 2020, museums will throw open their doors free of charge until late into the evening, alongside a series of specially organised activities. An exceptional exhibition marking the 500th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s death is at the Louvre until February 24, 2020. RP What to do Explore the myriad shops. Couleurs Vernis Brosserie sells irresistible…

THE British never warmed to Joshua Reynolds’s high-minded belief that history painting, taking the Bible and mythology as its subject matter, was far superior to any other genre, but, nonetheless, through an unfortunate cultural cringe, many people went along with it. As a result, to those who remembered him at all, for 150 years after his death, George Stubbs was merely a painter of horses and the country gentry who owned them, and thus more artisan than artist. Since his rediscovery by Paul Mellon, connoisseur of both horse flesh and British painting, the much wider range of Stubbs’s art and philosophical interests has become apparent. This excellent show opens with birth and closes with death. In between are horses aplenty, but also a whole menagerie of other creatures, familiar and…

IT seems a good omen for the future of relationships that the London church spire to which we owe the tiered shape of our wedding cakes has been rescued. This year’s Heritage at Risk register was released by Historic England last week and Fleet Street’s Church of St Bride —one of the first to be opened after the Great Fire and by Sir Christopher Wren —is among 310 entries that have been happily removed from the list. Other success stories include the wreck of HMS Invincible, a 1744 74-gun warship on the Solent bed; Carrshield lead mines and ore works in the North Pennines, which were on the brink of collapse, but are now restored and functioning as a camping barn for walkers, cyclists and dark-sky astronomers; and St…

1932 Unpublished Potter Ursula Mommens (1908–2010) at work in her studio near her parents’ home of Gorringes, Down, Kent. The daughter of acclaimed COUNTRY LIFE golf correspondent Bernard Darwin, the great-granddaughter of Charles Darwin and the great-great granddaughter of Josiah Wedgwood, Mommens studied under William Staite Murray, later worked with Michael Cardew and was still exhibiting new works at the age of 95. The COUNTRY LIFE Picture Library contains 120 years’ worth of photography and articles from the world’s leading architectural and gardens experts. Many are available to licence or purchase in print form from £28 plus VAT. Please email enquiries to clpicturelibrary @ti-media.com…

The End of 40 Minutes, the Fernie by Lionel Edwards Daniel Crane is a sporting artist and joint-master of the Scarteen in Ireland ‘A true foxhunter lives by an all-consuming creed; to him, hunting is not only a sport, it is his life. Lionel Edwards’s expertise epitomises this. The casual viewer sees a successful pack of hounds and sweating horses, but the sportsman sees beyond this. He sees the professionals’ work in kennels honing the pack and the horseman’s skill in producing a fit hunter, not to mention the generosity of farmers across the hunt countries. This picture also makes us wonder: where were you when hounds went away? What country did we encounter in our striving to see the finish? Edwards gives us The End, but those Forty…

THE first recorded fox hunt in Britain took place in Norfolk in 1534 and, from the start, drinking vessels with an alcoholic chaser were offered at the meet. They were known as stirrup cups: ‘Come, haste and quaff the stirrup-cup!/Turn down the empty glass!’ urged poet W. H. Ogilvie in English Grass. They first took the form of footless glass goblets and, later, silver modelled as animal heads. Common to both was a shape that couldn’t be set down and they were, therefore, served from a special tray. Occasionally, the snout and ears of the animals were created in such a way that the cup could stand upright. The first silver stirrup cups, fashioned as fox masks, were made in London in the 1770s. These were originally made in two…

ON a day of jolly boating weather last summer, I took out my friend’s big ugly cabin cruiser, which is moored at Henley. Unfortunately, it conked out, as mechanical things do in my hands. A passing Barnacle Bill-sort-of chap gave me a tow back to the dock at Leander, but, silly me, I forgot that, with no engine, I couldn’t brake… and when he stopped his smart boat, I ploughed into him. The sound of splintering wood must have been unnerving as he called me some terribly unnautical and unrepeatable names. Even when I told him that ‘just down the road, er, river is Freebody’s, which will soon have your boat shipshape’, he was uncomforted. ‘I bought it from them this morning,’ he replied, dampeningly. Peter Freebody & Co, still…

WILLOW & HALL handcrafts British furniture, personalised for you. The autumn sale is now on with 10% off all sofas, sofa beds and beds and, as a reader of COUNTRY LIFE , you can also benefit from an exclusive 5% discount on any items not already on sale—use the code CL311019 by October 31. For guaranteed Christmas delivery, order before midnight on October 31. ‘Customers can choose from a curated edit of more than 200 fabrics’ Willow & Hall’s beautiful products are all handmade by skilled craftsmen, to a design specification of your choice. Customers can choose from a curated edit of more than 200 fabrics, a handpicked selection of quality seat cushions and, if purchasing a sofa bed, from three luxury mattress options—open sprung, pocket sprung and memory foam.…

WHEN Patrick and I discovered this house was for sale, we both went white. We were shaking with excitement.’ I’m standing at the arched doorway of Churston Manor, the Devon home of the photographer Tessa Traeger and the artist, designer and opera director Patrick Kinmonth. The door—always ajar—opens directly onto a gently sloping lawn, framed on each side by curving borders. ‘Patrick designed the shape of the borders so that they enfold the house,’ Tessa explains. ‘He’s good at architectural structure, but I do the growing —the planting is all mine.’ I drink in the abundance: the smoky mauve of arching Rosa glauca, stands of pale-green Angelica archangelica, towering silvery cardoons and deep-pink, skyrocketing foxgloves. Trails of Rosa Veilchenblau, the colour of crushed blackberries, make their way up the old…

Persian chicken, quince and saffron casserole, with bejewelled rice Serves 4 Ingredients For the chicken 1 chicken, portioned100ml olive oil2 cloves garlic, crushedJuice of 1 lemonHandful of choppedparsley For the bejewelled rice 300g white basmati rice75g butter50g chopped pistachiosZest of 1 satsumaSeeds of half a pomegranate1 red onion, sliced1 pinch saffron strands1 cinnamon stick500ml hot chicken stockJuice of 1 satsuma1 quince, peeled, cored and slicedChilli flakesFresh parsley to garnish Method Preheat your oven to 170°C/325°F/gas mark 3. Put the chicken pieces into a large freezer bag and add the oil, garlic, lemon juice, parsley and seasoning. Massage the ingredients into the chicken from the outside of the bag and then refrigerate for up to 24 hours. ‘An autumn jewel, quince adds a delightfully floral fragrance to comfort food’ Tip…

WHERE better to sit sipping a pisco sour than watching a Peruvian Paso horse perform its extraordinary four-beat ‘swimming’ gait surrounded by a vineyard and the oldest working distillery in the Americas in a coastal valley of the Ica region of Peru? Founded in 1684, La Caravedo includes a stable complex, the padrón’s arcaded house with chapel under the shade of a 200-year-old weeping fig tree and five colonial-style bungalows available to rent. For all the productivity of this beautiful hacienda, where grapes are grown, harvested and pressed, their juices fermented, distilled and bottled with varieties of Peru’s national spirit, my lasting memory is of the peace. Hours spent reading by the pool, wandering the vineyards or riding through the estate are disturbed only by the call of the cuculí…

History A Short History of London Simon Jenkins (Viking, £25) SIMON JENKINS is one of our least hysterical opinion-page writers and his history of London is—as well as being well written—characteristically phlegmatic. London’s conflicts have, he writes, been ‘remarkably peaceful’. Yes, there was tension between the alder-manic power of the City, where the money was made, and the court in Westminster where it was spent. In the Civil War, the City came down against the King, but then ‘expressed itself forcefully for compromise’ and the Restoration. The diarist, John Evelyn, watched Charles II being greeted as he processed to Westminster, ‘above a hundred proper maids in white garments with flaskets full of flowers and sweet herbs strewed the way before him’. Whether quoting others or minting his own imagery, the…

THE establishment of an Office for Environmental Protection (OEP), an independent watchdog ‘to hold government and other public bodies to account’, according to Defra, is only one element of the much-awaited, ground-breaking Environment Bill, outlined in The Queen’s speech last week. Legally-binding targets are proposed to improve air quality via local authorities and cleaner fuels and vehicles, which Penny Woods of the British Lung Foundation agrees is ‘critical’; to increase sustainable water management and safeguard precious resources; and to restore and protect biodiversity and natural habitats, with particular reference to new housing developers, who will have to deliver a 10% boost to Nature. There is also a pledge to improve recycling and tackle waste with a deposit-return scheme and new charges on single-use plastics. The Bill only applies to England,…

IN tribute to the 80th anniversary of the start of the Second World War, Historic England has teamed up with the Poetry Society and Double Take Projections to create a series of dazzling illuminations at two cathedrals that fared very differently during the Blitz. As the Square Mile sizzled in flames on December 29, 1940, Herculean efforts were taken to preserve Sir Christopher Wren’s masterpiece. Sam Chauveau, a fireman on duty, described the scene: ‘By the time we finished tackling the fires on the roof of the [Stock] Exchange, the sky, which was ebony black when we first got up there, was now changing to a yellowy orange colour. It looked like there was an enormous circle of fire, including St Paul’s churchyard.’ Bombs poured onto the cathedral, most quickly…

WHEN Nick Fox flies Fancy from the back of Buckskin, the trio are fulfilling an ancient role, hunting ‘the wily old moor crows on the fells of Northumberland’. Fancy is one of a team of falcons Dr Fox uses for crow-hawking that includes her two sisters, Stingray and Flamenco. ‘I come up with the good names, such as Spitfire. The staff pick dreadful ones—usually, the latest pop star I’ve never heard of. Fancy is a steady, reliable bird and, if she loses the crow, she’ll fly above the horse until we find it again.’ Bred out of a black saker called Belukha, her father was a peregrine, an effective cross: ‘Peregrines are fast flyers, but sakers will take prey on the ground, whereas a peregrine will leave it.’ The instinct…

THE Prime Minister is going to chair a Cabinet Committee on Climate Change—an innovation that shows that this government is girding its loins for some pretty radical action. Even so, with Extinction Rebellion on the streets and Greta Thunberg across the internet, campaigners will call almost anything they propose inadequate. The road to Net Zero in 2050 is tough enough for any Government, but particularly for this one, which is subject to the courts if it fails to take adequate measures to achieve its target. Nor is it helped by the failure of previous administrations to move fast enough, leaving it with a good deal to make up. ‘We’ve only a decade left to make changes before global warming spirals beyond what we can tackle’ However, at least its target…

PEERING into my crystal ball (for sale, £50, but you will beat me down to £30), I see that, at 6.45pm on Tuesday, December 10, you will be seated with my wife, Rose, and me, together with COUNTRY LIFE colleagues and a few select friends, in the main nave of St Paul’s Cathedral, waiting for the Cancer Research UK Carol Concert to begin. Looking around, you will note all the world-famous musicians, singers and actors waiting to perform. Andrew Carwood, the conductor, will raise his baton and the choir will start to sing. Bother, I’m not getting any sound (being a psychic is hard, as I knew it would be), so I can’t tell you the first item on the programme. However, I can see that you’re deeply moved.…

THE 14th-century buildings of New College—described last week—may have formed the tradition of collegiate architecture in Oxford, but they have not been left unchanged for the past 500 years. Nor has the institution itself. After the Reformation, the Chapel was purged of ‘Popish’ aberrations. Subsidiary altars were removed in 1560, followed in 1566 by the destruction of the statues in the reredos, which was plastered over, and of the rood loft in 1571–72. There were also changes to the residential parts of the college. The warden’s lodgings were enlarged to allow for the presence of a wife and family; some late-16th-century carved chimneypieces survive there (Fig 3). By the late 1600s, the senior fellows, tiring of sharing their rooms with junior members of the college, were beginning to construct ‘cocklofts’…

THE fascination of shooting as a sport,’ mused P. G. Wodehouse, ‘depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun.’ As ever, the great Plum had a point, but we live in a land of game—furred, feathered and finned. As the leaves fall from the trees and the vales, valleys and moors ring out to the crack of rifle and the shotgun’s blast, it’s a fine time to be alive. In fact, there’s no place I’d rather be. Forget Thai beaches and pellucid Caribbean waters, the heady bustle of Hong Kong and Sydney’s eternal allure. Nope, I want to be in shirtsleeves in a Hampshire field as a flurry of partridge explodes from behind a well-trimmed hedge. Either that or gazing up at…

CERTAIN rivers are generous to me, but some, inexplicably, seem to turn their backs and hand out goodies to others instead. However much I like fishing them, for instance, the Stinchar and Findhorn are examples of the latter, yet Sutherland’s notoriously fickle Brora has always been bounteous. Last time I visited, I managed three salmon in as many days—an average I wouldn’t mind maintaining across a Scottish season. This August, I was invited back. Since Victorian times, the Brora has had the reputation of being a good spring river and—possibly due to a stocking of fry from the Rhine—is home to some exceptionally large salmon (a poacher took one in the 1940s that would only just fit into the local butcher’s freezer, and that measured 6ft square). These days,…

HENRY BICKERTON divides his time between two roles. He is both a director of London-based antique dealers Jamb—which produces a growing number of new designs inspired by the past, alongside its old pieces—and an interior decorator, who champions a look that combines distinctive pieces with a strong palette of colours. Featured here is the drawing room of his London home, which was formerly subdivided into six bedsits. When Henry and his wife, Sophie, tackled the layout, they were keen to retain a drawing room with a formal feel. ‘It’s something I try to encourage all my clients to choose. There’s a real benefit to having a grown-up room in which to enjoy long winter evenings. We spend the summer in the kitchen, but this room, with its dark-painted walls, warm…

THE recent launch onto the market of one of west Kent’s most appealing country houses, Grade II-listed Mere House at Mereworth, near Maidstone—at a guide price of £2.5 million through Knight Frank (020–7861 5390)—highlights an intriguing connection between the elegant Georgian former rectory and the libertine Sir Francis Dashwood, 11th Baron Le Despencer, founder of the secretive Monks of Medmenham, an extreme version of the notorious Hellfire Club. When John Fane, 7th Earl of Westmorland, died childless in 1762, his title passed to Thomas Fane, together with the family seat at Apethorpe, Northamptonshire. Meanwhile, Sir Francis Dashwood inherited, through his mother, the title of Baron Le Despencer and the Mereworth Castle estate, including the advowson of the spectacular St Lawrence’s Church, Mereworth, which had been built in the English…

WE are delighted to collaborate with Joanna Hardy again to host our Jewel Identity event at Dukes London. Joanna will be talking about her recent trip to the emerald mines in Zambia and Susannah and her team will be on hand to provide free verbal valuations on your jewellery. Whether you are curious as to the history, the date, the maker or the value, we will be able to enlighten you. This is a wonderful opportunity to unearth the secrets of your jewellery and chat to Joanna and Susannah in the secure setting of Dukes London, while enjoying a glass of Perrier-Jouët Champagne and some canapés. When Tuesday, November 19, 3pm–5pm. Where Dukes London, 35, St James’s Place, London SW1A 1NY. Tickets £19. Go to www.eventbrite.co.ukand search for ‘Jewel Identity’.…