Innholdsfortegnelse for 15-Jul-2020 i Country Life

WHEN Nick Sotherton joined the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) to study for his PhD in 1976, I doubt even he imagined he would still be there 44 years later. He rose to become the director of research, advisory and education before his retirement last week—which, he says, is ‘bloody stressful’, as he bemoans the state of his garden. Prof Sotherton’s success at one of the country’s top conservation charities is all the more surprising considering he grew up in a London suburb. At school, he was asked what he wanted to do for a career—when he said he ‘wanted to work with animals’, he was promptly sent to the local abattoir. Since then, however, he’s been a champion of the positive impact shooting can have on wildlife, backing…

What country-dwelling child hasn't picked a pale, creamy trumpet and sucked on the sweet nectar inside? Known as woodbine due to its climbing habit-‘Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms. So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle gently entwist,' crooned Titania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream-the widespread county flower of Warwickshire and symbol of devotion festoons woodlands and hedgerows with clusters of double-lipped bells, turning yellow after pollination, until August. The evening air is flooded with perfume as they open to attract moths, in turn supporting birds, bats and dormice, and bearing ripe red berries come autumn. Folklore held it unlucky to take it indoors, but a distillation from the flowers was recommended for nervous headaches.…

1947 August 29 Unpublished One man and his dog: a sailor gazes out to sea from Beach Street in the picturesque coastal town of Deal, Kent. The photograph is one of a series taken after the local council threatened to demolish swathes of the old town in a re-development scheme that was defeated after a vigorous campaign. The COUNTRY LIFE Picture Library contains 120 years' worth of photography and articles from the world's leading architectural and gardens experts. We are delighted to note that works are again available to license or purchase in print form, from £35 plus VAT. Please email enquiries to clpicturelibrary @futurenet.com…

John McEwen comments on Penelope Robert Adam is a Classical architect and urban designer who recently established Robert Adam Architectural Consultancy. His latest book, Time for Architecture , was published in March Although she is seated on a Classical klismos, wearing an ancient-Greek chiton, this picture of the daughter of a friend of the artist is clearly modern. In the words of David Ligare: “In Homer’s Odyssey Penelope was a brave, resourceful and patient woman. She represents the potential for honourable action for women of any period.” Bathed in the evening light of northern California, the simple composition and fine painting gives it a serene and transcendent beauty that, like Classicism itself, can speak to any age D AVID LIGARE was born in Oak Park, Illinois, in the US. His…

FOLLIES are misnamed. Despite their small size, they can be very serious little buildings indeed, whether they are pioneering an architectural style, such as the 18th-century Greek Revival, before it is used elsewhere, or works of geometrical complexity, as was the case in the Elizabethan period. The new folly at Wolverton Hall is of the latter type, being constructed on an octagonal plan (Fig 1). Yet, for all the intensity of the architecture, its festive character seems to captivate everyone who sees it. If, says the owner, he had been given £5 by all the people who have expressed admiration, it would have paid for itself many times over. That owner is Nicholas Coleridge, chairman of the V&A Museum and, until recently, CEO of the publishing group Condé Nast. (It…

TODAY sees the launch onto the market of one of mid Devon’s most captivating country houses, Grade I-listed The Manor House at Bradninch, which stands in seven acres of beautifully designed gardens on the edge of this ancient village, 12 miles north of the cathedral city of Exeter. Selling agents Knight Frank (01392 423111) quote a guide price of £3.5 million for the house, which was originally built in 1547. Cross-wings were added in the early 1600s; it was remodelled in the early 1700s and further altered in the 19th and 20th centuries. Writing in COUNTRY LIFE (September 13, 1916), Architectural Editor Lawrence Weaver attributes the survival of much of the manor’s richly decorated interior to its long association with the Duchy of Cornwall. According to Weaver, ‘Henry VIII,…

THIS brush-shaped fossil is the oldest known member of the daisy or sunflower family. Its colour and texture capture something of the feel of Vincent van Gogh’s famous paintings of the dying sunflowers, which were built up from thick ochre-coloured brushstrokes invoking the texture of petals and seed heads. The sunflower is distinctive and unusual because what appears to be a single flower actually is a composite of numerous, simple flowers of varied shapes that are grouped together at the end of a stem, collectively acting as a single integrated entity. This compound flowerhead gives the family its name Compositae and also its alternative name Asteraceae, which comes from the classical Latin word aster, meaning ‘star’. Nearly 10% of the flowers in the world today belong to this family. With…

A TEMPORARY holiday on stamp duty on the first £500,000 of property sales has been met with positive reviews by estate agents and property experts. The holiday, which was announced last week as part of Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s summer budget update, intends to kick-start the property market in England and Northern Ireland after the shock of the coronavirus pandemic. The holiday came into immediate effect and will last until March 2021. ‘Today’s announcement will provide a welcome boost to property transactions across the market and comes at a time when activity levels and interest have already started to recover following the two-month market shutdown,’ says Oliver Knight, head of residential development research at Knight Frank. ‘Clearly, the Chancellor recognises the multiplier effect that moving house can have on the…

WHAT’S the difference between a buffalo and a bison? Well, for one, you can’t wash your hands in a buffalo and, also, it seems, you’ll soon be able to find a bison in Kent. Last Friday, Kent Wildlife Trust and the Wildwood Trust announced some £1 million of funding to bring bison to a British woodland. The trusts say it will be the first time that bison are introduced to a UK nature reserve. The Wilder Blean project near Canterbury is aiming to improve the biodiversity of one of the largest remaining areas of ancient woodland in Britain. The European bison is the continent’s largest land mammal, with adult males weighing as much as a ton, and is the closest living relative to the steppe bison that used to roam…

THE Chancellor has announced his immediate stimulus package: billions of pounds to be spent before the end of March next year. It’s caught his opponents on the hop because what he’s doing is exactly what they had demanded, but with an urgency and directness they didn’t think possible. For a Government that has looked uncertain and incompetent, this was a particularly bravura performance. Chancellors are, of course, always popular when they give money away and we mustn’t forget that the reckoning comes later. However, for now, Rishi Sunak has genuinely surprised and delighted. His mini-budget was all about employment —keeping people at work was the driving priority; green measures, not simply because they’re green, but because they create jobs—and jobs that will continue in years to come; energy efficiency, not…

THE fantastical landscape of Brimham Rocks was formed about 320 million years ago, when torrents of sand, grit and water poured down from Norway and Scotland, creating eerie sandstone sculptures moulded into their layered shapes, like ragged cream slices, by later glacier advancement. So mystical and striking are their forms that, in the 18th and 19th centuries, some believed they had been carved by druids—hence Druid’s Writing Desk and Druid’s Coffin—rather than sculpted by natural, if violent, earth movements and millions of years of weathering. This haunting place, its starkness contrasting to the softer, more open bits of the 233 square mile Nidderdale AONB, was owned by Fountains Abbey and is now managed by the National Trust. It has long attracted academics and day-trippers, who have placed their own interpretations…

A figure of Hercules supports the fireplace in the White Hall, Hagley Hall, Worcestershire, a house built for Lord Lyttelton in 1754–60 by Sanderson Miller. For obvious reasons, Hercules is a commonly depicted as an atlas. Here, he wears the skin of the Nemean lion, which appears in the centre of the lintel, and his club is visible. The chimneypiece is by James Lovell Crouching figures in plaster carry the load of the vast oriel window in the hall of Harlaxton Manor, Lincolnshire, a Jacobethan fantasy designed in the 1830s. They seem agonised and unhappy with their burden, which, given the sheer scale of the pendant behind them, is perhaps not surprising. The heraldic stained glass in the window is signed ‘Thomas Willement 1837’…

THERE is something mythical about the eel, as if it were an imaginary creature such as a unicorn or a griffin. It is literally—and figuratively—slippery, full of contradictions and mystery. For as much as we know about Anguilla anguilla—the European eel—there is far more that we don’t. If you should be standing on the banks of the River Severn one night when the moon peeks out from behind a bank of cloud and catch a glimpse of an eel slipping through the water, you’ll see how magical it can be. The eel, with its distinctive, snake-like shape and fringe of fins, has been gliding through our waters for some 100 million years. Life begins thousands of miles away, in the Sargasso Sea, an area of the Atlantic Ocean as big…

WHEN Wiltshire-based decorator Emma Sims-Hilditch and her husband, John, were looking for a London base, they found this family house in Fulham, which was in need of a top-to-toe refurbishment. The work allowed Emma to employ her understanding of spacial planning to reconfigure each floor. ‘We wanted the house to work on many different levels: it was to be somewhere for us to stay in London; for our family to congregate; and for the company to meet new clients.’ By re-organising the run of stairs, Emma was able to borrow under-used space from the landing to make the bedroom larger. ‘We gained an extra 5ft. Not only did it mean that we had room for a superking bed, but also that we could have generous bedside tables, something I much…

Surrey, £4 million Designed by architect Baillie Scott for Sir Stanley Farr, Grade II-listed The Gate House has a name that rather under-sells its magnificence. With six bedrooms in some five acres of the Surrey countryside, the property is a spectacular example of the Arts-and-Crafts style from 1926, with highlights including the oak-panelled drawing room and the Oregan pine-panelled dining room. The house has been modernised since then, thankfully, with new bathrooms, a new kitchen, and extensive upgrading of the electrics. Outside, five acres of grounds include lawned areas, paddocks, outbuildings and stables, as well as a swimming pool with an electric child-proof cover. The medieval village of Limpsfield is a five-minute stroll away, and the property is within easy reach of some of the top independent schools…

LONDON dealer Daniel Katz possesses one of the best ‘eyes’ of his generation. He made his reputation by discovering or attributing European sculptures, particularly bronzes, which he has sold to many of the world’s most important museum and private collections. However, he is no narrow specialist and his tastes and enthusiasms range across wide collecting fields, from antiquities to 19th-century and contemporary British art. In 2013, he consigned 282 lots for sale at Sotheby’s under the title ‘Defining Taste’, before relocating from Bond Street to Hill Street, W1. In May, he repeated the exercise with 144 further lots, this time under the label ‘Refining Taste’. Mr Katz is known for his philanthropic interests, especially his support for academic publications and research, music, dance and neurology. The proceeds of 10 lots…

THE history of the Cerne Abbas Giant in Dorset has been called into question by his smallest foe yet: the humble snail. It is believed the 180ft-long chalk sculpture was either an ancient fertility symbol or a likeness to Hercules, but archaeologist Mike Allen has analysed soil around it and found fragments of snail species that first arrived in the UK in the 13th or 14th century, suggesting the sculpture could not have been created before medieval times. The site was gifted to the National Trust some 100 years ago by the Pitt-Rivers family and the organisation began tests earlier this year to determine its age, but the results have been delayed by lockdown. Mr Allen and Martin Pap-worth of the Trust believe the figure ‘may not be prehistoric, nor…

IT is with immense sadness that we share the news that Jonathan Hearn, COUNTRY LIFE’s Arts and Antiques Advertising Manager, died last week. Jonnie, as we knew him, joined the magazine in 1986 and was a hugely popular and well-known figure in the Arts and antiques world. Energetic and passionate in his conversations with both clients and colleagues, his enthusiasm and kindness extended far beyond his professional commitments and his love for the countryside, from tractors to dogs and everything in between, was unrivalled. He was always a friend first, and a colleague second. Those of us at COUNTRY LIFE , and everyone else who has worked with Jonnie over the years, are heartbroken and we extend our heartfelt sympathy to his family at this difficult moment. He will be…

HERE in Galloway, the drought is a distant memory and the monsoon has arrived early. It normally waits until we are about to start harvest. This has thrown our grassland-management plans. Back in the spring, we stood listening to Brian the contractor shaking his head dolefully and announcing the ground was so rock hard that he couldn’t direct drill and had to do a shallow plough ‘to make some soil’. (Contractors love getting the plough out as it is a costly business; farmers hate it for the same reason.) The seed sat there through the drought, then grass emerged slowly with a sickly looking fluff, before coming with a rush of the ‘compensatory growth’ beloved of agronomists when it rained. Now, the tall sward of lush grass badly needs…

If people that live in the country would take a little pains, daily observations might be made with respect to animals, and particularly regarding their actions and economy, which are the life and soul of natural history Gilbert White, May 12, 1770 IN the beginning was the word, and the word was that of the Rev Gilbert White. Ur-naturalist. Prophet of ecology. Creator, with the publication of his The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, of Nature writing. The gifts of White, born 300 years ago on July 18, were his own, but any biographer, in book or in article, must give thanks to the Church of England; the stipend for serving up a Sunday sermon supported the life of White’s other devotion, Nature study. He was the exemplar of…

New kids on the block DESPITE the doom and gloom of lock-down, a host of new hotels is opening for the very first time. In Los Angeles, US, you’ll now find The Maybourne Beverly Hills (www.maybournebeverlyhills.com)—a sister hotel to London legends Claridge’s, The Connaught and The Berkeley. Also in America, in Utah, fans of the wildly popular Amangiri hotel can now opt to stay at neighbouring Camp Sakira (www.aman.com)—a 10-tent, pavilion encampment with uninterrupted views over the dramatic desert terrain (right). Slightly closer to home, the design-led Nobu Hotel Warsaw (https://warsaw.nobuhotels. com), in Poland, will open on August 3, cementing the city’s up-and-coming reputation once and for all. A taste of summer If you can't get to Italy this summer, bring Italy to you, with a glass (or two) of…

Your aesthetic hero? Leonardo da Vinci. He was a universal genius, the father of science, art and design, who made many discoveries in both anatomy and Nature and who conceptualised future creations such as flying machines and the parachute. He also happened to be one of the greatest painters to have ever lived. He embodies enlightenment. Which book have you found inspiring? The complete works of Oscar Wilde. I think his writing is very funny and many of his acute observations about the workings of society and social etiquette are still so true today. He was Anglo-Irish, like my grandmother, Margaret, and I believe this gave him an original perspective on the culture of London society of that time. He was a champion of the Aesthetic movement who punctured…

THREE miles south of Ripon, a footpath leads from the medieval ruins of Fountains Abbey across undulating wooded parkland to Markenfield Hall, an impossibly lovely 13th- and early-14th-century fortified manor house, entirely surrounded by its moat. Despite its fairy-tale exterior, Markenfield is, in fact, a home—to Ian Curteis and his wife, Lady Deirdre. Walkers gaze over the moat, softly edged with long grass dancing with ox-eye daisies and field geraniums, and occasionally catch the couple lunching against a backdrop of pale roses and self-seeding opium poppies. ‘Sometimes they call out “what’s for pudding?”’ Mr Curteis tells me cheerfully, confirming the spirit of welcome that pervades this gentle house, which happily opens its doors to the public for certain weeks in the summer. ‘Walkers gaze over the moat, softly edged with…

FEAR not: I am not going to tell you that the German way of using herbaceous plants is better than ours. On the contrary, it’s simply different. Twenty years ago, I wrote a guide to German gardens. It gave me the opportunity to spend a year looking at gardens, old and new, in every region from the Baltic to the Alps. I had visited a few German gardens from time to time, but I had no idea that so much of historical, botanical and horticultural interest was to be found. Like many Brits, I had been brought up to believe that Germany was a cultural desert (apart from music) and that Goering had said ‘when I hear the word “culture”, I reach for my machine gun’. The quote was…

IN 1900, when the Compton Pottery was getting under way, its founder, Mary Seton Watts, wrote to her manager of how well suited terracotta pots were to the ‘present fashion for gardening and garden decoration’. What had started as a piece of philanthropy—recreational classes for villagers inspired by the Home Arts Movement—was soon a flourishing business, selling jardinières, gravestones and sundials ornamented with her own designs. Products were exhibited, won medals and were marketed by Liberty & Co; Gertrude Jekyll would even include miniature Compton pots in the garden she designed for Lutyens’s Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House in 1921. The catalyst for unleashing Mary’s creative energy was her decoration of Limnerslease, a studio-house designed by Ernest George as a winter retreat on the edge of the Hogs Back in rural…