Country Life

Chloe is reading Medicine at the University of Aberdeen and is a volunteer with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI)—which will mark its bicentenary on March 4. At the age of 21, she became the youngest person to pass out as helm of Aberdee

WHATEVER the hardships of winter, there is cheer to be found in the fact that the snow-drops will always come, first to break through earth crisp with frost, filling us all with inspiration just as we grow fed up with the New Year. ‘Lone flower, hemm

1) What word can refer to a sudden movement and a receptacle for rubbish? 2) In the rhyme that starts ‘Two little dicky birds sitting on a wall’, what are the birds called? 3) How many wings does a bumble-bee have? 4) What foodstuff is known as ‘the

SOLDIERS stand by a roadside shrine near the village of Rue du Bois, as Father Francis Gleeson blesses them. His right hand is raised—mirrored by his horse’s pricked ears—and he looks out across the battalion as he offers general absolution, the Cath

Gilmerton House, LothianThe seat of Sir David Kinloch Bt AT 10am on Monday June 29, 1795, Sir Archibald Gordon Kinloch appeared in the dock of the High Court in Edinburgh, dressed entirely in black, to stand trial for the murder of his elder brother.

WALK through the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries of the V&A and you might chance upon a chunky oak bracket, once used to support the jettied upper storey of a timber-frame house. It is carved with the figure of a man gripping a large club. In his

The tender Evenlode that makesHer meadows hush to hear the soundOf waters mingling in the brakes, And binds my heart to English ground‘The Evenlode’, Hilaire Belloc THE Mease, the Tees, the Dee, the Cree, the Chess, the Pang and the Clun… the Piddle

‘In fact, precisely at this transitional point of its nightly roll into darkness the great and particular glory of the Egdon waste began, and nobody could be said to understand the heath who had not been there at such a time.’ From ‘The Return of the

IT’S one of those beautiful moments of disruption in history, when it’s as if someone’s experienced time travel and is able to see into the future to create something the like of which has never existed before,’ says Jamb’s Will Fisher of the white m

IF you’re wondering what it looks like when a life revolves around creativity, search no further than artist Simon Turner. As a furniture-maker, silversmith, painter, weaver, clothes-maker and ceramicist—among various other hands-on pursuits—he is es

Fashion designer Giles Deacon has created a mini collection alongside The Fife Arms in Braemar. The Munro Capsule collection brings together the romance of the Highlands with a touch of high fashion and includes the Munro Victoria Cape and Munro Bag,

Once pacing the sizeable (17ft by 13ft) study at Muston Manor has lost its appeal, a splash in the heated outdoor pool may revive a tired brain. Beyond, within a little more than three acres of grounds, including a newly resurfaced tennis court, croq

LAST week saw the launch onto the market of one of Suffolk’s most intriguing country houses, the imposing Grade II*-listed Mockbeggars Hall—a secluded Jacobean mansion set on high ground to the south of the village of Claydon, with the A14 to the eas

THERE comes a time in the life of every garden when the most useful tool in the owner’s armoury is a chainsaw. A newly arrived purchaser may take such fright at what he has acquired that the only way to erase the previous owner’s neglect is to clear

LULLED by recent blue skies, I was lured into the garden and forced myself to consider the borders. I have to confess that the beds have been horribly neglected. My excuse? That the house was swaddled in scaffolding from early August until November.

MINIATURE painting is ‘a thing apart from all other painting and drawing’ in showing ‘those lovely graces, witty smilings, and those stolen glances which suddenly like lightning pass’. So said Nicholas Hilliard (about 1547–1619), past master of the a

▸ Preheat your oven to 180˚C/350˚F/gas mark 4 and prepare a roasting tray with a sheet of foil to cover it. ▸ Halve the onions without peeling them and add them to the roasting tray cut side up. Add the peeled and thinly sliced onion to the tray, tog

IN 1979, two things happened that would change Simon Phillips’s life. The first was that he joined the antique-furniture business that his father, Ronald, had launched in 1952, just as Britain was emerging from the grimmest post-war years. The second

WHEN Master Drawings London was launched in 2001, the concept of dealers cooperating in putting on a festival of shows in their own galleries had only been tried before by the Asian art trade and still seemed a gamble. The first few years were a deli

A prize of £25 in book tokens will be awarded for the first correct solution opened. Solutions must reach Crossword No 4815, Country Life, 121–141 Westbourne Terrace, Paddington, London, W2 6JR, by Tuesday, February 6. UK entrants only 1 Obvious it i

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