-
'It is so full of turrets and lofty buildings, spires and towers, it looks not like a town but a city': The glamour of Glamis Castle, from Macbeth to the Queen Mother
John Goodall looks at the eventful later history of Glamis Castle, one of the most celebrated of Scottish castles, and its association with Elizabeth, the late Queen Mother.
-
Country-house treasures: Echoes of a childhood, scratched in glass at Stedcombe House
Graffiti scrawled by a 12-year-old boy in 1788 starts a new series on the lesser-known treasures of our great country homes.
-
Affordable, sustainable, rural: How a group of volunteers embarrassed the government and built some of the best new homes in the country
Hazelmead has won almost every RIBA award going. The development on the outskirts of Bridport might be a springboard for a rural housing revolution, much like the Arts-and-Crafts movement more than a century ago.
-
Glamis Castle: From one Earl and his dog to the resurrection of one of Scotland's great buildings
John Goodall explores the development of the medieval Glamis Castle in Angus — seat of the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne — and its spectacular transformation into one of the landmark buildings of Scottish architecture. Photography by Paul Highnam.
-
Inside the remarkable restoration of King George III's observatory
Commissioned by George III, the observatory has a long and fascinating history as a seat of scientific endeavour. It has now been restored as a home, as William Aslet reports.
-
‘Its loss became a cautionary tale, and a rallying cry for architectural conservation’: The rise and fall and renewed interest in Ireland’s remarkable country houses
Lesley Bond traces a brief history of Ireland’s country houses and questions whether you can ever separate the house from the history it represents.
-
Allerton Castle: The great country house that blends Hampton Court, Highclere and the Palace of Westminster
A disastrous fire in 2005 prompted the rebirth of Allerton Castle, North Yorkshire, an outstanding Victorian house with a deep and remarkable history. Photographs by Paul Highnam.
-
In our built heritage, is the truth stranger than fiction?
Athena considers how our historic buildings are presented in an age of film and television.
-
Nuthall Temple: The Palladian masterpiece that was blown up to make way for the M1
Every Monday, Melanie Bryan, delves into the hidden depths of Country Life's extraordinary archive to bring you a long-forgotten story, photograph or advert.
-
Everingham Park: The revival of a lost vision of Georgian glory
Built between 1758 and 1764, Everingham Park, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, was brilliantly reinvented in the 1960s. It also possesses an opulent chapel, a triumphalist product of Catholic Emancipation. John Goodall reports on this Georgian house, home of Philip and Helen Guest. Photography by Paul Highnam for the Country Life Picture Library.
-
Sir Denys Lasdun: The brains behind the building branded 'a clever way of building a nuclear power station in the middle of London’ by The King
John Betjeman admired Sir Denys Lasdun’s work, but The King disliked it, and opinion remains divided to this day. Either way, the man who viewed ‘buildings as landscape’ has left an indelible mark on London.
-
Thomas Cook: The travel agent who changed the world, and the house his descendants live in to this day
Sennowe Park in Norfolk is the home of Charles and Virginia Temple-Richards, the descendants of trailblazing travel agent Thomas Cook. Oliver Gerrish looks at the travel business that funded and informed the renovation of this extraordinary Edwardian country house.
-
Eight of the UK's most impressive private libraries, as seen in the pages of Country Life
Every Monday, Melanie Bryan, delves into the hidden depths of Country Life's extraordinary archive to bring you a long-forgotten story, photograph or advert.
-
One of 'the most magnificent and perfectly preserved of Britain’s great Edwardian country houses', built for the heir to Thomas Cook's vast fortune
John Goodall looks at the creation of Sennowe Park in Norfolk — home of Charles and Virginia Temple-Richards — and charts its transformation at the hands of a local architect from a Georgian lodge to a luxurious Edwardian home.
-
Opinion: If we want to keep our architectural heritage, why do we tax those who repair it?
It beggars belief that the state lists buildings in order to protect them — and then doesn’t contribute to their upkeep, says Country Life columnist Agromenes.
-
The country home with an intriguing connection to the Titanic, doomed for demolition
Every Monday, Melanie Bryan, delves into the hidden depths of Country Life's extraordinary archive to bring you a long-forgotten story, photograph or advert.
-
'Step through the front door and your expectations evaporate in amazement and delight': The humble end-of-terrace house that's a wonder of neo-Classical grandeur
An unassuming house in Swansea reveals a marvellous and unexpected secret. John Goodall enjoys a rich collection of neo-Classical decorative plasterwork lovingly created by Royston Jones and Fiona Gray.
-
'I have lost a treasure, such a sister, such a friend as never can have been surpassed': Inside Jane Austen's Winchester home where she penned her final words and drew her final breath
Jane Austen spent the last days of her life in rented lodgings in Winchester, Hampshire. Adam Rattray describes the remarkable recent discoveries made about the house in which she died.
-
Ironmongers' Hall: The medieval marvel destroyed by a First World War bomb, and it's inspiring 21st century renaissance
Ironmongers’ Hall in London EC2 — home of the Worshipful Company of Ironmongers — is one of the Great Twelve City Livery Companies. This year it is celebrating the centenary of its Tudor-style Hall; John Goodall takes a look, and tells the remarkable story of the building. Photographs by Will Pryce for the Country Life Picture Library
-
50 years ago, the English country house seemed headed for extinction. Instead it was the start of a new golden age
Rather than perceiving the mid 20th century as a troubled period in the history of the country house, John Martin Robinson argues that it was perhaps one of the most interesting, unexpected and enterprising. All photography from the Country Life Image Archive, by June Buck, Paul Barker, Val Corbett, Will Pryce and Paul Highnam.
-
‘It has been destroyed beyond repair, not by the effect of gunfire, but by a deliberate act of vandalism’: Britain’s long lost great houses that live on only inside the Country Life archive
In the wake of the First and Second World Wars, some of Britain’s greatest houses were lost forever — to extinct familial lines, financial woes, neglect, vandalism and tragic accidents. Thankfully, plenty are preserved — in photographic form at least — for eternity, inside the Country Life archive.
