Monday last, a visit to Goodwood and am blown away by the autumn colours, then am in the office rest of week seeing through the architecture and restoration number, which has come together well in my opinion (they stir up such interesting people these special issues).
At the end of the week I take a train to Dorchester to deliver a talk at the Dorset County Museum, on 'The Country House Today' (with some special reference to Dorset houses) to the Art Fund of Dorset, a very well-informed audience full of architects, Country Life readers and country house owners, even specialist furniture makers come up to chat. Its a charming museum, with a long 19th century hall, like a mission church, with a balcony and fancy ironwork, and numerous objects, Romneys and ship models, dolls houses and Roman mosaics in a pleasing mix.
Afterwards I am invited to a splendidly hospitable dinner party in one of Dorset most Romantic manor houses, Wolfteon, home of Capt Nigel and Mrs Thimbleby, huge roaring fires and candlelight make for a great atmosphere. Everyone seems to be on a committee for something, historic churches, gardens and so on, or an expert on china or military history, so the conversation ranges widely from swimming at Ringstead Bay in November to the tragedy of the old Shaftesbury family home in Dorset.
I stay the night at Bellamont with the Sykeses and read a memoir of the late Lord Egremont in bed, which describes a great scene between his young bride-to-be and the grumpy uncle from whom he inherited; his bride-to-be admired the view of the lake from the windows of Petworth House, to which the old curmudgeon replied along the lines of: 'Young lady when one day your future husband inherits all this, he will also become the owner of half of Derwentwater and all of Bassenthwaite. They are lakes, what you are looking at is a pond!" Old grump.
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'A bluff, honest man in the trappings of greatness': The extraordinary story of the Foundling Hospital, and the sailor who saved the abandoned children of LondonA remarkable charitable endeavour to save abandoned children on the streets of London has a touching legacy in the form of the The Foundling Museum in the very centre of London. John Goodall tells its story; photographs by Will Pryce.
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The elegant country home of a motor racing daredevil who drove round the world in a 1936 Bentley and crashed a Range Rover into his own front porchPeasemore House, with its collection of barns, workshops, stables and more, is an ideal home from which to plan an adventure — something that was a passion of its present owners. Penny Churchill explains more.
