Antiques & Collecting
Features on Britain's antiques market, what people are buying and why, and how to collect items of historical significance, from the experts at Country Life.
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Hope blooms eternal: Tom Young paints Lebanon's beauty, without shying away from the scars of conflict'In situations where there is conflict or displacement, or trauma, art can help in some sort of healing process. When there are barriers, it can transcend them'
By Octavia Pollock Published
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Christian Bolt won't stop until he can revive the Renaissance sculpture technique of terra seccaAt his studio fringed by the mountains of Klosters, Swiss sculptor Christian Bolt is feverishly cooking up recipes to re-create terra secca, a material used in Renaissance Italy, not only to expand his own artistic horizons, but to help save the planet.
By Carla Passino Published
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‘Everyone had dodgy magazines hidden under their beds and I had interior design magazines’: James Thurstan Waterworth's consuming passionsInterior designer James Thurstan Waterworth was the European design director at Soho House before he went on to open his own studio, Thurstan. He discusses his love of Tudor history, Andrew Scott and how a portrait of a chicken changed his life.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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101 gold rats, a 'self portrait as a horse' and a tribute to motherhood take home top prizes at this year's Royal Academy Summer ExhibitionThe Royal Academy has announced its 2025 prize winners, spanning talented sculptors, painters and print-makers, with works on display in London until August 19.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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Downtown Abbey is about to finish forever, and you're about to get a chance to see — and to buy — the costumes from the showDownton Abbey's exquisite costumes and props are going on show at a free exhibition ahead of a sale being held by Bonhams later this summer.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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‘One of the most effective pieces of propaganda ever made’: the Bayeux Tapestry heads to Britain for the first time in almost a millenniumA historic agreement between this country and France sees the 225ft-long tableau — which may have been made in Britain but has been in France since 1077 — arrive at the British Museum in Autumn 2026.
By Carla Passino Published
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‘They remain, really, the property of all of those who love them, know them, and tell them. They are our stories, the inheritance of the people of Scotland’: The Anthology of Scottish Folk TalesBy Patrick Galbraith Last updated
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Canine muses: Lucian Freud's etchings of Pluto the whippet are among his most popular and expensive workIn the third edition of our limited series, we meet the dogs who've inspired some of our greatest artists.
By Agnes Stamp Published
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‘Reactions to the French in the 1870s varied from outrage to curious interest’: Impressionism's painstaking ten year journey to be taken seriously by the BritsClaude Monet and Camille Pissarro spent time in London, but it took James McNeill Whistler to act as artistic bridge with Britain and the ‘sweetened’ Impressionism of Jules Bastien-Lepage to inspire most homegrown painters.
By Caroline Bulger Published
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Canine muses: The English bull terrier who helped transform her owner from 'a photographer into an artist'In the first edition of our new, limited series, we meet the dogs who've inspired some of our greatest artists.
By Agnes Stamp Published
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Richard Rogers: 'Talking Buildings' is a fitting testament to the elegance of utilityA new exhibition at Sir John Soane's museum dissects the seminal works of Richard Rogers, one of Britain's greatest architects.
By James Fisher Published
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‘The perfect hostess, he called her’: A five minute guide to Virgina Woolf’s ‘Mrs Dalloway’To mark its centenary, Lotte Brundle delves into the lauded writer’s strange and poignant classic, set across a single summer’s day in 1920’s London.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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This obscure and unloved picture that turned out to be Turner's first oil painting — and it's about to sell for 500 times what it last costJMW Turner's 'The Rising Squall, Hot Wells, from St Vincent’s Rock, Bristol' was lost and forgotten for years — but now it's been rediscovered, and is going under the hammer in July.
By Toby Keel Published
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What was Andy Warhol really like? The Newlands House Gallery exhibition shows the artist like never beforeThe exhibition, in Petworth, West Sussex, shows the many layers behind the artist's public persona.
By Carla Passino Last updated
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The world’s most iconic handbag could be on your arm40 years after its conception, the original Hermès ‘Birkin’ bag, owned by the OG It Girl Jane Birkin, is going up for auction with Sotheby’s on July 10.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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A five minute guide to the new V&A East Storehouse’s treasuresSamurai swords and 350,000 books are just some of the curios in the new Victoria & Albert storehouse in Stratford, London, which is now open to the public.
By Carla Passino Published
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Young at art: Meet the new generation of Young British ArtistsAs British contemporary art beats all odds to remain a cauldron of inventiveness and passion, Carla Passino discovers which artists aged 40 or under are on the radar of forward-looking museum directors and curators
By Carla Passino Published
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Wigs, Weddings, Powder and Palaces: Live out your Bridgerton fantasies at the Old Royal Naval College in LondonThe Greenwich attraction, which is where Colin and Penelope's wedding in the Netflix series was filmed, is celebrating 100 years of being used as a film and TV set with a period drama-themed tour.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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You're all invited to Cecil Beaton's Garden Party'The space given over to 'Cecil Beaton’s Garden Party' at the Garden Museum is smaller than Beaton’s own drawing room, but its intimacy is its trump card.'
By Charlotte Mullins Published
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A woolly mammoth skeleton is among the curiosities for sale to save fire-ravaged Parnham ParkThe auction of the owner James Perkins' collection, hosted by Dreweatts, tomorrow (May 13), will be used to fund renovation works at Parnham Park in Dorset.
By Lotte Brundle Published
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Kermit the frog, a silver-horned goat and Charles III’s 69ft-long coronation record star in a groundbreaking exhibition‘Happy & Glorious’, at the The National Archives in Kew, captures the spirit of the King’s coronation with works by eight contemporary artists alongside the official roll of the day — and that of Edward II’s crowning in 1308.
By Carla Passino Published


