Entertainment
Country Life UK
Take a bough
Among their deceptively inert branches, trees shelter feathered Pavarottis, scuttling beetles, opportunistic fungi, and fierce owls. John Lewis-Stempel recounts a day in the life of an oak and the creatures that call it home
6 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
A monument to enthusiasm
Fawley Hill, Buckinghamshire, part II The home of Lady McAlpine and the late Sir William McAlpine In the second of two articles, Marcus Binney looks at a home filled with remarkable collections and striking interiors that reflect its creator's enthusiasms and interests
7 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Water, water everywhere
After days of incessant January rain, the chicken paddock has turned into a quagmire, ghost ponds have resurfaced and a sheep has come close to drowning. But, even in a downpour, John Lewis-Stempel finds glimmers of beauty
4 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
The Cruel Sea
IN 1952, Ealing Studios boss Michael Balcon acquired the film rights to The Cruel Sea, Nicholas Monsarrat's grimly realistic 1951 novel about Royal Navy convoys operating in U-boat-infested waters during the Battle of the Atlantic (1939-45).
2 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
A different approach to renewal
THE Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, opened its doors to the public just over 25 years ago, in October 1997. Since then, the museum’s signature building of limestone, titanium, and glass, by Frank Gehry, has become an internationally recognised symbol of the city.
2 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
It's time to unite
IN a nation where traditional political loyalties have become very weak, our political leaders seem increasingly out of touch when they argue about the things on which they fundamentally agree.
2 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
One-year reprieve for ENO
THE English National Opera (ENO) will receive £11.46 million from Arts Council England (ACE), it was announced last week, a few months after it was revealed that it would lose its £12.8 million annual grant from ACE unless it moved out of London.
1 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Dartmoor deal
A NEW agreement has been reached to allow wild camping to continue ‘with immediate effect,’ says the Dartmoor National Park Authority.
1 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Winds of change for King Charles
PROFITS from a wind-farm deal on the Crown Estate will be used ‘for the public good’ rather than go to the Sovereign Grant, The King has asked. It was announced last week that six new offshore-wind-energy lease agreements, worth £1 billion a year, have been agreed.
1 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Bonfire of the vanities
A BILL repealing all the remaining EU laws still on statute books by the end of the year has been described as ‘not democratic’, ‘inefficient, and possibly incompetent’ by critics. The Retained EU Law Bill was passed last Wednesday by 59 votes, despite efforts from MPs in both the Conservative party and Opposition to defeat it. The bill will likely face opposition in the House of Lords.
2 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Eat cake
AMID the dispiriting news last week—that teachers are to go on strike, that the tragedy of Ukraine is relentless, that heating prices surge as it freezes outside and so on—came the pronouncement from the chairwoman of the Food Standards Agency that a cake lying temptingly on a shelf in an office is akin to passive smoking.
2 min |
January 25, 2023
Country Life UK
Still tottering
IN January 1993, in these very pages, a new cartoon strip appeared. It told the tales of a certain Lord and Lady Tottering and life in magnificent Tottering Hall.
1 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Ahoy, sailors of the first Elizabethan age
A RARE Elizabethan ship was dis-covered in a Kent quarry last year, it was revealed last week. The ship was uncovered in April 2022 by a team from CEMEX, which was ‘dredging for aggregates’ at a quarry on the Dungeness Headland.
1 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
My favourite painting Kate Mavor
Charlotte Mullins comments on Munni
2 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Rediscovery points to an Italian master
A well-travelled Bronzino, perhaps a self-portrait, is set to make waves in New York
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
That's got my bird name written all over it
Many, such as cuckoo and rook, might be onomatopoeic and others, including lapwing, owe their moniker to the nature of their flight, explains Derek Turner, as he takes a bird's eye view of avian nomenclature
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Freezing points
THE Book of Ecclesiastes reminds us that for every-thing there is a season— a time to be born and a time to die. Gardeners know that there is a time to sow and a time to reap.
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Eat your new greens
Whether you are looking for new flavours to tickle your tastebuds or something different. to grow in your garden, little beats obscureand sometimes strange-looking-vegetables, says Mark Diacono
5 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Sweeping statements
The garden at Benington Lordship, Hertfordshire The home of Mr and Mrs Richard Bott Snowdrops have grown here for centuries, but recent plantings have greatly increased their variety and spread, says Kathryn Bradley-Hole
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Empty promise
Lucy Denton asks why we have so many uninhabited dwellings and what we can do to save them
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Land ahoy
The market for Scottish estates is changing, as the demand for 'natural capital' soars
4 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
A roaring trade
It's not only the energy crisis that is creating unprecedented demand for stoves: clean-burn technology, app-based controls and new designs fuelled by alternatives to wood are also transforming possibilities
3 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Happy to be in the soup
Whether it's a laborious bouillabaisse, a sophisticated French consommé or a citrusy avgolemono, no dish is as comforting or democratic as soup, says Tom Parker Bowles
3 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
The fork in the road
Once viewed with suspicion, forks remained the preserve of royalty until nearly 200 years ago. Matthew Dennison takes a stab at the king of cutlery, which changed the way we eat
5 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
The remains of the day
Described by John Clare as 'Eden in such an hour' and 'the weakening eye of day' by Thomas Hardy, the twilight hour is a bewitching time for John Lewis-Stempel
6 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
The roads most travelled
In driving cattle, sheep and geese to market over the centuries, drovers shaped many of the routes we still use today. Gavin Plumley charts their harsh journeys across the country
6 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Ancestral Modernism
Leuchie Walled Garden, East Lothian A home of Sir Hew and Lady Dalrymple A Modernist home created during the 1960s within the walled garden of a historic house stylishly blends the contemporary and the historical.
8 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
The Shell Country Alphabet
THE middle decades of the 20th cen-tury were a time of much curiosity about the appearance of Britain, its countryside and townscapes, its landforms and archaeology, as well as contrasts between the regions.
3 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Of Constable and clouds
A walk in the painter’s Suffolk stronghold triggers new appreciation of his depiction of big skies
3 min |
January 11, 2023
Country Life UK
Can the tide be turned?
SLOWLY, but increasingly surely, Rishi Sunak is pulling back on the forays of his predecessors as he seeks to re-establish his party as a credible force in British politics. He may not succeed, but he has brought a sense of reality to the Government. It isn’t, of course, a quick fix. The spoilers are still in the wings.
2 min |