Clive Aslet

The fascinating story of the evolution of the country house in Britain, from its Roman precursors to the present The Story of the Country House is an authoritative and vivid account of the British country house, exploring how they have evolved with the changing political and economic landscape. Clive Aslet reveals the captivating stories behind individual houses, their architects, and occupants, and paints a vivid picture of the wider context in which the country house in Britain flourished and subsequently fell into decline before enjoying a renaissance in the twenty-first century. The genesis, style, and purpose of architectural masterpieces such as Hardwick Hall, Hatfield House, and Chatsworth are explored, alongside the numerous country houses lost to war and economic decline. We also meet a cavalcade of characters, owners with all their dynastic obsessions and diverse sources of wealth, and architects such as Inigo Jones, Sir John Vanbrugh, Robert Adam, Sir John Soane and A.W.N. Pugin, who dazzled or in some cases outraged their contemporaries. The Story of the Country House takes a fresh look at this enduringly popular building type, exploring why it continues to hold such fascination for us today.

A History of Places and People

The Story of the Country House

The Five Hundred Places That Made Our History

Landmarks of Britain

Descriptions and historical context of 21 English houses.

The English House

'Clive Aslet has been an extraordinarily informed and influential standard-bearer for the cause of the countryside and Britain's heritage for many years' Max Hastings On 15 April 2019, Paris's beloved Notre Dame was ablaze. It shocked the world - a revered landmark, a national symbol, a manifestation of French identity was here today, gone tomorrow. Life is fragile. So are the buildings, monuments and landscapes that move us. The question 'what would you save if your house was on fire?' is a familiar parlour game. But what would you save if England was on fire? What are the places that we most cherish, that express qualities that are especially English? In this delightful celebration of the real crown jewels of England, Clive Aslet takes us on a journey of 100 places that make our country great. From ancient oaks and Devon lanes to war memorials and the BBC, the white cliffs of Dover to views of Durham from the train, Aslet lovingly captures the magic of the places that underpin our national identity. The Real Crown Jewels of England is both an invitation to rejoice in our common heritage, and to discover the world of astonishing beauty that lies just beyond your doorstep.

100 Places That Make Us Great

The Real Crown Jewels of England

- Each of the 12 houses will be featured in national and international press to announce the book- In the UK, the media includes Tatler, House & Garden, Country Life, The English Home, and Telegraph Luxury Online- In the US, the media includes Town & Country, Architectural Digest Online, The AD Aesthete Podcast, Air Mail, and DeparturesThis book is a sumptuously produced journey around 12 privately-owned country houses, asking what it is like to live in such places today. What role do they play in the 21st century? For many years after the Second World War, the country house was struggling. Now a new generation of young owners, often with children, has taken over. They're finding innovative ways to live in these ancient, fragile and poetic places. While they treasure the history and beauty of the houses, they're also adapting and enhancing them for a modern era. Old Homes, New Life is a behind-the-scenes account of today's aristocracy, as they reinvent the country house way of life. Each family does this in its own way, maintaining the tradition of individualism, even eccentricity, which is so much associated with country houses. Dylan Thomas's superb yet intimate photographs capture both the inhabitants of these houses and the spaces they occupy - from State dining to family kitchen, walled garden to attic. This feast for the eyes is accompanied by an equally mouth-watering text by Clive Aslet, based on interviews with family members and his long experience of the subject through his years as editor of Country Life. The result is an exclusive tour of a dozen spectacular homes.

The Resurgence of the British Country House

Old Homes, New Life

The Academy celebrates the architect John Simpson's newly finished building for the School of Architecture at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana: the Walsh Family Hall. The language of John Simpson's architecture, which derives from the fifth century BC, has been daringly applied to new uses and an instant landmark of exceptional interest has been created. Through a judicious combination of Classical richness and warehouse-like workspace the Walsh Family Hall provides a humane and joyous series of spaces, which elevates the spirits of those entering and passing through it. This book describes not only the architecture of the Walsh Family Hall but the process whereby it came into existence, with written contributions from the generous donors, Matt and Joyce Walsh; Dean Michael Lykoudis, who commissioned the building; and some of the students who work in these uplifting surroundings. Further educational works by John Simpson such as his new 'yard' for Eton College and major new additions and improvements to the Royal College of Music in London are described, with an essay by Simpson explaining his approach. All these works are presented and explored with full color commissioned photography, drawn plans and original sketches throughout. John Simpson Architects believes that Classicism can enhance life in the 21st century by creating inspirational spaces that relate to the proportions of the human body - a view of architecture that is triumphantly demonstrated in the Academy that is the Walsh Family Hall.

John Simpson: Walsh Family Hall, University of Notre Dame

The Academy

The magnificent country houses built in Britain between 1890 and 1939 were the last monuments to a vanishing age. Many of these great mammoths of domestic architecture were unsuited to the changes in economic and social priorities that followed the two world wars, and rapidly became extinct. Those that survive, however, provide tangible evidence of the life and death of an extraordinarily prosperous age. Originally published in 1980, long out of print and now thoroughly revised and reillustrated, this book recounts the architectural and social history of the era, describing the clients, the architects, the styles and accoutrements of the country houses. The people who could afford them - the Carnegies, the Astors, the Leverhulmes - had grown rich by exploiting the new economic opportunities of the age, and the houses they built in the years before the First World War reflect the desire for two contrasting ways of life. The social country house was the setting for the opulent world associated with Edward VII. The romantic country house was simpler, more genuinely rural, for those who wanted to be in closer contact with the countryside and the vanishing rural crafts, or who wanted an idyll of the past that did not suggest the world of the motor car. These traditions lost coherence after the war, and the period ended with a number of spectacular, and often eccentric, houses. Some of the most remarkable were those that not only replicated the look of old buildings, but used genuinely old materials and even incorporated whole Tudor buildings moved from other places. Clive Aslet writes of the immense changes in the way country houses of this period were lived in and used. The shortage of servants, aggravated by the First World War, spurred numerous developments in the technology of the country house - vacuum cleaners, washing machines, telephones and central heating were called upon to replace the army of servants who never returned from the trenches or the factories. Interior decorators, becoming increasingly in vogue, developed the style Louis Seize into the last word in Edwardian chic. Gardens came to be seen as integral to the concept of the country house and reconciled formal planning with informal planting. This fascinating world, so popularly depicted in Downton Abbey, can now be viewed from a new perspective. The Edwardian Country House will enlighten and entertain all those interested in glimpsing the lost life style of another age.

A Social and Architectural History

The Edwardian Country House

Reading like a history of Western civilization, this biography of a small British city begins in Roman times, when the town on the Thames housed a mysterious temple, and follows two thousand years of turbulent events--from Elizabeth I signing Mary Queen of Scots' death warrant to the construction of the city's famous observatories.

The Story of Greenwich

Britain's villages are world famous for their loveliness and idiosyncratic charm. Each village is different; travel across the country and you will unearth a joyous variety, from straggly Leintwardine in Herefordshire to BBC-film-perfect Askrigg in Yorkshire to higgledy-piggledy tourist hub Polperro in Cornwall to Miserden in Gloucestershire, with its staggeringly beautiful gardens, to Pittenweemin Fife, still eking a living from fishing, to the warring villages of Donhead St. Mary and Donhead St. Andrew in Wiltshire. History and architecture account for some differences-the memorials in churches, the details of door frames and chimney stacks-but there are also differences of spirit, and in how life is lived there today. What are the thriving local businesses? What are they selling in the shops-or are there shops at all? What are the traditions, old or invented? Who are the people who make these communities work? In this captivating volume, Clive Aslet draws on thirty years of travel in the countryside working for Britain's Country Life magazine to give us a living, personal, and opinionated history of five hundred of Britain's most beautiful and vibrant villages. Meticulously researched and drawing from conversations with local residents, publicans, and vicars, this book is both an indispensable gazetteer for anyone planning to tour the countryside and a portrait of rural Britain in a time of change.

The Five Hundred Villages that Made the Countryside

Villages of Britain

Looks at the career and life of the modern British architect, describes his designs for houses, mansions, and offices, and shows how he makes use of the classical tradition

The Revival of Architecture

Quinlan Terry

Clive Aslet's War Memorial: The Story of One Village's Sacrifice from 1914 to 2003, is a powerful story of those who died in war. Who were the men and women whose names are commemorated on war memorials around the country? Where did they live - and how and why did they die? Such questions usually go unanswered, but this book for the first time unravels the story of one war memorial, in the Dartmoor village of Lydford. Through original documents, Clive Aslet traces in vivid detail the lives of the twenty-two men, and one woman, who made the supreme sacrifice fighting for Britain in the two World Wars, the Falklands and Iraq. The result is an intimate portrait of one corner of the countryside in the twentieth century, and an extraordinary tale of the endurance and bravery of otherwise ordinary people - farmers, masons, railway-workers, landowners, schoolchildren - who, but for the war memorial, would be forgotten. The perfect book for those who loved The Real Dad's Army by Colonel Rodney Foster, War Memorial is about the people who laid down their lives for us, and who will always be remembered. Praise for War Memorial: 'With this book Aslet makes an important contribution to social history... the stories are not tidy portraits of heroism but achingly real portraits of wartime loss experienced by a changing rural community' Daily Express 'Leaves one with a profound sense of the vagaries and cruelties of fate, particularly during times of war' Country Life '[A] fascinating history . . . Aslet tells their stories with great elegance, and though the period has been gone over in exhaustive detail, he still manages fresh insights that bring it to vivid life' Daily Telegraph Clive Aslet is an award-winning journalist and former Editor of Country Life who has spent his career observing Britain and its ways. An authority on British life, he has written several books on the subject - including The Last Country Houses, Landmarks of Britain, and Villages of Britain.

The Story of One Village's Sacrifice from 1914 to 2003

War Memorial

The Birdcage

The Arts and Crafts Country House is a fascinating and beautifully illustrated survey of some of Britain’s most important houses. The Arts and Crafts Movement produced some of our country’s greatest works of design, architecture and decorative art. It grew out of a reaction against the Industrial Revolution in the late 1850s, inspired by an alternative vision of life based on the revival of traditional building crafts and the use of local materials. Country Life magazine, founded in 1897, championed the movement in the weekly articles it devoted to country houses, illustrated with specially commissioned photographs. In his stunning book, Clive Aslet draws upon this unique archive to provide a detailed survey of 25 major country houses, designed by the movement's foremost architects, including Lutyens, Webb, Williams-Ellis and Blow. He also shows how the Arts and Crafts tradition continues to influence architects today. The 22nd title in this acclaimed series, The Arts and Crafts Country House reveals the enduring legacy of an architectural ideal.

Clive Aslet

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