I find few activities quite as pleasurable as poking about in historic English country houses and I know I’m not alone in this. Membership of the National Trust has now topped 4 million and 90 million visits are made to National Trust properties every year. A visit to a grand pile not only offers you exceptional architecture in breathtaking landscapes, embellished with follies and bridges and gardens to lift the spirit, but also interiors to marvel at in their beauty and superior craftsmanship.
Nor is this a new fashion as the great buildings of this country have been largely accessible to crowds of curious tourists for centuries. It was with the aim of seeing the fine mansions and other beauties of the county that Elizabeth Bennet – of Pride and Prejudice – set off with her aunt and uncle on a tour of Derbyshire. Having shed her prejudices towards Mr Darcy and he his pride, her visit to the latter’s grand country house of Pemberley resulted in marriage and her consequent taking on the role of chatelaine. Sadly not all country house visits are as fortunate!
On the flip side we can leave the heavy and costly burden of running these large establishments to the National Trust and their other private owners whilst we enjoy them for the price of a ticket or a lavishly illustrated book. The historian Jeremy Musson’s book ‘English County House Interiors’ with exquisite photographs by Paul Barker is a beautiful and detailed survey of 15 houses representing the best of their styles in key architectural periods over 400 years. The work is surprisingly detailed in its description of the interiors of such houses as the Jacobean Hatfield, Baroque Chatsworth, Palladian Holkham, Neo-Classical Harewood, the French Chateau style of Waddesdon and Gothic Revival at Arundel Castle among others.
Evelyn Waugh was surely not far off the mark when he referred to the English country house as ‘our chief national artistic achievement’. What’s fascinating however about these great monuments is that they simultaneously work on many different levels. They are not just paragons of architectural, interiors and landscape styles, they are also powerhouses that reinforce the authority and status of the occupying dynasts. It is beyond the purview of this book to delve too deeply into the iconography of the English country house and it’s evolution over the centuries, but the political and social statements implicit in the choice of style and decoration of the great families who built them, are fascinating to explore having enjoyed this sumptuous book. ‘English Country House Interiors’ is an ornament to any book collection!
