Booked: Ben Pentreath’s English Decoration

When I was in NYC last week at Grace & Favor, a book caught my eye, and I knew I had to have it. First, it’s by Ben Pentreath, about whom I wrote last month, here. Ben is a hugely accomplished architect and shop-owner as well as a blogger. Second, it’s about English decorating, which, as in many houses in the UK where I’ve been a guest, is all about generations and layers.

I’ve seen a number of images of Ben’s house on his blog, as well as the houses of friends, so I knew this book would be a treat.

Ben talks about six or eight houses and what makes them work. Obviously, classical architecture’s a good jumping off point.

And then a selection of great pieces that’s been assembled and collected over the years, not just picked up at HomeGoods.

Ben talks about the art of styling a table, and of course, he goes right to the master – David Hicks.

One of the things I love about British decorating books is that the rooms are not styled to within an inch of their lives, like American rooms are. For instance, you’d never, ever see an image like this in an American book.

Or this:

Or this:

In an American book or magazine, everything would be perfect. The pillows would be fluffed and chopped, the blanket would be thrown over the back of the chair at an insouciant angle and the books would be in the Hicksian colour arrangement. I think that more people live in houses that look like this than in houses where everything’s perfect. I know I do!

It was great fun to see Ben’s massive London map in a few of the images of his flat.

And in the bottom image, you can spot the map in the mirror and the David Hicks book on the table.

The book is terrific and if you’re looking for a present for yourself or someone who loves English Decoration, you can find it here.

Purple Passion

I don’t know whether you’ve seen this house in England that’s making the rounds, but someone’s got a passion for PURPLE! In Baltimore, we take our passion for purple pretty seriously, as that’s one of the team colours for the Ravens. But I think that this might just be too much, even if we do go back to the SuperBowl (doubtful this year!). Take a look!

Thank goodness for the white accents!

50 Shades of Purple

The purple carpeting is climbing up the sides of the tub!

That chair looks very uncomfortable.

Wait… the dining room opens onto a bedroom?

Purple carpeting in the kitchen. {Shudder}

The funny part is that the house looks pretty normal from the outside!

Yours for a mere £400,000!

I’ll Take This: Plan de London

You might remember a few years ago when I wrote about the amazing Turgot Plan de Paris. I had put it on a large wall in my former house.

Unfortunately, when I eventually took it down in preparation for moving, Connor chewed several pieces of it and they were unsalvageable for the new house, in which there’s a perfect hallway.

A month or so ago, I was looking back through old posts from Ben Pentreath, a London-based architect and shop-owner, and saw that he had a a map of London, similar to the Plan de Paris, in his flat.

Amazingly, the sections fit PERFECTLY on the wall!

Ben said it was the John Rocque map of London, done in a similar style to the Michael-Etienne Turgot map of a similar period, in this case, 1746. It’s officially called The plan of the cities of London and Westminster, and borough of Southwark and is on a scale of 26 inches to a mile. For more information on the map, click here. The map shows internal details for some buildings, such as St Paul's Cathedral, and in less densely populated areas gardens are shown.

And damn if there’s not a link to each piece of the map! I might have to print it out again! I’ve been using Staples to print large format pieces, and since everything’s digital, they do a great job for not a lot of money!

If you don’t want to go to the trouble, the map is available here for a mere $850. I think that I paid $60 for the Paris map. It’s in 24 sheets of cover-weight stock. Or you can buy the map at 1/10th of its original size for $35.00. Ben’s currently in negotiations to re-produce the John Rocque map and he told me to look for it sometime in 2014.

I saw another one listed for $2,400, but the link was broken. However, someone had this fabulous comment, “Old maps make your space seem exotic and traveled.” Quite a trick.

This contemporary Plan de London was produced in 2012 for the Queen’s Jubilee and the Olympics. It’s about 35 x 20 inches and is printed on canvas. It took three years to draw.Only 200 were printed and at £79, that seems like quite a good deal. There’s a paper version for £15. Click here for details.

Do you like  maps as much as I do?

I’ll Take This: Bolthole in Brighton

One of my favourite scenes in the movie, “The King’s Speech” was in the speech therapist’s office with all of the peely wallpaper and mottled plasterwork.

I was really intrigued by that room, which I understood was a brothel in real life.

As I was poking around The Guardian, I saw a similar “holiday flat for let” in Brighton, England. A glass cupola, distressed walls, velvet headboard and wood wainscoting! What’s not to love (aside from the Ikea light fixture hanging down the middle)?

This is another view of the room.

As is this. I am actually quite torn about this place – some of it’s fabulous and some’s pretty ghastly. And the listing says it’s a ground floor flat, but I don’t see how that’s possible with the massive skylight.

It’s right on the beach, with a view out to sea.

There are two other bedrooms, and oddly, they both look like this:

One of two reception/living rooms with what loos like an antler lamp. I do like the metal table on the left side.

And this looks like the other.

And another view of the room.

Interior hallway with reclaimed planks.

The loo with some original details.

Right down the road from this:

This flat sleeps six and is £538 a week. Details here.

My New Fave Read!

I can’t even remember how I discovered this, probably googling for something random, but the day I discovered the Financial Times’ How to Spend It website, was one happy day! The tagline is a website of worldly pleasures from the Financial Times.

It presumes that you have bucket-loads of disposable income, and even if you don’t, it’s loads of fun to peruse. It does have a British/European slant to it, but there’s nothing wrong with that.

Someone there has a great sense of humour and the columnists have the best titles:

I particularly like their Diary of a Somebody, in which a “somebody” writes about their week. It was in reading one of them, that I discovered the amazing Cheapside Hoard which I wrote about recently. I’ve also found good sources for books, and some other great tips. also love Van der Postings, the musings of the wonderful Lucia Van der Post, whose writing I discovered when I lived in the UK.

Literally, every time I check in to How to Spend It, I find something new! I like that some of their articles are relatively long – 1,000 words or more. You get in-depth information in an age where most everything is just a snippet. An interview with Paul Smith ran well over 2,000 words.

It’s a big rabbit hole, but you’ll be better for reading How to Spend It. It’s not dumbed down at all, and in fact, I think you’ll be even more clever if you read it. You’ll thank me later.

I’ll Take This: Manor House in Wales

A friend sent me this listing because he knew I drove by this house almost every day on my way to work when I lived in Wales.

It’s on the Llantwit Major Road in the village of Cowbridge, and I always thought it looked like the quintessential British country house. Luckily, the past owners haven’t ruined it with modernizations, and have kept many of the period details.

I love the collection of Bristol blue glass on the windowsill!

There are four bedrooms, but only one is en-suite.

The property is comprised of six acres in the Vale of Glamorgan with its distant views to the valleys beyond.

In addition to the main house, there’s also a self-contained three-bed flat and another one-bed flat in the house, both with their own entrances. The price for this house isn’t too bad, £1,550,000, although it sold for £640,000 in August of 2013. More information here.