Southside House Wimbledon

Friday 25 September 2014

Southside House

3-4 Woodhayes Rd

Wimbledon Common 
SW19 4RJ

Yesterday, we visited a most extraordinary house.  We were part of a group organised by the Friends of the British Library, and the three of us were delighted to be joined by another Mary, who had travelled some buses with us in the days of the first project.

We met at Wimbledon Station and took a bus (the 200, since you ask) to the Common where we had a picnic, before meeting the rest of the party outside Southside House.  The weather was not as warm as the Met Office had predicted, but still very pleasant.

Southside House is open to the public from time to time, because it is owned by one of those Family Trusts, which is allowed not to pay death duties on property provided the nation can have access to the relevant item or items.  And I must say that the Pennington Mellor Munthe family have done a proper job, unlike some families, whose inheritance-tax-free artworks are about as accessible as the bypass plans Arthur Dent was looking for. (click here if you don't understand the reference, but really, you should read the books)

We were admitted into the little brick courtyard, with a remarkable statue of one of the two sons of Axel and Hilde Munthe, and were then taken round to the garden room for coffee and biscuits. Photography is not allowed in the house, which was fine as there was so much to look at and listen to that we did not need any more distractions.  Also there are a couple of indoor pictures here. Our guide was Irish, and called Pat, but I did not catch his surname.  

The story of the house is more complicated than in many stately homes.  I hope I have got this right: Hilda and Axel Munthe bought the house in 1932.  She was from a wealthy family, the Pennington Mellors, whose money, derived from 'trade', was not therefore totally acceptable in 19th century London society.  So the family had built themselves a handsome chateau in Biarritz, where they were able to mingle with royalty and nobility to their hearts content. It was there that she met and fell for the great Swedish writer and doctor, Axel Munthe. The economic difficulties of the between wars years mean that they moved to England, where they owned two houses, the other one being Hellens Manor in Herefordshire, which is run by the same family trust.  Various family stories attempt to link the family to the whole story of the house since the 17th century, but the links are tenuous. A Pennington did, however, marry into the family of Lord Wharton, which helps explain the artworks from the Wharton collection which are here.

But enough of the background and into the house.  The garden room, where we met our guide, contains a rocking horse, which once belonged to Horatia Nelson, daughter of the naval hero. Emma Hamilton was a regular dinner party guest in the house in the early 19th century.  It also has a couple of van Dykes, and Pat explained that 'studio of' tended to mean multiple copies of the great man's work by his assistants.  Then we went through a narrow corridor, lined with portraits. This gave Pat an opportunity to tell us about the Chevalier d'Eon, whose gender was the subject of huge bets amongst the dashing punters of London Society.  He seems to have dressed as a woman for reasons of security, though he continued to give demonstrations of swordsmanship in his bonnet and dress.

In the breakfast room hangs a sketch by Constable, part of his preparatory work for The Cornfield, as well as portraits of Hilda and Axel.  Of their two sons, it was the younger, Malcolm, who took responsibility for houses and finances, while the older, Peter, went to the Slade and then became an artist.  His confidence in himself can be seen in topiary hedges out in the garden.

The dining room is part of a later addition to the house, and is embellished with an enormous chandelier and table brought over from the Chateau in Biarritz.  The walls are covered with paintings, including a splendid Hogarth of Sir Charles Kemeys Tynte, and a Burne Jones cartoon for a stained glass window, nestling behind the door. We then moved to the entrance hall, which has a classically Dutch black and white floor. We admired the apparently stone pillars and balustrades, which proved to be wood: replacements after a bomb in 1940.  Pat told us about all the films and TV period shows which have been filmed here.  The latest is Timothy Spall as J M W Turner, which will be out any day now.

The Library contains photographs of the two brothers: Peter in Royal Navy uniform, Malcolm in the uniform in which he won his MC, after a period in SOE. Malcolm was wounded after landing at Anzio, and his health was affected from then on, but this did not stop him working to save the houses and the family and other treasures from the ravages of the Labour government after the War.

Pat pointed out a lovely bust of a young child, and said it was by Foley, the great Irish sculptor, and challenged us all to see whether we had heard of him. Linda and I were red-faced when he reminded us that this is the artist who 'did' both Albert and Asia, on the Memorial which we had visited only a few months ago.

Because no home is complete without a bedroom that someone famous slept in, the family concocted a room in which 'Poor Fred', son of George II had slept;  the Prince of Wales' feathers, in silver sequins, on the velvet bedhead are actually a reference to a later Prince of Wales, Victoria's son, the future Edward VII, who visited the family in Biarritz.  There is also a cabinet with some fine jewels, many with royal stories attached.

A tiny oratory was built in the 'newer,' concrete rendered, part of the house;  it has a Swedish wooden steeple above it and a couple of little stained glass windows as well.  Pat explained to us some of the benefits of inadequate cash, (and also of not handing the house over to the National Trust!):  some areas have not been renovated, including a room still displaying painted canvas wall-hangings rather than panelling or tapestry.  We were also shown the tiny powder closet, where gentlemen could have their periwigs repowdered after the breezy ride across the common.

The music room is perhaps the most extraordinary;  it has ten huge crystal sconces along the walls, as well as a fine Romney portrait of Emma Hamilton, who used to perform her 'attitudes' here after a good dinner.

I haven't really said that all the rooms look lived in; none of the chairs corded off; no part of the carpet where one cannot stand.  It makes for a rather surreal experience for those of us used to other stately homes.  Only one room feels at all museum-like, and that is the small room where some of the ladies' dresses designed by the House of Worth are displayed. 

This was where our formal tour ended.  

But visitors are free to visit the large garden (two acres much coveted by the private school next door, which would like the space).  The garden is as idiosyncratic as the house, including a small waterway, a shelly grotto, the topiary of Peter's name, and a pets' cemetery.  Most of the pet graves have depictions of the animal above them;  Axel Munthe's owl is somewhat hidden in the undergrowth, but there are plenty more to enjoy.

All in all, we thought this was a fascinating place.  Our only criticism would be that we were given no time to linger or to study the objects and paintings that were pointed out to us. Even so, it had taken over an hour and three quarters to be shown the house, so I suppose we should not be surprised.

The House of Illustration

2 Granary Square

King’s Cross

London N1C 4BH

Sunday September 21 2014

This was partly an expedition to look at the newly opened (July of this year) House of Illustration but also the buildings around it, which are the regenerated King’s Cross. With both St Pancras and King’s Cross Stations and surrounds now more spacious and welcoming, attention is turning to the rest of the environment; open spaces, the canal, bridges, trees.

Many of the buildings were warehouses or engine sheds; Central St. Martin’s (now part of the University of the Arts) has been in its ‘new’ building since 2011 and Waitrose are converting a former potato shed while the House of Illustration, whose concept dates from 2002, has now occupied the ground floor of what was probably an office rather than warehousing block. Like many smaller galleries it will hold a series of special exhibitions during the year, rather than hold a permanent collection though I believe Quentin Blake, as one of the founding illustrators, has already pledged his original work, and this exhibition ‘Inside Stories’ celebrates the range of his work.

Apart from the combined shop and ticket entrance the space consists of four rooms.  The drawings and illustrations on display cover both the preliminary (very) sketchy placements and then the finished art work as it appeared in the various books. The range shows his talent across varying subject matter:

‘Clown’ – this book is pure illustration so everything has to be conveyed via the drawings, yet it is not a strip cartoon.

‘The Wild Washerwomen’ sadly out of print, shows the artist’s ability to differentiate seven and ultimately fourteen different characters who are never caricatures.

‘Roald Dahl’s ‘The Twits’ – disposable in my view,  but then I ‘m not a child and the much more naturalistic ‘Danny the Champion of the World’.

In similar but more urban vein is the much more modern David Walliam’s ‘Boy in a Dress’ also shows a range of very recognisable school children.

‘Candide’ is indeed an illustration of Voltaire’s caustic twist on optimism.

If you like a more complex tale Russell Hoban’s ‘Captain Najork and His Hired Sportsmen’ contains some  depictions of intricate machinery and human contortions while The Story of the Dancing Frog is simplicity itself and an animal tale to boot. I think Quentin Blake must be rather fond of frogs as they often appear as bemused onlookers in a variety of the books. The artwork – from first idea to finished concept – for these eight books are distributed round the largest of the rooms.

Directly behind the shop is a light airy room set aside for workshops I suspect and for this exhibition also offering an explanatory video of the artist at work on an illustration for The Twits and another for Clown.  The second room also provides copies of the books to read and offers children further experiences to colour in on different sheets or draw for themselves – materials are provided and the friendly staff are keen to support visitors to ‘get involved’.

The last room is reserved for the superlatively expressive art work that accompanied ‘Michael Rosen’s Sad Book’ which is exactly that – a depiction of the former Children’s Laureate’s experience of the grief at losing his eighteen-year old son Eddie.  If you thought it was impossible to draw loss and anger and bereavement you would be wrong; Quentin Blake does it most movingly.

This particular exhibition lasts until November 2 2015 and is then followed by

Paula Rego/Honore Daumier ‘Scandal, Gossip and other Stories’  14/11/2014 – 22/3/2015

Paddington: Illustrated and Animates 18/10/2014 – 4/1/2015

Rachel Lillie: Odyssey 3/11/2014 – 11/1/2015  Artist in Residence

Francisco Toledo & Dr. Lakra 3/4/2015 – 28/6/2015

PS For more Quentin Blakes see Hall Place entry: 19 May 2014

Eltham Palace

The Courtyard

Eltham

London SE9 4QE

Monday September 8^th 2014

Easily accessible by train and bus, Eltham Palace is an intriguing mixture of medieval and Tudor remains, carefully restored, and the height of Art Deco interiors somehow and successfully melded into one building for a home to the Courtaulds , this time Stephen and Virgina (known as Ginnie), for about 10 years. After they left for Scotland and then for the warmer climate of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in the late Forties the buildings were taken over by the Army Education Corps and later restored by English Heritage, who opened the property in 1999.

If you are wondering whether these Courtaulds were related to those who founded the Courtauld Institute and gallery (see entry for June 5^th) Stephen was indeed the younger brother of Sam.

 This was in fact my 6^th visit to the site; we had some overseas visitors in tow with a few hours to spare before a Gatwick flight and as we had already visited with Jo it seemed right to write up our trip which took place on a perfect September day. Since taking over  English Heritage have made several improvements – there are now two separate picnic spots – one close to the house and another adjacent to the car park, where there is also a sheltered and very pleasant children’s playground: picnicking may be a better option than the café where the strength is tea-time catering rather than anything more substantial.

The approach is perfect – across the moat and then you are ushered in via the side entrance to pay and collect your audio guide – the guide is very detailed and with extras could take nearly two hours; it gives a really good picture of the kind of social life led by the rich during the Thirties and the expenses not spared in providing interiors in which to lead this life.  It goes without saying that this was not their only home.  I do recommend the audio guides if you want an enhanced experience but equally English Heritage provide information boards in each room explaining their function and history and when the furniture and furnishings are largely reproductions but based very closely on the contemporary documents and specifications.    So complete is the effect that it is very popular as a film and TV location.

Armed with your guide of whatever kind your first gasp is reserved for the entrance hall which doubles also as a sitting room with intricate inlaid wood walls and matching floor suites and carpets in delicate shades of beige (Swedish influence) – only those opting to get married can tread on the  Marion Dorn rug. 

Interestingly the Courtaulds’ house guests, while allowed endless hot water and en suite bathrooms (quite unusual in the drafty English country house), were expected to use the coin phone in the ‘service’ wing for outside calls – the house phones only worked between rooms. It is here that you also encounter the house’s other famous resident, the Courtaulds’ pet lemur ‘Mah-Jhong’ who had his own ladder to access his upstairs suite/cage visible from the landing. The entrance hall is beautifully light thanks to the dramatic central dome. Don’t miss the excellent Art Deco wash basins still in use in the public toilets.

Another more conventional sitting room opens off the dramatic entrance hall and holds some of the more treasured majolica pieces in the glass cupboards. Needless to say no expense was spared in the silk furnishings and antique Turkish rugs.

Along the corridor to the Great Hall are what you might call ‘his and her’ offices, more or less equally sized and with lovingly built to fit furniture, be it recessed lighting, side tables, maps on rollers or bookshelves. Ginnie’s room is a little softer given that it has a sofa, but you could imagine yourself working or more likely giving work to a secretary in either room. The prize exhibit  in Stephen’s room is a model of Charles Sergeant Jagger’s ‘The Sentry’, currently on show in the Wellington Arch (see blog entry August 11), as a reminder that he too served in the Artists’ Rifles and was profoundly affected by his experiences.

The suggested and preferred route through the house then takes you into the Great Hall which has the third largest hammer beam roof after Westminster Hall and Hampton Court (see August 4^th) but being less crowded and with a simple largely empty interior it is easier at Eltham to appreciate the intricacies of the timber structure. This kind of double structure is called ‘false’ but actually there is no fakery to it and this one dates from Edward IV and the late 15^th century. I would have liked to find a little animation of how they constructed these roofs , but architecture websites seem too sober for that.

Still stand and enjoy.  When they restored it (a farmer had been using it as a barn) the Courtaulds added a few embellishments in the ‘Tudor’ spirit, namely a minstrels’ gallery and a screen at the raised end of the hall. The windows are large giving maximum light and slightly incongruously you can walk out into the Thirties Orangery at the dais end.

Back to the corridor and up the wonderful curved staircase with huge portholes which are not glassed in brings you quite abruptly back to the Thirties glamour of the cruise liners when cruising was the prerogative of the rich. Courtesy of the Minstrels’ gallery you can get an even closer look at the timber work and hear about how close the bombs fell during World War II – the bombing of SE London is something we covered more than once on our Woolwich type bus routes…

There were of course several guest bedrooms as the Courtaulds were inveterate entertainers; one of them is now ‘set-up’ as an officer’s bedroom to recall the post-war Army days. Stephen and Ginnie’s ‘His and Her’ bedrooms again reflect their different tastes – hers has a wildly extravagant gold en suite to a circular bedroom with built in wardrobes and concealed lighting, his is more modest in fittings if not in size but also with a beautiful  bathroom. Not to be missed are Mah-Jongg’s sleeping /living quarters  at which point the audio guide will tell several tales of what a nasty little pet he was. The Venetian Guest room completes the substantive tour of the upstairs, where there are also some ‘home movies’ of the time on a loop. Needless to say there were rooms for secretary and servants too, though you do not visit the latter.

The tour finishes on another dramatic note, that of the dining room with its custom built pink leather dining chairs, which combined with the beautiful woods used, give the room a warm and flattering glow. The arresting  feature is not the fireplace, as is the usual case with stately homes, as by now we have concealed central heating and even an electric fire as part of the ‘modern look’ but the cupboard doors with their inlaid lacquered  exotic animal reliefs.  On that exemplary Art Deco note it is time to leave the house for the garden, which would justify a visit in its own right.

As we have by now been round at most times of year it is fair to say the garden is one for all seasons Rather than try to describe the tour round just think there is a moat path to follow right round the hall and house – this can be roped off in part if wet weather has caused flooding – and these sunken areas, when not under water are sheltered and tended. The photos show the borders, and the sunken rose garden.

Just one word of warning – check before you visit especially at weekends as the house is often closed for weddings and you will be met by large bouncers barring your way…

Tate Britain: Late Turner

Monday 15 September 2014

Tate Britain
Millbank SW1

I had better start with a couple of justifications:  the original 'rules' of the Project  said that we were not going to visit special exhibitions.  But the problem is that it is quite unusual to go to one of our great galleries without a special exhibition to draw one.  When did anyone last pop into Tate Brit to have a quick look at the Turners?  Also, as several of the reviews have said, most of the sumptuous works in this exhibition normally live in the Tate, so we could be seeing them on a 'normal' visit. AND because as a Member of Tate, it was free entry. Finally, what are rules for if not to be broken?

So Linda and I met on the steps, just before the place opened. Linda's journey was much easier than we had feared, with the Victoria Line down: an 87 bus dropped her at the door. And I really approve of places in Westminster that have adequate cycle racks. I had time to watch the large number of people using the so-called super highway along Millbank.

There is no photography allowed in the exhibition, but you will find a number of reproductions here;  and the exhibition is really worth visiting.

It is very difficult to believe that Turner was in his 60s before Queen Victoria came to the throne, and died before the Great Exhibition opened.  The pictures are amazingly modern:  while there were brief references to Turner being influenced by Claude, there was no discussion of what the Impressionists had learned from him.  A couple of the paintings of the Thames could almost have been from that Monet series, from the early 20th century.  Turner's depiction of light and atmosphere kept taking our breath away.

As well as the paintings, the exhibition includes several of his notebooks; he sketched endlessly, sometimes in washes of watercolour, sometimes with meticulous pencil drawings (or 'graphite' as curators always put in the captions)  There was also a room with a wall full of sample sketches, which his agent would show to prospective clients and then he would make paintings from them.  

The six rooms of the Exhibition are more-or-less themed, with a whole room full of sea pictures, and another of his various travels, with the sketchbooks set alongside finished works.  Venice, of course, predominates, but there were many swiss scenes as well.  Very interesting was a room of smaller circular or square oils, almost everyone a vortex of light of amazing brilliance.  But I am not qualified or equipped to evaluate pictures other than to say that they are wonderful!

We did also enjoy a picture, by William Parrott, of Turner on varnishing day at the Royal Academy:  you can see it here if you scroll down to figure 20.  It was interesting because the Tate Exhibition has quite a lot to say about the critics, and occasions when buyers changed their minds having listened to the critics.  You could argue that the modern visitor to Tate should be grateful, since these form some of the great Turner Bequest, which included everything in his studio at his death in 1851.


When we could manage no more wonderful colour and form, we went up to the newish Members' Room, which occupies the balcony all round the inside of the Dome, and had a cup of coffee.

The Museum of Brands, Packaging & Advertising.

Colville Mews

Lonsdale Road

Notting Hill London W112 AR

Wednesday September 10 2014

I have always been a fan of packaging, indeed you could go as far as saying ‘a sucker for packaging‘ where cosmetics are concerned, so this was not a difficult choice this week. As it happens Jo and I had both been to the original museum back in the 1980s when it was still on the Gloucester dockside and a good place to lose a wet afternoon whilst on holiday in the nearby Forest of Dean. After nearly 20 years in Gloucester the collection transferred to its current site in a quiet mews in north Notting Hill, at one time the less wealthy end though the presence of high end fashion showrooms next door shows this area has seen changes. Totting up all those figures will tell you that Robert Opie, its founder, has been collecting packaging for nearly fifty years. We met at busy Notting Hill Gate having both arrived by underground; the 15+ minute walk  takes you along  the very attractive Pembridge Road and Crescent; the bus numbers 23 and 31 will take you closer.  

As photography is not allowed this account would look rather plain so I made a decision on reaching home to look out some of the brands that were on display from our own store-cupboards and photograph these. This underlines the fact that the Museum only has UK brands (though some are of course now owned by multi-nationals) and unlike last week’s visit would not appeal to many overseas visitors. These are quintessentially the items homesick Brits/ex-pats request when living overseas. I have to confess that my store cupboards had far more overseas items than home grown… and I suspect that it is the case for many of us today. Also the packaging is today’s and not historical, though some of the display’s charm lies in seeing how little things have changed and of course many modern designers do like that retro feel.

Apart from the special, additional World War 1 cabinet at the start, the museum is arranged chronologically. After the Victorian and Edwardian sections there are areas for each decade.  The signage summarises the key political and social developments during that 10 year period plus any significant inventions or events to give a context. The cases are then arranged by products – ie biscuits / chocolates / soap / marmalade / Gentlemen’s Relish (‘Patum Peperium’) with separate cases looking at any of the contemporary celebrations starting with the Jubilee of Queen Victoria and following through to the 2012 Jubilee and Olympics. Exhibitions, sporting events, and royal  occasions various (but weddings especially) all inspire special editions of well-known brands with their products packaged in celebratory mode.  There are also cases for each decade with the most iconic and popular toys and games from that decade.  The World War 1 games are both patriotic and competitive, eg. ‘Race to Berlin’ and ‘With the Flag to Berlin’ are board games while ‘Pop into Potsdam’ is one of those hand-held ball-through-the-maze toys. By the Seventies and Eighties we are looking at Barbie Dolls and Star Wars figures, the point at which global marketing became what drove and drives the toy industry. Toys also link in with TV programmes, and increasingly films made for children.

The brands and their packaging are presented but not critically evaluated – what makes a brand a brand: is it the content? – tea-bags / soap powder / soft drinks and above all cigarettes – or is it the ‘image’ it sells also? Brands need to be instantly recognisable for the shopper who just grabs a tin or packet when in a hurry…  I know when I enter the cereal aisles that Shreddies are the almost only blue package on view, so I go on buying them.  Hence the success of Dorset cereals whose ‘see through‘ window packaging was immensely popular  and helped them secure  a part of the market.    

The Museum of course records those brands that are no longer …. Venus Soap, or Keating's Powder which is perhaps no longer needed as ‘it kills off fleas and lice’, they even had a  jingle  for this now hopefully redundant product.  There areinnumerable kinds of beef extract as given to ailing Victorian heroines.  Patriotic adverts for Bovril and Oxo are particularly prevalent   Occasionally a ‘celebrity’ is pulled in to help boost a product, for example WG Grace the cricketer – now reduced to a fridge magnet  promoting mustard.

New inventions of course generate new brands. I had thought the freeze drying and dehydrating of goods for later rehydration was a fairly new way of presenting food but it seems to have been used since Edwardian days at least.  Eating at the front or on manoeuvres have a longer legacy than just feeding the troops – and ‘instant coffee’ really took off after World War II as meat extract drinks faded from the scene.

Sweets and biscuits have strong brand identities even if the number of biscuit firms has declined as companies combine and take each other over.

The Twenties  was a decade that saw the introduction of several favourite brands, among them some of our best loved chocolate bars.  

Mackintoshes ‘Quality Street’ toffees have virtually the same font and the same tins they have always had – after the series of cases devoted to each decade come shelves of virtually unchanged packaging which include the following products:

Johnson’s Baby items

Imperial  Leather Soap

Scholls Foot Products

Roses Chocolates

Bovril

Optrex

Dettol

Ovaltine

Bird’s Custard

Tate & Lyle Golden Syrup

HP Sauce (still a mystery as to what the HP stands for ??

Interestingly some packaging has become ‘intellectual property’ so only Cadbury’s can package in purple (while Suchard Milka has mauve) certain jar shapes are limited to Nescafe, and you may remember the JIF  lemon squeezer, which some used as a water pistol .....

Of course after tins and paper packaging – the latter so ephemeral the advent of plastic changed packaging radically in the second half of the 20^th century. There were other innovations – light crushable aluminium with ring-pulls for cans, wine boxes, and tetra packs for some liquids.

Cellophane makes a brief appearance – there is no acknowledgement that in the quest for hygiene, sell by dates and keeping qualities some products are very difficult to open.  One case is devoted to the sustainability of packaging – only certain wood pulps re-cycle and of course packaging forms a large part of our litter problems:  you can sometimes gauge the popularity of a brand by the number of wrappers in the gutter…  Some packets are hard to retrieve so it is surprising there are any crisp packets on display  at all. A great find for the museum was a houseful of goods dating from the late Seventies and early Eighties left untouched for thirty years. Dotted amongst the toys and packets are the odd promotional toy or mug.

Rather under represented – perhaps because most of the key products are French or American – are the cosmetics and beauty products (or maybe because the collector is a man?) where the packaging is almost as important as the product – pretty jars and boxes are needed   for your bathroom and certainly influence this consumer.

The entire collection  is a very visual experience – advertising takes many forms and  the museum focuses on the visible and  tangible; there are some old reels of TV adverts and you can hear the odd jingle towards the end of the  display cases, or when you stop for a drink in the modest café.  It is also a very nostalgic experience – as Time Out put it (quoted on the promotional  brochure):

‘to walk through the magnificently cluttered time tunnel of cartons and bottles toys and advertising displays is to locate your own place in history.’

It is no surprise that old adverts etc are such a key element in any reminiscence work with the elderly. 

PS In case anyone was wondering they are Mr and Mrs. Ribena Berry (aka a pencil sharpener and pen holder).

PPS TFL have finally come good after a certain amount of agitation and replied to my complaint from June... 

2 Temple Place

Monday 8 September 2014

On this beautiful sunny day, Andrew and I went on a private tour of 2 Temple Place, organised by the Friends of the British Library. I thought Linda and Mary would not mind if I wrote it up, though we shall of course visit it when there is an exhibition on and access is more straightforward.  They have exhibitions between January and March each year, and the next one will be 'Hidden Collections of the Industrial North West'.

So we arrived in the calm front courtyard of this remarkable building, though the traffic noise from Temple Place and the Strand was intrusive, and were met by our guide, Nigel Black, who began by telling us about the original owner of the building, and pointing out some key features.  The money came from William Waldorf Astor, for whom the word 'rich' is an understatement, but the inspiration was his architect, John Loughborough Pearson. For this building, Pearson moved from his usual Neo-Gothic to what the guide aptly called Neo-Tudor.  The outside embellishments include lamps with 15th century ships on them.  The weathervane, just visible above the crenellated roof, is of Columbus' 1492 ship, the Santa Maria.  Columbus, after all, went the 'other way' from Aster, Europe to America.

Since these were to be the offices of the Astor business empire, and therefore modern, the cherubs on one lamp stand are telephoning one another.  (The other lamp stand has one winding a coil while the other holds up a light bulb).

If I say that his home in London was in Carlton House Terrace (up for sale last year for £250,000,000) and his country houses were Cliveden and Hever Castle, you will see what I mean about his being rich.

But we were here to see William Waldorf's offices.  Having inherited his father's fortune, and wisely continued the family habit of investing in real estate in New York, he moved to England in 1890. He was always worried about his personal security, and the USA was a land of kidnappings and gangsters. So in we went, to the wood panelled entrance hall. It has a striking stone floor, onyx, chalcedony, porphyry and jasper inlaid in the marble.

Astor was very fond of historical fiction, and so the hall and staircase are embellished with wooden carvings of characters from his favourites. The ground floor has the Three Musketeers, plus d'Artagnan,  Milady, and various others.  Then on the upstairs landing, we have Hawkeye and Uncas from James Fenimore Cooper, two characters from Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, and Rip van Winkle and his daughter to illustrate Washington Irving.  Above them all, for British literature, are friezes of Shakespeare plays.  These are by Thomas Nicholls, taking a break from church embellishment which was his main focus.  (You can see some more of his work in Waltham Abbey).  Above all this wood is a stained glass ceiling dating from 1895.

Next we moved into the Library, which was book-free, having in fact been Astor's office. (He had bought the Pall Mall Gazette, turning it from a Liberal paper to a Conservative one, though it made him no money and his wealth continued to come from New York)  The Library is embellished with lots more cherubs, by William Frith who also made the entrance lamp stands.  They depict the Arts and the Sciences, one of them holding a retort, and a couple of others with musical instruments and books
Above, are fifty heads of historical and literary figures by Nathaniel Hitch.  Here Bismarck and Martin Luther mix with the Lady of Shallot and others.  And then there are characters from Ivanhoe...
At either end of the room are stained glass windows by Clayton and Bell, depicting a Swiss sunrise and sunset.  When one end of the building was damaged by a nearby V1 in 1944, the glass was safely is storage, and survived.

Oh, yes, because you can never have too much, there is also a fine door carved by George Frampton, the man who 'did' Edith Cavell and Peter Pan. It shows nine women from the Arthurian legends.

Then we went through a 'hidden door' (part of Astor's security worries) into an exhibition room, still sporting the wallpaper from a William Morris exhibition, and our tour finished.

We had learned a lot of Astor family history, which I shall not detail here. Astors entered British Tory politics and embedded themselves in the establishment.  An Astor won gold at the 1908 Olympics (for Racquets, that upper class and now abandoned Olympic sport); one small descendant was bridesmaid to Katherine Middleton;  one is stepfather to the Prime Minister's wife.

We also learned about the owners of the building since Astor:  Sunlife Assurance of Canada, followed by the Accountants and Auditors/Chartered Accountants, who used it as a sort of Livery Hall.  But now it belongs to the Bulldog Trust, a charity which helps other charities with their governance, and by giving 'modest grants' (Nigel Blacks words, not mine!)

It had been a fascinating tour, and one which I would recommend to anyone, especially anyone with an interest in late 19th century decorative arts .... or an interest in how rich Americans like to spend their money.