Country Furniture Online

There’s been a fascinating series on mainstream tv by an ex politician who is now a traveller and very decent presenter of interesting facts.  He carries a well known rail gujide from the last century – depending on location.  His travelogues have become more and more popular – not only is he an engaging personality, but they find interesting folk to chat to in each of the locations filmed.  I have seen fantastic historical pieces about early English and European settlers in the States – the stories of racial and ethnic cleansing are humiliating and true, sadly.  However, as there’s nothing we can do about our sordid past now, I feel it best to capture the essence of the programmes and enjoy what each person wishes to show me!  Fantastic arrays of early furniture are usually the mainstay, and the earliest working machinery.   The furniture is so lovingly cherished, moreso in the States and Canada it would seem.

Upon opening the cover of my favourite country style living magazine, which is not only nationwide, but also often includes articles from europe and the USA, my eyes hit upon a property very local to me.  I nearly fell off my chair because this particular stately pile has always been talked about in hushed tonesd and with a reverence held normally for very very important people.   There has been a general assumption that it was still owned by the slightly aristocratic family who bought it some 300 years ago.  But upon loooking at the description of the property – in all its glory over 2 pages of the mag, it would seem that it was sold once before, in the early 2000s.   Word has now gone round about this incredible bit of news — the local ‘big house’ up on the market for a smidgen short of £10M.  It seems absolutely unbelievable.  The write up suggests it has eleven bathrooms and sixteen bedrooms.  All sorts of statistics fill the paragraph of ‘what we have to offer’.  Oh how I would love to be able to pretend to be a buyer on the look out!

I do have a joy these days of watching the tv programmes that feature auctions or at least valuations of furniture and effects that could be offered for sale at them.  There’s something rather sad seeing a family taking their heirlooms to the expert – either we already like the party and have some empathy for them. .  Or we’ve found them truly annoying and are quite pleased when the expert questions the provenance of the article, not rediculing it, but gently letting them down with a more likely scenario, whilst hacking several hundred off the anticipated value.   If we want to buy antique furniture for ourselves, it is always advisable to do a great eal of research and to buy from reputable dealers and auction houses.  The car boot sale and pop up ‘one day only’ sales are always going to be suspect.  Stolen items can be disposed of this way – although many of the purloined beauties are stolen to order and shipped abroad immediately, there are outlets for other lucky acquisitions.

At least in the summer months, July and August for example, the weather can usually be relied upon to keep us calm, keep us warm, and most of all, keep us from going batty with mud an wet weather gear keeping everything nicely damp!  I love going off for a good poke around a country house – now that I have a little more time to myself, I have taken out membership of three of the major heritage charities and enjoy nothing better than planning a sorti to one or two properties wherever I happen to be in the country.  The membership is useful also when I’m travelling around and want to stop off for a nice, relaxed, quality cuppa – the car parks are always free to members and the tea shops are absolutely top notch!  This reflects the quality of the furniture inside most of them too – such history and feeling of belonging!

There’s a programme on tv that everybody seems to like – one where we see experts repairing much loved heirlooms and that aged relatives have been hanging on to for years.  I particularly like the clock repairs – the chap is a real expert and expalins very clearly what he thinks is wrong with the thing at the start of the show.  Obviously the researchers have gone through everything first with a fine tooth comb to ensure that each piece offers enough work to keep it viable for a third of a programme – the amount of film ending up on the cutting room floor must be heartbreaking!  There’s also a really fantastic ceramics expert who seems able to put back together the most incredible mish mash of chipped and broken collectables.  I remmeber also a fantastic job was carried out on a very old rocking horse – the leather expert really made an outstanding job of a seriously battered saddle – other colleagues were brought in to deal with the mane and tail.  It’s heartening to know we have real expertise in this country – a real morale booster in these very challenging times.