Wednesday, August 13, 2008

attingham: the houses: hardwick

Week 2 favorites ~ Hardwick Hall ~ "more glass than wall!" This house was a place of complete sensory overload for me ~ from climbing up onto the roof to see the magnificent vistas to losing myself in room after room of textiles. I have very few photographs from Hardwick, partly because I was so distracted, and partly because the interior light levels are kept extremely low in order to protect the textiles. But, for more about Hardwick see Anne's guest post from last year, and these two publications:

* The Embroideries at Hardwick Hall (pure eye candy)
* Bess of Hardwick

Also, while I (madly!) lugged home all of the guide books for the houses we visited, you might be interested to know that you can order them through The History Press (they will ship internationally).

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I need to read the Bio on Bess. Loved the faux Mary, Queen of Scots room at Hardwick. Fun to know we are part of a long line of "polite tourists" to English country houses. KDM

Sabina said...

I have some catching up to do on this blog after taking a long break over summer. So much to look forward too!!

:)

LINDA from Each Little World said...

Mary Lovell's bio of Bess is superb and published in the U.S. with a different cover so you don't have to send to the U.K. to buy it.

I've never been to Hardwick but it is my dream house. Klehm's Song Sparrow nursery in Wisconsin sells lily of the valley plants from Hardwick. I am growing them and they are quite attractive. See www.songsparow.com for details. They do mailorder and ship anywhere in the U.S.