I’ll Take This: Chateau in Antigny, France

Just one glance at the images of this chateau in France made me want to pack my bags and move! At 13 bedrooms and just 80 acres, it’s practically petite!

The chateau dates to the 15th century, but had extensive exterior renovations in the 19th century. From the agent’s website:

It has an ornate entrance gate leading to a beautiful, typically French-styled garden, a terrace overlooking the valley below, magnificently carved stone fireplaces and ceilings and a chapel with protected frescos, commissioned by Jean de Moussy which forms part of the “trilogie de la Gartempe”, dating from the end of the 15th century and is set in 32 hectares of pastureland and woods with over 1km of river frontage. It comprises a fully-fitted kitchen with feature fireplace, dining room again with feature stone fireplace leading to the chapel with the famous (listed) frescos, living room again with feature fireplace, entrance with carved stone vaulted ceilings and stained glass windows, games room, 13 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, stables, guardian’s lodge, tennis court, swimming pool, kennels and a riverside lodge.

Hey, I’d be happy living in the stable block by the looks of them! Especially with that garden just outside the door.

It’s fun to see how they’ve incorporated the old and the new.

Original ceilings, not original light fixtures.

The dining room.

Overlooking the river.

The obligatory suit of armour!

Guessing this is the blue bedroom…

The folly.

The house is a cool €4,750,000 and you can see all of the details here.

Hi Ho! Silver at Noon!

Ok, this is a bit of shameless self-promotion, so if you’re not interested, click away… But be warned, there is such gorgeousness below, you’re going to regret leaving.

I acquired a set of the most stunning mother of pearl-handled silver I’ve ever seen, and because I am a hunter, not a collector {snort}, I am selling them. But since so many people have e-mailed me and messaged me with their interest in the pieces, I am going to list them at noon on August 10th on my Etsy shop, and the first person there, gets them.

Now you might ask what’s so special about them… Just take a look at these gorgeous pieces. First of all, there are twelve pieces – six each of the knives and forks. So, that’s a dinner party right there. The knife blades and the fork tines have an argyle pattern interspersed with flowers. And the pattern is on both sides of the blades and tines.

And how about that stunning twisted loop and the arrowhead on the knives? These look like they could have belonged to the laird of a castle in one of the outer islands of Scotland.

They’re definitely English, and the hallmark leads me to believe they were made in Sheffield by Martin & Hall & Co. between 1860 and 1897. So, they’re high Victorian when all things Scottish were in fashion. The pieces are hallmarked on the knife blades and the fork necks.

The fluted ferrules make a perfect transition between the argyle of the blades and tines and the elegant mother of pearl handles.

If the blades aren’t fabulous enough, the handles are stunning. They are carved in a reeded pattern with a cap on the end. They are in absolutely perfect condition with their luminescence glowing from within.

These knives and forks are in excellent condition, especially considering how old they are. You can see by the images that there are no scratches or faded areas on the silver. The silver experts I’ve consulted have never seen a set of silverware like these.

They are so fabulous, that I am almost tempted to keep them for myself, but as I have an entire set of beautiful French Ivory-handled silver and a set of Mappin & Webb Kingsware pattern silverware, these go to the first to click on them. Remember, 12 noon, EST on my Etsy Shop.

I’ll Take This: English Cottage in Baltimore

I saw that one of my favourite houses is on the market and so I got right on-line to see what it looked like. I’ve actually only seen it from the outside, zooming by on the way to and from my parents’ old house.

All this house needs to look like it’s from a wee village in the Cotswolds is a thatched roof, but I am pretty sure they’re illegal here… and besides, no one in this area knows the art of thatching.

I am going to digress for a moment – why, in this day and age of digital photography, and photoshop, can’t real estate adverts have decent images???

Anyway, back to this charming house… It even comes with a little guest house with a Juliet balcony.

I am assuming that they’ve converted the whole thing from a garage to living quarters and that these doors are purely decorative.

I was all prepared to love this house, when this image popped up on my screen.

For the love of all things architectural, how the hell did they ever think this looked good? And how in gawd’s name did the zoning ever get approved?  It doesn’t even look like the same property as the front of the house!!!

It’s like the home version of a mullet hair-cut. Serious in the front and horrific in the back. It is just tragic! What happened to the rest of the lovely roof-line?

This made me lose any will I had to look at more pictures of the house. It’s just ruined. I am so sad now. Seriously, since I was a teenager, I’ve loved this house and the way it was settled into the landscape, and now this!!! It is borderline criminal the way this has been ruined. They will never sell it.

And what’s up with these strange windows????

It was built in 1853, and ruined sometime in the last 30 years, it looks like. Apparently, the main house is divided into two units, just like the mullet. One lucky person gets to live in the sweet front of the house and some poor thing has to live in the hideous addition.

This is all too painful, and I feel like I need to go drink something strong. If you can bring yourself to look, here’s the listing with the remaining pictures. Just don’t blame me if you start sobbing.

Save the Date

As you might know, I occasionally give lectures and talks, and I’ve just scheduled my next one for October 25th. The talk is called “200 Years of History on Charles Street”. Charles Street is the main street of Baltimore and it divides the city neatly in half. It runs from south of the harbour,

all the way up to the beltway encircling the city.

As it traverses its nearly 11 mile length, Charles Street changes from row-houses close to the Harbour, to tall office buildings, to elegant townhouses, museums and churches, to more row-houses, to vast estates and then schools and universities. But I am going to concentrate on a few short blocks of the street, beginning at the historic Old St. Paul’s Church and walking to the now-200 year old Washington Monument, from where the above pictures were taken.

These few blocks are filled with some of the most beautiful architecture in Baltimore, as well as a few not-so-nice buildings, but that’s all part of the story of Charles Street. This is one of the treasures along the route taken by a friend who also likes to Look Up!

If you click on the image below, you will find information on the lecture series, mine along with a lot of others!

Hope you can come along on my walk through history.

20 Questions for Bunny Williams From the WSJ

Did you see the Wall Street Journal’s Off Duty section over the weekend? There was a great “20 Odd Questions” piece with design icon, Bunny Williams. Ever since she arrived on my radar, I have admired her common sense in so many things – her decorating, her outlook on life, and the way she deals with her many rescued dogs. 

Bunny says that the dog always knows where the coziest place in the house is, and I can certainly agree after Connor took over the most comfortable chair for the past two years. She says that she has faux fur rugs for her dogs, and I know that was always Connor’s favourite place in the winter.

While everyone is mourning the closing of Bunny Williams’ iconic shop in New York, Treillage, she has opened a showroom in the Fine Arts Building in Manhattan to showcase her designs. She joins other design and decorating firms including Bennison and Chelsea Textiles.

Bunny talks about hating the colours mauve and teal, and acres of dry-wall walls. She likes texture on the walls. Nothing to disagree with there!

As part of the article, there’s also a brief video of Bunny talking about her likes and what interests her. Antique urns are a big thing – in more ways than one! There is nothing better than a chippy old cast iron urn.

I know that a trip to Bunny Williams Home will definitely be a stop on my next trip to New York!

To access the article, please click here. I don’t think that it’s behind the pay-wall.

Small-timore, Again! This Time With Lots of Pretty Pictures!

As you may know, I’ve been snapping up lots of the gorgeous pearl-handled silverware, which is now on my Etsy shop. It’s really stunning stuff and in the last auction, there were a few lots that I had my eye on.

But the bidding was fast and furious and I only won some of the lots I bid on. This being Baltimore, I thought that the chances of me knowing who was bidding against me were pretty good. Within a week, I found that it was a friend of a friend! And then it was confirmed I saw this image on her Instagram page!Angela Mangione runs House of Presley, a company that rents china, silverware, glassware and other “props” for weddings and parties. We have had a few conversations back and forth, and when she sent me the link to her website, I was enchanted. She’s actually transitioning between websites, so I have linked her Facebook page, which is populated by gorgeous images like the ones below!

Which is your favourite image? I am hard-pressed to choose the one I like the best! All of the images are from here, so go check out the House of Presley and look at the rest of the images. And tell Angela I sent you over!

All images except the first one, courtesy of the House of Presley!

Summer Supper

I bought a plant of “Sweet 100’s” cocktail tomatoes, but in reality, it’s only Sweet 4. That’s all the tomatoes that are on the plant. It’s kind of pitiful. I was planning to make some roasted cocktail tomato jam to have over the winter when I am craving the sunshiny taste of fresh real tomatoes. I guess I will have to take a jaunt to the local Farmers’ Market and pick up some. The recipe I’ve linked is one of the few without a ton of sugar – some have more than three cups! I just want the simplest possible – tomatoes, olive oil, garlic and a bit of sea salt.

I picked up some beautiful Maryland corn for supper this evening and it was delicious! I used a little bit of Kerrygold Butter with herbs and garlic, (which I accidentally bought after the dog who’s staying with me ate a half a stick of regular butter and I had to go get more) and a sprinkling of sea salt. It was perfection.

Do you know the easiest way to cook corn? Freakishly simple: Chuck a piece of corn into the microwave. Don’t peel it or shuck it or anything. Set the microwave for four minutes. Pull the corn out. Cut off the bottom about a half inch above where the husks meet the stalk. Squeeze the corn from the silk end and a perfect piece of corn, with NO silk, will pop out. Butter and salt it. Eat and enjoy.

Tell me about your favourite summer supper!

Spit & Polish

One of the chores that I have never minded doing is polishing the silver. As a child, we would polish the silver before holiday dinners and my parents’ dinner parties. It was one of those instant gratification chores – you could see your success immediately! Luckily, I still like polishing silver, because I have quite a collection – especially in the pearl-handled flatware – which all needed to be cleaned up before sale.

In the comments section of my last post, someone asked what I used to polish my silverware. After years of using Wright’s Silver Cream, they have gone and changed their name and are now Weiman. Then my life got dramatically easier when I discovered that they make silver wipes. I never though that the pitiful little sponge included in the tub of polish was substantial enough and usually fell apart before I’d finished all the polish.These Weiman Silver Wipes are amazing!  They’re really strong and don’t fall apart, no matter how much I rub and scrub. If I only need to spot polish something, I put the used piece into a baggie and use it the next time.

I thought I’d show you how well they work. Bad me! I hadn’t polished this gorgeous teapot for a while. With all of our humidity recently, it was really beginning to tarnish quickly and I can’t stand that.

After a few swipes with the cloth, it really started cleaning up nicely!

Then I finished polishing the whole thing, including all of the pieces.

This piece is pretty amazing. It’s a teapot on a stand with a spirit burner, which in itself is quite amazing!

The wick raises and lowers, and when you turn a screw, a little piece comes over and extinguishes the flame. And there are two clips to keep the pot on the stand when you’re transporting it.

You can see how nicely this polished up, and I only used one of the cloths!

The thing about silver is that the more you use it, the less you have to polish it. And for heaven’s sake, don’t ever consider using one of those dips that claim to remove all of the tarnish instantly. They also remove every single bit of patina on the piece!  This set of Mappin & Webb mother of pearl-handled cutlery took a lot of silver polish and elbow grease to clean. If I’d dipped it, it would look flat and grey. No depth at all.

Do you polish your silver? If so, what do you use or recommend?