FABERGÉ ABROAD : NEAR WINCHESTER

Just another lonely boy from the city finds his way back home

sit in quiet down by the river

wait and hope for my luck will change

sit in silent sounds in the mirror

watch my twig slowly drift away..

An hour outside of London is the city of Winchester: known for its namesake cathedral, the former capital of England, and the location in which the Domesday Book was compiled.  Twenty minutes further southeast and you will find yourself in Bishop's Waltham.

I traveled there to visit Loopy, a darling friend who runs the award-winning Bowman Ales Brewery and who appointed himself my de facto tour guide through Hampshire. 

One of our first visits was to the New Forest, a surprisingly large area of pasture, heathland and forest to be found in such a densely populated county. We found a modest Canadian war memorial dotted with flags and faded photographs; according to Loopy, the New Forest was the international site for D Day preparations where tens of thousands made camp and prepared for their call. The heath is now populated by indigenous ponies and donkeys who happily graze in peace.

Nearby in the tiny town of Fritham is the most marvelous of pubs, the Royal Oak. Its timber walls and thatch roof frame two cozy rooms, a fire roaring in its hearth and ramblers sipping pints of best bitters well before noon. 

Across the parking lot we found the site of the Schultze Gunpowder Factory. Suffering rapid decline in business during the early twentieth century due to anti-German sentiment, all that remains of Schultze is a metal post box. 

We next ventured to Pagham, a seaside village in the country of West Sussex. As we walked along the beach, Loopy explained that it was the site of massive coastal erosion. An ever-growing spit has displaced the entrance to the harbour, and is forcing an aggressive tide to flow parallel to the beach. Last year during a storm the tide rose up to the door of the yacht club, and residents were panicking about the lack of interest and support they were receiving from the government. After our walk we continued our beer tour at the nearby Kings Beach Hotel, named for King George and also under threat of purchase by a supermarket chain.

The next morning I was left to my own devices, and was intent on finding Hazelholt Farm. My parents were tenants in a servants lodge on the property (the other lodge apparently occupied at the time by a German POW), and it was there that I had spent some of my earliest days on this earth. I set out across a public access footpath and wandered from farm to farm, eventually relying on the kindness of strangers to guide me. The quaint little lodge was deserted, bucolic, and predictably not at all as I remembered it.

-Henri Fabergé

 

FABERGÉ ABROAD : KENWOOD HOUSE

Perched on the northern edge of London's Hampstead Heath is Kenwood House, a magnificent estate where my Granny recently took me for lunch. "They have a wonderful Rembrandt self-portrait in their collection," she mentioned casually.

The majesty of the grounds - appreciated by both tourists and locals alike on this unseasonably sunny spring afternoon - is easily matched by the exquisite home.  The original house was built for John Bill, King James I's printer, a brick structure but by no means modest (records show it contained 24 hearths). Its major transformation occurred after it was purchased in 1754 by William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, for the tidy sum of £4,000 as a weekend country villa. As William and his wife Elizabeth became more enamoured with its beautiful surroundings, they commissioned the renowned Scottish neoclassical architect Robert Adam to remodel, expand and modernize the house in 1764.

 The home was passed down to half a dozen Earls of Mansfields until 1922, when the 6th Earl held a four-day sale and dispensed with most of the original furnishings. The home was bought along with 74 surrounding acres by the 1st Earl of Iveagh, Edward Cecil Guinness (of the beer dynasty). And so in the hands of an Earl it continued until his untimely death five years later, at which time the estate was bequeathed to the nation, stipulating that it should be open free of charge to the public with the "mansion and its contents...preserved as a fine example of the artistic home of a gentleman of the eighteenth century". The rooms have been refurbished to reflect that time as well as featuring Guinness's impressive personal collection of Old Master and British paintings, the Rembrandt displayed in good company with Vermeer, Turner, Gainsborough, and several portraits of Lady Hamilton (famously the mistress of Lord Nelson). Of the interiors the library is most impressive, showcasing Adam's colour schemes and retaining the original decorative ceiling paintings by Venetian artist Antonio Zucchi.

An extensive conservation project was launched in 2012, including repair on the roof, redecorating of the interior and exterior, and the house reopened in late 2013, just in time for our lazy afternoon. Granny and I settled in the shade of the quaint garden cafe for a light lunch, and simply to appreciate beauty as a leisurely pastime of eighteenth century aristocracy.

-Henri Fabergé

GALLERY OF COMPARATIVE ANATOMY AND PALEONTOLOGY

Built in 1898 for the National Exhibition of Paris in 1900, the 3 storey hall housing the Gallery of Comparative Anatomy and Paleontology is a sublime relic of Victorian-era science.  With many important specimens on display such as the marsupial wolf, as well as the skeleton of Louis XV's rhinoceros, the displays strive to present direct comparison between bone structures, making similarities between species more obvious and evolutionary adaptations for land, sea and air apparent.  

Many of the original labels are intact as are earlier mounting, repair and extension techniques.  The hand of the collector is very apparent here, making, for me, the specimens more accessible and interesting than if placed in a more clinical environment.  However, the excess also brings to mind many extinctions that occurred because of the frenzy for collecting specimens in the 19th century.  The 3rd floor houses an extensive collection of gastropods and fossils accompanied by hand painted and collaged diagrams that would be the envy of many a mid-century-modern-styled living room.  Water damage, peeling paint and a general shabbyness throughout didn't seem to deter a healthy number of guests and seemed appropriate alongside so many relics.