We have always been entranced by the history, both cultural and architectural, of the grand country houses of England. The London-based magazine Country Life has long been the essential chronicle of these iconic estates, having featured a different country house in each weekly issue since it was founded back in 1897 and advertised many hundreds more in its property pages. A stunning new book, The English Country House, by Mary Miers from Rizzoli is sourced from the magazine's incredible archives. More than 400 images, mostly in color, highlight 62 houses encompassing a range of architectural styles spanning seven centuries beginning with the medieval Stokesay Castle and also examining the decoration, gardens, and landscapes, settings that inspire a continuing tradition of sporting style via country pursuits pursued with panache such as hunting and shooting, as well as whole schools of interior design.

As a result of its famous series of beautifully illustrated and authoritative articles, Country Life amassed an "astonishing library of photography and scholarship that provides a fascinating record of changing tastes and approaches to the country house and its garden over the past century," Miers notes. The book is illustrated almost entirely with images from its famous picture library, many of them by leading photographers of their day. The focus is not on the world-famous palaces that have now become museums, but rather the sort of houses to which Country Life has had privileged access over the years, many of which are still private homes often occupied by descendants of the families that built them. In the gallery you can preview photos from the book of Parnham House in Dorset, Honington Hall in Warwickshire, Claydon House in Buckinghamshire, and Renishaw Hall in Derbyshire.



Spanning more than seven centuries, these houses were nearly all built as an "expression of status at the center of a landed estate, many interpreting the mainstream architectural trends of the day with their own distinctive provincial character," Miers notes. "They celebrate that rich seam of English domestic architecture that reflects, through a variety of material and design, the diversity of the English landscape and its regional traditions of craftsmanship." Punctuating the book at intervals in the form of booklet inserts on rich, uncoated paper are six essays by leading British architectural historians that set the English country house into its social context and chart "the changing tastes in decorating and collecting, the development of ancillary buildings, gardens and landscapes, and finally, its influence in the United States" in our own magnates' mansions.

"Keep calm and carry on" is the phrase written on the rear of the upcoming Britannic watch by Industrial North Design. The term is the famous slogan of the British Ministry of Information. Quintessential British machinists and designers have created two quintessential British watches with the Britannic and Vanguard-Precision. Each is limited to just 15 pieces, and will be hand-made in England. Some people know that England used to be what Switzerland is today for watch making. The country is still ripe with talent and mechanical know-how.

Seen here are pre-production prototypes, with final designs yet to be cemented. The cases and dials are in high-grade steel and precision-cut. Size is 46mm wide. While the movement's are Swiss automatics, the watches are purely British. As such, you'll find things like rare 10BA screws used in the watches to secure the case together. These are "British Association" screws that are no longer used and originated back when Britain was an empire.

The Vanguard-Precision watch has the phrase "come into the factories" engraved on its caseback. This along with the textile pattern dial is meant to remind one of the cloth mills in northern England. Dials are cut sterling silver, and the seconds hand is double-sided. The watches will each have hand-made calf leather straps that are a wide 26mm wide. Watches with great personality, and to me feel like what a English Panerai would be like. Keep an eye on Industrial North Design for the watches to be released soon.

Ariel Adams publishes the luxury watch review site aBlogtoRead.com.

British comedian and actor Russell Brand has been in the news a bit lately. He's been increasing his profile in the United States with more acting roles (he's set to take on the Dudley Moore role in the remake of Arthur) and with his romance with Katy Perry. Perhaps Brand is considering a permanent move to the U.S. because the BrickWork blog reports that Brand's home in the Hampstead area of London is on the market.

The Victorian home has been renovated in a hiply goth style that reminds me of the vintagey creations of Douglas Little. The home has five levels and features dark flocked wallpaper, large televisions and modern furniture. An entire room is given over to Brand's love of yoga and the plush black and silver master bedroom is exactly what you might from this self-confessed sex addict. The home also includes a media room, outdoor hot tub and a top floor bedroom suite which currently serves as an office. It is listed at £2.5 million.

I guess everyone has to eat, even in a recession. When the light appears at the end of the tunnel, though, appetites get bigger ... and more discriminating. In London, upscale eateries are seeing the investment banking crowd come back, and the wine is once again flowing. The cities top chefs are still worried about what will happen after Christmas, but for now, they're happy to see their creations gobbled up by the city's financial sector.

Marcus Wareing has had what he calls "a fabulous year." The waiting list keeps getting longer, and he says, "There's a good vibe." Tristan Welch's Launceston Place is seeing more wine flow, and demand is picking up. Pearl's Jun Tanaka remains cautious, "We'll really know in the first quarter 2010 if business has returned ... I don't know if it's a trend or a hiccup."

Across the city, there's a mix of optimism and trepidation. Le Gavroche, Wahaca and Le Café Anglais, for example, offer some variation of "Business is good" or "Business is booming, and Gordon Ramsay tells Bloomberg News, "There's an increasing air of confidence, which has been particularly apparent since the beginning of September." Michelle McGuire of The Palm said the restaurant had its busiest week three weeks ago since its opening in May, "with record takings." Sam Hart, of Fino, Barrafino and Quo Vadis, on the other hand, calls the improvement "fragile."

Nonetheless, this is a far cry from the angst that characterized the fine dining world a year ago. When people start to eat well, you know that things are turning for the better.

The Frieze Art Fair is drawing the right kind of people this year, even if the art market is showing little more than hope (and even that's debatable). Roman Abramovich - billionaire, Francis Bacon fan - has been seen scoping out the merchandise. Gwyneth Paltrow is at the show, too. Both were at the VIP preview (separately), and David Ganek made an appearance as well. Ganek is a hedge fund manager and art collector, and his wife, Danielle wrote a god-awful novel about the art business in Manhattan.

The Frieze Art Fair runs through October 18 and occupies 70,000 square feet in Regent's Park. In attendance are 165 gallery owners from 30 countries, all eager to take advantage of collectors excited to be at Europe's largest art fair. But, they have their work cut out for them. Auction sales are down between 70 percent and 80 percent from last year, and that's usually a pretty good sign of how the art market as a whole is doing.

There is some action at Frieze this year. Artist Jim Hodges has an exhibition at the Pompidou Center in Paris that's captured the attention of a museum. Stefan Edlis, Jean Pigozzi and David Roberts - all prominent collectors - have been seen at the fair. Art dealer Marianne Boesky moved 13 paintings from a new series of 15 watercolors by Barnaby Furnas that depict the capture and execution of John Brown, the Civil War abolitionist. Prices ranged from $25,000 to $30,000.

After the dismal situation at Frieze in 2008, there's a collective desire for this year to be better. While wishing for an art market recovery probably won't make a difference, the sentiment itself is comforting.

More real estate news from Nicolas Cage. Various sources have reported that the real estate loving action star is selling his £5 million home on the edge of Bath, England. This Is Bath says that Cage will be in Bath on November 26 to switch on the city's Christmas lights but will be putting the 18th century Midford Castle on the market. The article says that Cage still plans to be in the area on a regular basis. The castle is a Grade One-listed building and has seven bedrooms. He brought the property, which includes two cottages, a ruined chapel and 58 acres of land.

The castle was built by card player Henry Disney Roebuck in the late 1700s. Legend has it that the castle's unique three-sided footprint was designed to match the ace of clubs. It was in serious disrepair when Michael and Isabel Briggs bought it in 1961 for just £15,000 and spent 45 years restoring the home.

Damien Hirst is again playing the role of philanthropist (so I have to be nice), along with Raqib Shaw and Marc Quinn. The artists have donated paintings to an auction that London jeweler Laurence Graff is holding for FACET (For Africa's Children Every Time). Graff wants to raise $1.26 million for the organization, which seeks to support the education, health and quality of life of children in Africa ... where Graff Diamonds picks up most of its raw material.

Graff's event follows several other charity auctions this year, all of which were pretty impressive in their results. Sotheby's raised ₤453,950 for two organizations that help orphans in Africa, and Christie's raised an astounding €342.5 million at its Yves Saint Laurent collection auction back in February – the money will be used to fund HIV research and fight the spread of AIDS.

The first lot donated was by Graff himself: diamond earrings estimated to be worth around ₤80,000. The other paintings (e.g., by Hirst) are pegged at around ₤100,000 each.

Sotheby's, Christie's and Phillips de Pury have released their estimates for the October auctions, and late summer signs of confidence have disappeared. Contemporary art forecasts for next month's auctions are down 81 percent from October 2008 – which was the first series of auctions conducted following the financial crisis.

The three auction houses expect to rake in around $33 million during London's Frieze Art Fair, according to Bloomberg News. Last year's low-end estimate (not accounting for currency fluctuations) was five times greater than this year's low-ball number. And, last year, the houses were offering minimum price guarantees to sellers, a practice that has since been suspended.

Frustrating the situation for auction houses further is the fact that many collectors are turning to private sales rather than auctions, as they hope to retain a greater degree of control over the outcome of the transaction. If the buyer doesn't agree to a sufficiently high price, the seller at least walks away with his piece.

The coming of the Frieze Art Fair includes contemporary art auctions by Christie's and Sotheby's which will be held on the same day. The former will send 25 lots under the gavel on October 16, 2009, with a low estimate of ₤6.8 million. This is a profound drop from 2008's 47 lots (six guaranteed) and a low estimate of ₤57.8 million. The only promising sign earlier this year was an increase in sold rates, with Christie's moving 88 percent of its lots in June and Sotheby's selling 92.5 percent.

At today's Phillips de Pury & Co. auction, Now: Art of the 21st century, handbag designer (and possibly former artist) Damien Hirst is back on the scene with a major auction house. A year ago, he divested his collection of his own work, ostensibly sensing that the market for him was about to crash (which, in fact, it did). Phillips de Pury isn't making any big bets today with Hirst, though. For now, it has two lithographs of Hirst's famous(ly expensive) skull up for sale. For the Love of God, Laugh; The Diamond Skull is listed at £10,000 - £15,000.

Peter Fuss, on the other hand, seems to have nailed it. His piece, For the Laugh of God,, shown above, is also up for grabs. It's a knockoff skull, listed for a little more than half the price of the lithos (£6,000 - £8,000), but the title conveys the spirit. Created when Hirst was peddling the original skull for the princely sum of £50 million ($100 million at the time), For the Laugh of God was originally offered for £100, as a way to help Britain reclaim this "treasure."

The blog "Modelator," which covers Polish art, observed in June 2007, "Our British friends, we are coming to rescue you! Like the cheap Polish labour well known to you, Polish artist Peter Fuss wishes to relieve the British nation from such a great expense." This was in response to Guardian journalist Jonathan Jones, who declared, "We must buy the diamond skull for Britain."

While Hirst's skull cost a fortune even in materials, For the Laugh of God consists of close to 9,900 pieces of glass made to look like diamonds and entailed an investment of £250 and 18 hours. Now, it's up for more than 40 times that amount, while Hirst is reduced to selling posters.

The author behind the children's book The Sheep-Pig which later became the movie "Babe" starring the adorable talking pig, had some great inspiration. The author, Dick King-Smith, now in his 80s, grew up on Boyd Farm in England's Golden Valley during the 1920s. The home is a six-bedroom converted millhouse and the 10-acre property includes three barns. The Boyd river runs next to the farmhouse and wildlife including herons, otters and deer abound. It's English countryside charm at its best right down to the listing picture which shows two plump hens along a shady path. This home is listed at £2.25 million.

[via Homes and Property UK]

Selling at the top of a bubble is fantastic ... if you can pull it off. You look, feel and live like an absolute genius. Former art dealer Anthony d'Offay did this, unloading 725 postwar and contemporary pieces before the art market collapsed, dragged down by a global financial crisis. Timing is everything, and the collection purchased for a mere £26.5 million was valued at an astounding £125 million. Included were Jeff Koons' "Winter Bears," an Andy Warhol hamburger (evidently more expensive than those at Burger Joint) and an Anselm Kiefer palm tree.

D'Offay didn't make a dime.

Rather than sell the collection at a profit of close to £100 million, he sold them to the United Kingdom at cost: £26.5 million. Instead of taking the money, d'Offay chose to be paid with strings ... namely those attached to the deal. The condition of his sale was that the country had to send the artwork on tour throughout the UK, making it easy for people under age 18 to access the art.

D'Offay explains that financial constraints on British museums – which are free and thus have no money with which to acquire new pieces – are great for the people, but not for keeping the walls full with fresh material. On the list for the future is a special room for Damien Hirst's "Pharmacy" installation and has already purchased Hirst's "Painkillers" piece (pill cabinet) for $877,000. In a deal with Hirst, he also picked up work by Koons, and Hirst's new "Necromancer." Hirst was d'Offay's gallery assistant as he was finishing college.

D'Offay's talent, he says, is buying art, rather than curating or creating. He became inspired as a child in northern England when viewing a collection of Francis Bacon (shocking, right? Bacon connection comes back again ...).

The time to grow is when the market is suffering. This must be in the back of the mind of art market guru Larry Gagosian, who has been involved with such heavy-hitter artists as Damien Hirst and Richard Prince. While there are small signs of a recovery, much is still uncertain. However, this hasn't stopped Gagosian from making a bold move: opening a branch of the Gagosian Gallery in Paris.

Bloomberg News reports that Gagosian is in talks to pick up space in the 8th arrondissement, near la rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore. Nobody from the Gagosian camp has commented so far.

There are plenty of deep-pocketed art collectors in Paris, including Francois and Bernard Arnault, and the French market hasn't suffered as severely as those in London and New York. That said, Paris is the smallest of the western troika, but with a presence in the two largest markets already, the French capital was the next logical step.

Waring Hopkins, director of modern art specialist Hopkins-Custot – which is located in what is likely to become Gagosian's back yard – observed to Bloomberg, "Gagosian would instantly become one of the most important dealers in Paris," and that setting up shop in Paris "would be good for Gagosian and it would be good for the city."

The market itself is only part of what makes the expansion shrewd. Gagosian can use the space in Paris to show works from contemporary artists represented by competing galleries in New York and London.

The Hackney Council of Stoke Newington, England just made a big mistake: it painted over a mural featuring a spoof image of the Royal Family by graffiti artist Banksy. The owner of the building on which the mural was painted, Sofie Attrill, agreed to have the mural painted so it could be used on the cover of the band Blur's 2003 single Crazy Beat. And for six years, it sat there, attracting plenty of attention.

When she saw the Banksy artwork partially covered in black paint, however, Attrill was moved to tears – a feeling ostensibly made worse by the fact that the workers were smiling as they covered the (once) priceless creation. Working with a crowd that had gathered, Attrill was able to get the painters to stop before they covered the mural completely.

The Hackney Council claimed to have had permission because it sent letters to Attrill and received no reply. Then, it sent an enforcement notice and again heard nothing. Unfortunately, they sent them to an address she used 25 years ago.

At first, the Hackney Council offered no apology. When it realized its error, though, it began to talk to Attrill about ways to resolve the situation.

[Photo of the Stoke Newington mural unavailable]

When times are tough, you don't spend when you don't have to. There's sufficient graffiti in London to keep art collectors entertained, which is causing them to shy away from works by Banksy. Larger auction houses have cut down on the Banksy works they are carrying, and some of the regional auction houses are canceling their urban art specialist sales.

It's hard to tell if Banksy is disappointed. The artist, who was born in Bristol (west England) keeps his (her?) identity a secret. So, if you see some weirdo crying in a corner over the next few weeks at a pub in Bristol (or, maybe, London), ask if it's Banksy. It could be cooler than finding Waldo.

Prices for pieces by Banksy have plunged this year, with failure rates on the rise. Auction houses are now sufficiently nervous to hedge their bets, carrying little (or no) inventory by the artist and canceling auctions that may not deliver.

In general, contemporary art auction selling points are down 30 percent to 50 percent – about as much as your 401(k). The top houses – Christie's, Sotheby's, Bonhams and Phillips de Pury – didn't carrying any of Banksy's work in their June or early July auctions. This year, 76 Banksy paintings and prints have come under the gavel, with 30 of them (almost half) not selling. The highest price reached was $230,500 at a New York Sotheby's event. Last year, the top price for a Banksy piece was $1.9 million at Sotheby's RED charity auction in February.

Looking for that elusive part for your vintage Bentley or Rolls-Royce? Your chance to find it may be coming up as the Bentley factory warehouse in Crewe, England, is opening its doors to the public for a unique event. The factory produced both Bentley and Rolls-Royce motorcars between 1955 and 2002 when the two stoic British premium auto marques went their own separate ways, and ever since, Bentley's been stocking parts for both brands. But with the new Grand Bentley on its way next month, they're cleaning house to make space for a whole new set of parts. Everything from engine blocks to indicator lights are for sale, according to Bentley, at the event in late September, so if you're an owner, enthusiast or trader, better book your ticket now.