Sandcastles, donkeys, piers and sticks of rock. Beach huts, paddle steamers, promenade shelters and ice cream cones. Our modern seaside is the sum of its parts and all those parts have their history. This book explores the best-loved features of our favourite holiday destinations, each object and building adding its own layer to the story of our shared seaside heritage. Using a mixture of historic images and modern photographs the book takes a roughly chronological journey through the things that have made our seaside distinctive. The places where we have chosen to take our holidays for the past three hundred years have been transformed from mere stretches of coastline but they are not like inland towns. Inside these pages can be found a celebration of all that makes our seaside special.
In this revealing look at the history of assassinations, Kenneth Baker examines over a hundred political and religious murders or attempted murders, ranging from Julius Caesar to President Kennedy to Osama bin Laden. Assassins hope to change the world, but rarely succeed: Baker concludes that the assassination of Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in June 1914 was the only one that changed the history of the world. Other assassinations, whether of monarchs, politicians, dissidents, clerics, journalists or others at best give only a glancing blow at history. The author concludes that, in Macbeth’s words, an assassination ‘is a poisoned chalice.’ Kenneth Baker also reveals that since 1945 there have been fewer individual assassins working alone; now assassinations are more likely to be carried out by political and religious terrorists, or by the security services of certain states to eliminate dissidents. Not only Russia and Israel, but the USA, the UK and others have resorted to targeted killings when they consider their security is under threat. On Assassinations shows how we have moved from the era of individual assassinations, through to terror groups’ murders and now onto state-sponsored targeted killings
The four charismatic women who led the Royal College of Art's School of Fashion for nearly seventy years, helped establish a global reputation for British design excellence in ready-to-wear clothing.
An amusing but authoritative account of the establishment of a garden, nature reserve and environmental education centre on theSuffolk Essex border.
One family. Three generations. A wartime secret connects them all. It is 1917, and Private Daniel Dawkins fights at Messines Ridge and Passchendaele. He writes home to his true love, Joyce, but reveals little of his extreme bravery, his kindness, his loyalty to his comrades, and the horrors they experience on the Western Front. It is 1920, and Captain Peter Harding is tasked with a secret mission to assist in the selection of a body. Dug up from the battlefields of Flanders, it's to be buried in Westminster Abbey as the "Unknown Warrior." The events that take place on the expedition will haunt Peter for the rest of his life. Nearly a century later, in 2011, Sarah Harding discovers Daniel's letters and Peter's diaries. Together with historian James Marchant, she pieces together the hidden truth behind the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior and must decide what to do with it. Values are challenged and characters are tested in this gripping novel that asks: What would happen if the identity of the Unknown Soldier was discovered? And should the secret ever be revealed?
'Look Where We're Going' is written by someone who has been at the centre of British government and international affairs for half a century, it looks afresh at the ideas, hopes, lessons and largely unintended consequences of successive generations of political leaders; it shows us how to 'Look Where We're Going'. Based on deep personal experience, the author is one of the few left who served in Margaret Thatcher's first Cabinet of just over forty years ago. Howell gives us a new picture of the dramas deep inside government and how yesterday's clashes of ideology and personality have led to today's unanticipated turmoil. Old assumptions are torn apart and accepted versions of what occurred are unravelled. Howell shows how technology has made much of our conventional political vocabulary obsolete, how we now need quite different types of leadership serving new priorities and how, while we wrestle with the issues just before our eyes, much bigger forces are at work which are re-shaping our lives and our future.
A British doctor's experiences and reflections on independent, post-colonial India over 50 years and the nation's continuing influence on contemporary British life and culture.
In Sculpting the Land, award-winning landscape architect Diana Armstrong Bell explores her unique interpretation of the possibilities of landscape design. Influenced by the work of the Russian avant-garde artists Kazimir Malevich and El Lissitzky, Bell's distinctive approach to contemporary design is primarily informed by the abstract. Known for distinctive, innovative designs that are site-specific and sensitive to context, Bell has designed and built projects all over the world, and in Sculpting the Land she reveals the process and inspiration behind her work. Drawn to earthworks, lines, and patterns, Bell gathers clues about a landscape's past and lets them inform a new story in her work. Sculpting the Land explores many of Bell's large-scale public landscapes in the urban realm, which are sculptural in their conception and modern in style, including Parco Franco Verga in Milan, Proche du Lac de Carré Sénart in France, Rochester Riverside Park in Kent, and Electra Park in London. With more than 150 color illustrations--including landscape plans, schemes, and hand-drawn pencil, ink, collage, and watercolor pieces--the book showcases a remarkable collection of art which is used to convey Bell's design process and present her ideas.
Gift book celebrating the British Isles maritime history. A history uniquely written in narrative verse. Begins Pre 1066 up to Present Day. Includes The Spanish Armada, The Battle of Trafalgar and D-Day.
London and its landmarks as you've never seen them before. Inspired by the author's father's experience of Parkinson's, exploring a different way of viewing the world, channelling the Surrealist art movement.
Based on the exhibition Red Image Tour held at the Pingyao International Photography Festival in September 2012.
A new edition of the retrospective of the celebrated potter's most significant writings, including new images from the family archive. Bernard Leach was as renowned in Japan and the East as in Europe and North America as an artist-craftsman and as a thinker. Known in the ceramic world as the father of British studio pottery, his interpretation of Asian traditions in ceramics and his unique philosophy of life were a lodestar for many potters in the West. Throughout his career, his techniques explored the interplay between Eastern and Western art. Beyond East and West, first published in 1978, is a retrospective of more than ninety years of Bernard Leach's long, illustrious life. Featuring some of Leach's most significant writings and full of amusing, sharply-etched recollections, the essays have been placed in chronological order and annotated by the author for more coherence. The recurrent theme of the meeting of East and West is apparent at all levels--artistic, cultural, social, and political--of Leach's life and writings. This new edition of a classic text, accompanied by new images from the Leach family archive, gives readers an intimate look at the life of one of the world's most widely known and respected potters.
Old Buildings and new ones tell their stories of colourful lives that have made up the character of a well-loved urban quarter.
Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and its charity CW+ have been pioneers in the Arts and Health field for over 25 years.
Anna Coatalen (nee Hook) was born in Bristol, studied at the Byam Shaw School of Art in London, and then worked as a book illustrator before WWII. It was as a WRNS in Plymouth that she met her Anglo-French husband Herve, an RNVR engineer officer, which resulted in her spending many years in France. Anna painted prolifically throughout her life, continuing right up to her death aged ninety-five, but never sought to publicise her work. Amongst friends who appreciated and admired her were the artists Mary Fedden and Alexander Goudie, whose son, Lachlan, has written a very perceptive introduction to this book. Her daughter Annik has gathered together a selection of the most compelling of Anna's huge output, ranging from early woodcuts and paintings to the three stained glass windows in Ile Tudy church in SW Brittany. They are presented here as a tribute to her life and to permit a wider audience to appreciate her skill --
Hunger focuses on the role of food, or the lack of it, in the First World War. Diary quotes, historical accounts, and notes from the author's own re-enactment in the field combine for a gripping and at times harrowing read.
A Passion for Fashion provides an amusinglook at some of the clothes, underclothes, shoes and accessories worn by manyof the more colourful characters in Blenheim Palace’s 300-year history, as wellas a cautionary look at the role that arsenic, lead, mercury and mousetrapsplayed in the fashions of the day.Adult and children’s fashions fromthe 18th and 19th centuries are examined, as well ascontemporary style from renowned designers including Christina Stambolian,Stephen Jones, Christian Louboutin and most recently of all, Dolce &Gabbana. Blenheim Palace’s on-goingrelationship with the House of Dior, is celebrated with a look at the earlycatwalk shows of the 1950s, and the launch of Dior’s Cruise collection, whichtook place at Blenheim in May 2016.The Palace is renowned for manythings, but one of its leading claims to fame is that it is the birth place ofa certain Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill – twice prime minister of GreatBritain and accomplished writer, artist, sometime bricklayer and arguably, infashion terms, the inventor of the ubiquitous and ever popular ‘Onesie’! A Passion for Fashion brings 300 years of Blenheimstyle to life.
This short book by historian and journalist Beckles Willson is in memory to the Canadians who fought during the Great War around Hooge, near Ypres at the Battle of Mont Sorrel in 1916. The Battle of Mount Sorrel lasted for almost two weeks and cost the Canadians over 8,000 casualties. Having lost the first two phases of the battle, the Canadians achieved victory in the final operation. Careful planning and concentrated artillery bombardments had begun to tip the balance on the First World War battlefields in favour of attackers over entrenched defenders.
For Valour: The Complete History of the Victoria Cross is the first definitive reference detailing every winner of the Victoria Cross, the highest award in the British military honor system, awarded for gallantry in the face of the enemy. This book is the fourth of eight volumes to be published in association with the Victoria Cross Trust. Each volume is divided into two parts. Part one, "Wars, Battles & Deeds," contains descriptions of each war and battle or engagement that involved deeds resulting in the awarding of a Victoria Cross. The deeds are described within the context of the war and battle during which they occurred. Part two, "Portraits of Valour," presents a biography of each recipient of the Victoria Cross. In this offering, Volume Four covers the Colonial Wars from 1896-7. This volume also includes a foreword by Lord Ashcroft, who owns the largest collection of Victoria Crosses, and are part of a limited edition print run numbered 1 to 500.
An outstanding collection of historic photographs of the people of Monemvasia, illustrating the social bonds and institutions, which hold a society together within a unique physical and historic environment.
History has not been kind to Charles Richard John Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough, or "Sunny," as he was known. This is because, as Michael Waterhouse and Karen Wiseman reveal, it was largely written by his first wife, the "dollar princess" Consuelo Vanderbilt. Not an easy man, their marriage was indeed an unhappy one. However, he was not entirely to blame for the unhappiness of his marriage to Consuelo; in fact, it would be fair to say that he was sinned against more than sinned. His second wife, Gladys Deacon, proved far too unstable to be the love and companion of his life. Though he needed love, he never found a woman who loved him enough. In The Churchill Who Saved Blenheim, Waterhouse and Wiseman give us the life of a man who lived through a time of great change and felt the responsibility of preserving his home, Blenheim Palace, and the way of life he knew. He was a quiet, well-educated, introverted man who took his role as head of a great estate most seriously. He cared for his tenants and his servants. To those he loved, he was loyal, generous, unfailingly helpful, and courteous, and when necessary, he was also that rare and valuable thing: a critical friend. He left Blenheim in a far better state than he found it. This was his greatest achievement. And this is his story.
The invasion of Normandy was the most significant victory of the Allies in the Second World War. By 1944, over 2 million troops from over 12 countries were in Britain in preparation for the invasion. These forces consisted primarily of American, British and Canadian troops but also included Australian, Belgian, Czech, Dutch, French, Greek, New Zealand, Norwegian, Rhodesian and Polish naval, air or ground support. The operation was codenamed "Overlord" which saw the largest invasion fleet ever assembled, before or since, landing 156,000 Allied troops on five beach-heads on D-Day 6 June 1944. These forces established a foothold on the shores of Northern France, and broke out into the French interior to begin a headlong advance. D-Day was originally set for June 5 but had to be postponed for 24 hours because of bad weather. The forecast was so bad that the German commander in Normandy, Erwin Rommel, went home to give his wife a pair of shoes on her birthday. He was in Germany when the news came.British factories increased production and in the first half of 1944 approximately 9 million tonnes of supplies and equipment crossed the Atlantic from North America to Britain. Bagpiper, Bill Millin struck up ‘Hieland Laddie’ as soon as he jumped into the shallows and then walked up and down the beach playing the pipes. German prisoners later admitted that they had not attempted to shoot him because they thought he had lost his mind.The British infantryman was paid £3 15s a month, the Americans got £12.A naval bombardment from seven battleships, 18 cruisers, and 43 destroyers began at 5am and went on until 6.25am.On the night of the invasion only around 15% of paratroopers landed in the right place.New gadgets designed for D-Day included a “swimming tank” and a flame throwing tank called “the crocodile”. There were even collapsible motorbikes. The morning after D-day the police raided a brothel, which French women had set up in a wrecked landing craft.1,900 Allied bombers attacked German lines before the invasion began. Seven million pounds of bombs were dropped that day. A total of 10,521 combat aircraft flew a total of 15,000 sorties on D-Day. All this and much more is uncovered in a range of informative and detailed events spanning this most significant event in military history; biographies, fun facts, myth busters and illustrated throughout with infographics and contemporary photographs.
Peter Humfrey's in-depth analysis of the Stafford Gallery, based on original research, shows how during the quarter century of its existence (1806-1830), it represented the greatest art collection in Regency London.
Bryan Robertson (1925-2002) was the greatest director the Tate Gallery never had.
Soldier and Dramatist tells the story of LCpl Harold Chapin, a US born actor, author and playwright who volunteered for the British Army in 1914. Originally and posthumously published in 1917, A truly poignant and imaginative read, from letters written for his wife and child
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