International SPRING 2022
SPRING AWAKENING Where to hear the sounds of the new season
A sea of light: Turner in Italy PAGE 26
Stately trips: grandees’ favourites PAGE 38
Where to stay and play PAGE 46
Country Life International
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AST summer’s opening of Hauser & Wirth Menorca, on the historic Isla del Rey, helped to turn this Balearic island, a UNESCO biosphere reserve, into one of the hottest places to be seen in the Mediterranean. The art hub, which features an outdoor sculpture trail by the ruins of a 6th-century basilica, attracts the kind of fashionable crowd more commonly found on Mallorca or Ibiza, drawn by Menorca’s reputation for sustainability, which had already won the island fans looking for ‘green’ destinations. The local food culture is also attracting attention, with Menorca celebrating its status as a European Region of Gastronomy 2022. According to Engel & Völkers, the property market has seen a corresponding lift. Agents are reporting increased demand for private estates in good locations, which offer extraordinary value when compared with neighbouring islands: ‘Clients still have the opportunity to take advantage of the comparatively low prices,’ reports Engel & Völkers’ Gary Hobson.
Flying solo
Bright lights, big cities
HE pandemic continues to affect the way people travel, but business is booming for private jets, particularly in America: last year saw the number of private-jet flights across the US reach levels unseen since 2007. ‘The industry is 5% to 10% larger than it was pre-pandemic,’ says Travis Kuhn, vice-president of market intelligence at Argus International. Private air-charter expert Victor, which saw 139% yearon-year growth in new bookers for its on-demand service, adds that its customers want to avoid crowds, cut travel times and increase flexibility. Co-CEO Toby Edwards says: ‘Disrupted travel experiences put the benefits of flying privately into focus.’
ONTRARY to various reports announcing the demise of city living, recent analysis has found property markets in prime city locations to be in excellent health. Knight Frank’s latest Wealth Report recorded average price growth of 8.4% for prime residential locations in cities worldwide last year, with Dubai (above) leading the way: the emirate’s swift handling of the pandemic earned it an increase of 44%. Moscow came in second place—although this may change—followed by San Diego and Miami in the US. Savills are also confident this trend will continue: ‘28 out of 30 prime residential cities are set for growth in 2022,’ comments Paul Tostevin, head of the company’s World Research. ‘Cities such as Miami, Dubai and Lisbon have benefited from the flexibility of remote working. Together with a return to offices, education and travel will deliver growth to all major cities.’
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Alamy; Getty; Courtesy Heidi Horten Collection; Rolex/Carlo Borlenghi
Treasure island
Visitors to Vienna this spring are in for a treat as one of Europe’s finest private art collections—the Heidi Horten Collection—opens in its permanent new home in the city’s Hanuschhof building. Mrs Horton, now 81, first put her pieces on show at Vienna’s Leopold Museum in 2018, where they created the most popular exhibition in the museum’s history; this prompted her to make the artwork available to view on a more permanent basis. The collection features several hundred pieces, ranging from early Modernism to the present day, including many by Klimt, Picasso, Chagall and Gerhard Richter. Visit www.hortencollection.com
News
Virtual realty M
ARK ZUCKERBERG’S announcement last October that Facebook was rebranding as Meta sparked a rise in interest in the metaverse, a simulated digital environment. This has been backed by some serious investment and, now, these virtual worlds are no longer the preserve of teen gaming and pop concerts: earlier this year, MetaMetric Solutions, a company that tracks digital property prices, announced that real-estate sales in the metaverse topped $500 million in 2021. Knight Frank’s latest Wealth Report explains that virtual property works in very much the same way as bricks and mortar: ‘Location is key,’ notes Hong Kong entrepreneur Yat Siu. ‘Places that have a higher influence have higher value.’ Some parcels of land in popular worlds have sold for the equivalent of millions of dollars (transactions are in cryptocurrencies) and metaverse company Republic Realm, whose virtual superyacht The Metaflower went for $650,000 last year, sold 90 of its 100 Fantasy Islands private-island development in a single day. Originally listed for $15,000, some of these islands are now offered for resale at more than $100,000. According to Janine Yorio, CEO of Republic Realm: ‘There are big risks [in the metaverse], but potentially big rewards.’
Bonjour, Notre-Dame A
NEW exhibition at the Espace Grande Arche in Paris allows visitors to experience Notre-Dame Cathedral as never before. Curated in partnership with the Diocèse de Paris, Eternal Notre-Dame uses thousands of high-resolution images of the medieval cathedral to render a 3D ‘guided tour’ of the building as it was before the devastating fire of 2019. Through their headsets, visitors can discover the historical events, key protagonists and some of the well-kept secrets that pepper the cathedral’s 860-year history. The conservation and restoration of Notre-Dame is estimated to cost in the region of €1 billion and 30% of the ticket price will be donated to the work (www.eternellenotredame.com).
Screen star
A Regularly attracting fleets representing 20 or more countries and attended by a glamorous and competitive crowd of both amateurs and professionals in all sizes of yacht, the Rolex Giraglia is one of the hottest tickets in the sailing calendar. This year, the 69th edition kicks off on June 10 with the SanremoSaint Tropez race (www.rolexgiraglia.com)
N architectural journey lies behind El Fureidis, a Roman-esque villa with Persian-style gardens in Montecito, California, US, for sale at $39.995 million (£30.33m). In the early 20th century, property magnate James Waldron Gillespie took architect Bertram Goodhue on a year-long trip through Europe and the Middle East to seek inspiration. Einstein, Churchill and John F. Kennedy stayed at the villa and it appeard as Tony Montana’s home in Scarface. Riskin Partners Estate Group (001 805 565 8600; www.montecito-realestate.com). March 30, 2022 | Country Life | 19
Country Life International
Under the Italian sun Mary Miers considers how the country that fascinated J. M. W. Turner from youth shaped his artistic vision
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With a dagger in his umbrella, he made six Italian journeys Turner had first come to Venice in 1819, four years after the defeat of Napoleon, who captured the city in 1797 and plundered its treasures. Now under Austrian rule, the once glittering port had succumbed to picturesque decay, but its faded glories seduced the English Romantics, which revived the fortunes of gondoliers, silk merchants and glass-makers. On that first visit, Turner recorded the crumbling palazzi of the Grand Canal, the civic architecture around St Mark’s Square, with its four golden horses recently returned from Paris, and the crowded spectacle of the Ascension Day festivities. He sought out the great Venetian colourists, whose works he already admired, and discovered Tintoretto, the great exponent of Venetian chiaroscuro. Ever the businessman, Turner recognised the commercial potential of building on the success of Canaletto, whose celebrated views 26 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Above: Giudecca, La Donna della Salute and San Giorgio. Facing page: Venice today of Venice were in many British Grand Tour collections. Surprisingly, however, it wasn’t until he returned from a visit in 1833 that he embarked on his first great Venetian oil painting, a commission by the Manchester textile magnate Henry McConnel. This scene of the Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore acknowledged Canaletto’s topographical approach, but the Venice that Turner would make his own was less distinct and more poetic: melting vistas infused with the literary imaginings of Byron and Shakespeare. Between 1834 and 1846, he would exhibit only 25 oil paintings of the city, yet these luminous works, together with his virtuoso watercolours, shaped the romantic image of Venice. They were also a formative influence on the next generation of artists, notably John Ruskin, who thought Approach to Venice (1844) ‘the most perfectly beautiful piece of colour of all I have seen produced by human hands, by any means, or at any period’. Fascinated by the culture of Italy, Turner had long dreamt of a visit, but the 1792–1815 wars prevented Continental travel. At home, he was able to study many of the Old Masters in British collections and was particularly indebted in his own work to the 17th-century Rome-based landscape painter Claude Lorrain. Even before he became familiar with the antiquities and intense light of Italy first
hand, Turner’s work absorbed Claude’s compositional devices and classical ideal. His first, brief visit to Italy was in 1802, when the Treaty of Amiens ushered in a shortlived peace. Seizing the opportunity to cross the Channel, Turner spent time in Paris sketching in the Louvre, before venturing through the Swiss Alps as far as Aosta. It would be 17 years before he was able to return. For his 1819–20 tour, he set out armed with a packed itinerary from James Hakewill, with whom he was collaborating on A Picturesque Tour of Italy (1820). His sketchbooks reveal a zig-zag route that took in Turin, Milan, Verona, Padua, Bologna and Naples, as well as Venice and Rome, and returned via Florence. ‘Don’t go the Ferrara road to Venice, tis very bad,’ advised Hakewill. ‘On no account trust yourself in a felucca, but hire horses and guides to Spezia.’ Eustace’s A Classical Tour through Italy provided a good source of sites to record; he was inclined to scribble opinions on subjects ranging from wine to ox carts in the margins of his guidebooks. Travelling with a dagger hidden in his umbrella handle, Turner made six Italian journeys and braved numerous dangers, from the near sinking of his packet boat and the threat of bandits to two coach crashes in Alpine storms. He was indefatigable, ‘endlessly popping his head out of the window
Bridgeman Images; Alamy
NE evening, while I was enjoying a cigar in a gondola, I saw Turner in another one sketching San Giorgio, brilliantly lit up by the setting sun. I felt quite ashamed of myself idling away my time whilst he was hard at work so late,’ recalled the painter William Callow. It was late August 1840, when Turner was 65 and still working tirelessly to fill his sketchbooks with the pencil and watercolour studies that were always the absorbing objective of his travels. Indeed, the artist found himself re-energised by this two-week sojourn. In addition to his impressionistic renderings of well-known prospects, he sketched the markets, bragozzi (fishing boats) and buildings, including Santa Lucia (later lost to the railway station), explored poorer quarters such as Dorsoduro and roamed the canals by night. More than 100 sheets of watercolours from this last of his three visits convey the significance of Venice to his later work. He made daring experiments with brushwork, colour washes and white paint to capture the atmospheric effects of sun and moonlight, storm clouds and shadows on the floating city.
The clear, vivid light of Rome and its ancient mythology inspired Turner, whose views of Edinburgh evoked the Roman Forum itself
to sketch whatever strikes his fancy’, and would later adopt the snowstorms and other meteorological dramas as a powerful—and politically symbolic—theme. Despite all his adventures, Turner never mastered the language. ‘Dov’é la Academia di belli Arte/Where is the Academy?’ he had to remind himself in a sketchbook. Yet Italy had a transformative effect on his palette and use of watercolour and provided him with a vast repository of material for his paintings. It also influenced his range of subject matter and changed his perception of the British landscape. As James Hamilton has observed in Turner & Italy, a series of watercolours, published as engravings in the 1820s, depicted ‘Lancaster shining under a Mediterranean sun, the sun setting over the Roman campagna that was in fact Richmond and Twickenham, Minehead, the very image of the Bay of Naples, Hythe in Kent in a Claudian setting, and Edinburgh from Calton Hill, set out like an intact Roman Forum’. If Venice in decline was a source of poetic inspiration, Rome the modern city built on ancient ruins, prompted Turner to meditate on history and empire. On his first visit in October 1819, his focus was the Vatican and its sculpture, St Peter’s, the Forum and panoramas viewed from the various hills. Back home in 1820, he painted Rome from the Vatican, in time for the RA summer exhibition. 28 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Rome, €2.65 million (£2.27m) Set in a 17th-century building, this threebedroom apartment has striking coffered ceilings. Christie’s International Real Estate (00 39 0 6 321 8355)
Richly layered, it paid tribute to Raphael in the 300th anniversary year of his death and revealed Turner’s mastery of perspective. In Rome again in 1828, Turner re-engaged with a circle of British artists, sculptors, poets, scientists and aristocrats and took a studio. Here he painted Palestrina-Composition, real Italy reimagined as a Claudean fantasy, as a pair for a work by the master himself in Lord Egremont’s collection at Petworth. Turner’s largest body of works inspired by Rome dates from the 1830s—views of the ancient and modern city and the Roman campagna interwoven with history and mythology. In 1839, he exhibited several of these
Venice, €4 million (£3.358m)
The essence of Venice is distilled in this three-bedroom apartment, where windows frame views of the Grand Canal. Knight Frank (020–7861 1057)
alongside The Fighting Temeraire, emphasising a unifying preoccupation with liberty and the decline of empire. The culmination of this epic theme came in 1850, with paintings that returned to his favourite myth of Dido and Aeneas. In The Departure of the Fleet, Aeneas sets off from Carthage to found Rome against a backdrop of glowing light. Frail and ill, Turner must have struggled to complete these four large canvases, yet Italy sustained him. As Kenneth Clark wrote, ‘when he…began to re-create his impressions in his studio, the memories of Italy were like fumes of wine in the mind and the landscape seemed to swim before his eyes in a sea of light’.
Country Life International
The sound of spring Carla Passino follows chirruping birds, croaking frogs and rushing waterfalls to enjoy the new season across Europe
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S the days get longer and a tapestry of trembling new leaves and fragile blooms clothes meadows, trees and bushes, Nature’s orchestra begins to play with gusto. There are many places in Europe where you can hear the world reawakening, but here are seven European favourites.
Best for the all-day chorus Extremadura, Spain Each spring, dulcet trilling, warbling crescendos, melancholic singing and every sound in between fill the plains and crags of Extremadura, one of Europe’s birdwatching hotspots. ‘The combination of birdsong with the glory of wildflowers is like stepping back in time to springtime as it used to be across western Europe,’ says Martin Kelsey, who, with his wife, Claudia, and their son, Patrick, runs Birding Extremadura (www.birding extremadura.com). The region, he explains, has an astonishing variety of landscapes, each of which has its own spring soundscape. ‘Rural gardens, orchards and woods flow with the rich sound of nightingales; bee-eaters give their short, rolling flight calls. The plains erupt with larksong, especially that of the robust Calandra lark, singing without a pause in the sky high above, capturing in perfect mimicry the sound of other birds. ‘Around villages, you hear the cheerful and conversational chatter of redrumped swallows and the zany whistles of spotless starlings. White storks clack their bills like castanets in greeting and, in the evening, above the town square and along the narrow streets, swifts scream in tight, manic flocks.’ 30 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Live locally Madroñera, €1.1 million (£916,000) This charming property stands in olivestudded countryside rich with partridges, turtle doves and ducks in the town of Madroñera, close to the birdwatching paradise of the Monfragüe Natural Park. The atmospheric main house has five bedrooms and a profusion of exposed beams and stone walls, plus lovely grounds and a swimming pool. Engel & Völkers (00 34 91 277 4500; www.engelvoelkers.com)
Live locally Pistoia, €17 million (£14m) This neo-Classical house is about 1½ hour’s drive from the Dardagna waterfalls and boasts 35 bedrooms, frescos, vaulted ceilings and gardens. Sotheby’s International Realty (www.sothebys realty.com; 00 39 055 075 1888)
Best for roaring waterfalls
Lizzano in Belvedere, Emilia-Romagna, Italy A river’s sound is meant to be a susurration, a mere whisper, but no one informed the Dardagna, which hurls itself down the rocks with a mighty din near the sanctuary of Madonna dell’Acero, where story has it that the Virgin appeared to two young shepherds by an ancient sycamore. Fringed by soaring trees on either side, the river breaks against scattered boulders and tumbles down into pools bordered by marsh marigolds. In spring, when water volume often trebles, the waterfalls (plural—there are three main ones and seven altogether) are a thundering tribute to the force of Nature. In the longest, most tumultuous drop, the Dardagna jumps more than 98ft (www.cornoallescale.net). March 30, 2022 | Country Life | 31
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National Park of the Casentino Forests, Monte Falterona and Campigna, Italy For a place where silence supposedly rules, the National Park of the Casentino Forests, Monte Falterona and Campigna is bursting with sound (www.parco forestecasentinesi.it/en). Chirping, croaking, burbling and the mighty roar of a waterfall that inspired one of the world’s greatest poets fill the air. Even the monastery at Camaldoli, where signs invite people to ‘share the silence’, rings with bells and psalms. At the dawn of the first millennium, Saint Romuald, a Benedictine monk who devoted his life to founding monasteries, arrived at the forest and built a Sacred Hermitage, with a monastery later. More than 1,000 years on, monks are still there, their lives punctuated by Mass and prayers in the Baroque church that, despite its remoteness, houses works by Giorgio Vasari and Andrea della Robbia. Two centuries after St Romuald, another saint made his way to this corner of the Apennine mountains: in 1224, St Francis spent 40 days in prayer on Mount Verna, where Catholic doctrine says he received the stigmata 32 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
and communed with singing birds. A miracle of another kind has since allowed the forest to remain untouched by modernity and birdsong is still its most distinctive sound in spring. The chiselling and drumming of black woodpeckers, the trill of the chaffinch and the call of the song thrush are the opening salvo of a concert that, later in the season, adds the sweet warble of the common whitethroat, the fierce call of the tree pipit and the powerful melodies of the nightingale. Many birds congregate early in the morning around streams gurgling with mountain water, especially in the area around the Camaldoli monastery or near the hamlets of Rimbocchi and Siregiolo. Vying with the birds for attention are frogs and toads, which can be heard croaking by the small lakes of Traversari and Metaleto, and wherever there’s still water—the WetLife Amphibia conservation project has turned old troughs and even the monastery’s former fishery into havens for amphibians, including the small and mighty Apennine yellow-bellied toad. But the park’s most famous sound is undoubtedly the Acquacheta waterfall. Sometimes frozen in winter, it wakes up in spring with a deafening roar, as water jumps 210ft down a sandstone cliff. It prompted Dante Alighieri, who in
1302 spent some time in the nearby village of San Benedetto in Alpe, to compare it to the infernal river Phlegethon in a tercet filled with words that evoke the sound of rushing water (sadly, a little lost in translation): ‘Thus downward from a craggy steep we found/That this dark wave resounded, roaring loud/So that the ear its clamour soon had stunn’d.’
The ceiling of the Sacred Eremo Monastery of Camaldoli in the Foreste Casentinesi National Park
Live locally Poppi, €1.85 million (£1.5m) Bordering both the Arno river and the National Park of the Casentino Forests, Monte Falterona and Campigna, this estate has a three-bedroom villa and two guest houses featuring wooden beams, terracotta floors and underfloor heating. Outside, the grounds include landscaped gardens with swimming pool, a pergola, a fountain and even a pizza oven. Christie’s International Real Estate (00 39 57 578 8948; www.christiesrealestate.com)
Getty; Alamy
Best all rounder
Country Life International
Best for booming drums Seville, Spain Spring is not only defined by the sounds of Nature. In parts of Italy and across Spain, music marks the Holy Week celebrations in a triumph of brass, drum and religious chanting. This is particularly true in Seville’s Semana Santa, in which nazarenos, members of the city’s Catholic brotherhoods—their feet often bare, their heads shrouded in capirotes: pointy hoods intended to hide the penitents’ identity—accompany processions of ancient, candlelit floats featuring Jesus or Mary (www.semana-santa.org/en). Held on the shoulders of the costaleros, the floats are followed by musical bands—drums and cornets only for Christ, big band for the Virgin. The brotherhoods, the oldest of which was founded in 1340, march in silence, so the sombre boom of the drums and the mournful tunes of the cornets, trumpets and tubas that come after them is all the more striking, with brighter melodies borrowed from the Gitano repertoire sometimes adding an unexpected twist. Every now and again, a sorrowful chant—a saeta—will cut across each procession like the arrow after which it is named. Singing a cappella from a balcony as the floats pass below it, saeteros take their inspiration from the Passion of Jesus, chanting His suffering to the haunting notes of flamenco. The joyful bell ringing on Easter Sunday ends the proceedings, celebrating the Resurrection —but also, implicitly, the return of spring. Live locally Seville, €7 million (£5.8m) Views alone are a reason to buy this house, which looks out towards the gardens of the Reales Alcazares, but it also happens to be situated in the Calle San Fernando, on the route of one of the Holy Week processions. Built around a glazed courtyard, it has lavish reception rooms, eight bedrooms, a private garden and a roof terrace with swimming pool. Sotheby’s International Realty (00 34 9 5421 6100) 34 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Best for buzzing bees Corsica, France In spring, Corsica comes alive with the buzzing of a very special insect. ‘The Corsican black bee is an ecotype of the black bee that was once prevalent in Europe,’ explains Denis Casalta of beekeepers Le Jardin des Abeilles in Ocana, near the regional capital of Ajaccio (www.lejardindesabeilles.com). ‘It is by far the most aggressive, hardworking bee in Europe.’ It’s also a protected species, so much that in Corsica, says M. Casalta, it is forbidden to import other bees. ‘It is one of the pillars of the Protected Designation of Origin Miel de Corse/Mele di Corsica AOP.’ As well as spotting passing bees in the local countryside, fans of the humble pollinator can (safely) view a working hive (and hear its roaring buzz) at Le Jardin des Abeilles, which has an educational trail that ends with a tasting of the six varieties of Corsican honey—two of which capture the aromas of the Mediterranean maquis in spring—and an opportunity to try Apa Nera, a beer made with the bitter, strong-flavoured honey that’s harvested from November.
Live locally Ajaccio, €2.45 million (£2.04m) This five-bedroom villa in Ajaccio is a short drive away from Le Jardin des Abeilles, but buyers can expect more than bees—perched on a lofty spot above the coastline, it takes in far-reaching views of the sea. The best places to soak up the panorama are the terrace and the infinity pool. Sotheby’s International Realty (00 33 7 8958 7608; www.sothebysrealty.com)
Country Life International
Best for amphibians
Centre-Val de Loire region, France Come March, croaking, chirping and even whistling spurt from French ponds and marshes in a spring symphony that, although not as melodic as Vivaldi’s, is no less sonorous. France is Europe’s second-richest country for amphibian species and even has an annual campaign to support them and their habitats: from March to the end of May, the Fédération des Conservatoires d’Espaces Naturels, an association of 29 conservation groups that looks after the country’s nature reserves, holds Opération Fréquence Grenouille, a series of almost 500 events that encourages people to discover wetland wildlife (www.facebook.com/operation.frequence. grenouille). Among the highlights of the programme is a nighttime walk in the Hauts-de-France region’s Saint-Landelin wood, a 101-acre nature reserve near Créspin, to take in the chants and ‘wedding parades’ of the breeding season (April 20; 00 33 3 2289 6396 to book). But the Grenouille calendar is especially packed in the Centre-Val de Loire region, where initiatives include an evening to discover the secret life of the amphibians of the Lailly-en-Val marsh, serenaded by the loud calls of the European tree frog (April 23, 00 33 6 1577 4435); a tour of the Mousseuse marshes at La Ferté-Vidame taking in both the amphibians and the horses that share this habitat (April 30, 00 33 6 2281 2784) and a twilight walk in the Val de Loire nature reserve serenaded by the croaking of the natterjack toad (May 20, 00 33 3 8660 7825). Beyond Grenouille, the entire region is peppered with water meadows and wetlands to explore—not least Le Méandre de Guilly, a nature reserve on the Loire, home to six different amphibian species, including crested newts, as well as herons and beavers. Live locally Chartres, €6 million (£5m) Set in grounds full of ancient trees near Chartres, this 18thcentury château has it all: sumptuous reception rooms, 26 bedrooms, an orangery, converted stables, a dovecote, a spa, a chapel,and a heated swimming pool with a waterfall. Mayfair International Realty’s associate Groupe Mercure (00 33 1 4705 5137; www.mayfairinternationalrealty.com) 36 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Best for baa-ing lambs
Co Galway, Ireland Little is more adorable than the bleating of a tiny lamb, so tender yet rich, with a natural vibrato that would spark envy in the most accomplished of singers. There’s no better place to hear it than Co Galway on Ireland’s west coast, which has more than 422,000 sheep (the third largest number in Ireland after Co Mayo and Co Donegal and almost twice as many as the local human population). The trail along the Killary Fjord, at the westernmost end of the county, is particularly generous with views of fluffy lambs frolicking in the fields and baa-ing against the backdrop of the sea. For a close-up encounter, Killary Sheep Farm (www.killarysheepfarm. com), in Bunowen, welcomes visitors, who can not only spot the lambs tottering in the fields, but also watch sheepdog demonstrations. ‘What I like most about spring is the sounds of new life—young-born lambs calling
for their mums,’ says owner Tom Nee. ‘It’s just a lovely time of year.’ Live locally Oughterard, €650,000 (£541,000) Set close to the charming village of Oughterard, Riverwalk House is a great springboard to enjoy Co Galway (it’s currently used as a guest house). The ground floor has an elegant sitting room with fine fireplace and a large conservatory opening onto the pretty gardens and terrace, which is ideal for alfresco dining. Upstairs are nine bedrooms. Savills (00 353 1 663 4307; www.savills.com)
Country Life International
Peer review Two lords and one lady share their most enjoyable experiences abroad with Eleanor Doughty
Lord Monson on Kenya
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N the King’s Road in the 1970s, there lived a lion cub called Christian, who had been bought from Harrods by a chap called John Rendall and his friend Anthony “Ace” Bourke. He lived in their furniture shop in Chelsea and Rendall drove him around in an open-top car. Rendall and Ace had decided that, for him to have a good life, he ought to be taken back to Kenya and rehabilitated into the wild by George and Joy Adamson of Born Free. I went there in the 1980s and tried to find him. ‘I flew up to the reserve, near the Somali border. It was quite dangerous—the Somalis had attempted to kill George. We went to find Christian, George and I, in a Land Rover and, 38 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
suddenly, he stopped the car. On a huge rock was a lioness, holding her head in a very noble way, looking at us disdainfully. George knew this lioness, Greta, and pulled out a bit of rotting camel meat. The smell was so awful I almost fell out of the car. George flung the meat and, in one bound, Greta was 10ft away. I thought: this is it. George hit the ground with a stick and she snatched the camel meat and left me alone. And that’s how George Adamson saved my life. We never did find Christian. ‘On the same trip, I was on a pedalo on Lake Naivasha in Nakuru County with my future wife. There were flamingos everywhere and it was so pretty—lovely colonial houses. It’s an idyll. But then, the pedalo stopped moving, stuck in weeds. We were alone, so I thought I’d jump in and sort it out. Suddenly, the head of a hippopotamus popped up. I thought: ‘Just
smile and carry on doing what you’re doing.’ Somehow, I knew it had no hostile intent. Slowly, I pushed myself back on to the pedalo. ‘If you’re going to Kenya, you should do a bit of the coast and a safari in the Masai Mara. The wonderful Kenyan people have been really hurt by the fall in tourism. Who knows for how long these kind of experiences will be available?’ Nicholas, 12th Baron Monson campaigns for the right of women to inherit titles and the reclassification of skunk as a Class A drug Live locally Kenya, KES430,000,000 (£2.87m) Perfect for flamingo-spotting, this lake-side property has a five-bedroom house, plus six more homes, a pool, squash court and gym and, across the road, farmland and staff accommodation. Knight Frank (00 25 479 142 2092)
Around the world
Lord Ted Innes Ker on France and Corfu
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HEN I was at university, I went on a road trip with three of my friends— one of the best I’ve ever been on. I had just taken delivery of a rather smart two-door BMW 3 Series and I decided that the best course of action was to do a massive road trip in Europe with three friends—all of us well over 6ft tall, in what is quite a small car. A friend of ours was having a 21st birthday in a villa outside St Tropez, so we drove down there through France. I started in Aberdeen and picked my friends up on the way. We headed to Dover, spent a night in a Travelodge, then drove through France the next day, having races with Ferraris and motorbikes and other BMWs—it was so much fun. ‘We spent a week in St Tropez having a brilliant time, then drove to Venice to get a ferry to Corfu. That was a 14-hour journey. We didn’t get a cabin on the ferry, so ended up roaming the halls of the boat, drinking an extraordinary cocktail of very strange drinks, one of which was called Unicum Zwack, an eastern European herbal liquor. It was the most uncompromisingly horrible thing I had ever—and still have ever—drunk. We ended up in Corfu at a friend’s house, where we spent a very fun week, before we planned to get a ferry back to Venice. On the
day we were supposed to leave, we realised we had missed the boat—literally—and ended up getting a ferry later that day to Ancona. We drove from Italy up to Rheims that night, before driving back to the UK. We went into the Champagne region, which was very beautiful, but we spent most of our time in France bombing down the motorway and didn’t stop much. Rheims was beautiful, especially the cathedral.’ Ted Innes Ker is the founder of Reiver Travel, a sporting and adventure travel company (www.reivertravel.com)
Live locally St Tropez, €6.825 million (£5.73m) This Provençal mas in St Tropez, which has five bedrooms, combines traditional charm with a delightful garden (complete with pool), easy access to the La Moutte beach and long views across the surrounding vineyards. Savills (00 33 4 9482 7278) March 30, 2022 | Country Life | 39
The Duchess of Rutland on Switzerland
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E have an apartment in Les Diablerets, in Switzerland, so our favourite memories of holidays in Europe are always skiing. I used to take the children [the Ladies Violet, Alice and Eliza Manners, the Marquis of Granby and Lord Hugo Manners] skiing every year over Christmas and, because there’s a lot of us and they brought lots of friends, I was known as the old woman who lived in a shoe—she had so many children she didn’t know what to do. There was a supermarket down the road and I would go and do the big shop and push the trolley back. Luckily, the resort only had one nightclub, so the children all cut their teeth there—it was a world away from Belvoir. 40 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Les Diablerets is on the other side of the mountain from Villars-sur-Ollon, in the west Swiss Vaud Alps, about an hour from Lausanne. The train went straight to the door, so we didn’t need a car. David [the Duke of Rutland] doesn’t ski, but I spent years going up and down a mountain with the children and now they’re all much better than me. Having been a chalet girl in a village on the other side of Verbier many years ago, I love mountain holidays. I learned about Les Diablerets when I was a chalet girl—I used to spend all my days off there. It’s an amazing little village trapped in time, so charming, with a glacier. It’s competitively priced and a great place to experience the Alps. Sometimes you can get too hung up on the big resorts—you can have amazing family holidays in the smaller ones.’ The Duchess of Rutland is the chatelaine of Belvoir Castle, Leicestershire (www. belvoircastle.com)
Live locally Les Diablerets, CHF 2.35 million (£1.93m) Built in 2019, combining mountain vernacular with an exacting attention to detail, this magnificent chalet enjoys spectacular views across the village and the surrounding peaks. It is split into two apartments, so one can be let out if required. Cardis Immobilier Sotheby’s International Realty (00 41 79 300 4101)
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Country Life International
Country Life International
Glass half full
Swap your lukewarm party pitcher for one of these Continental aperitifs, says Emma Hughes
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HISPER it: not everyone loves Pimm’s. Everything that goes hand-in-hand with it, absolutely, but the drink itself? Some of us tolerate this sugary suspension of fruit salad in the same way we do soggy sandwiches and picnic chairs that trap your fingers: it’s simply one of the prices of admission for English socialising. But, given the choice, we probably wouldn’t choose to kick things off with a cup of portable wasp-magnet. The good news is that—whether you dislike Pimm’s or you enjoy it, but would sometimes like to try something different—you do have a choice. A huge one, in fact: cast your gaze towards Europe and a whole new world of party-starters opens up. Aperitivi or apéritifs, depending on whether you’re in Italy or France—from the Latin aperire, meaning to open—are designed to prepare the palate, as well as to set the mood. Aperol, the vibrant orange blend of gentian and rhubarb that launched 1,000 spritzes, needs no introduction. Here are five slightly less well known, but no less delicious, alternatives.
Campari A ruby-red Italian icon, Campari was invented in 1860 by Gaspare Campari. The exact recipe remains a closely guarded secret, but the blend of numerous herbs, spices, barks and peels contains woody cascarilla and is thought to include the citrus chinotto. It’s delicious served simply with soda and is sometimes sold ready mixed in dinky, red, picnic-friendly glass bottles; look for it in Italian delis. Drink it at home… In a Negroni (with Tanqueray and Martini Rosso) at Quo Vadis 42 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
in Soho, which has one of London’s bestappointed cocktail menus, including a strong selection of Campari-based ones, if you’d like to start your evening with a hint of bitterness (quovadissoho.co.uk). …and abroad The prices might be eyewatering, but, if you’re in Milan, you should definitely set aside time for a drink at Camparino in Galleria (above). Opened by the son of Campari’s inventor in 1915, it’s an olive’s throw from the Duomo and boasts grandly ornate wooden interiors in the downstairs Bar di Passo (www.camparino.com) Live locally Milan, €3.3 million (£2.79m) Arranged across the top two floors of a 1960s building, the vast five-bedroom apartment takes in long views of the city’s skyline, particularly from the 1,615sq ft rooftop terrace. Luxury Portfolio International’s associate Giorgio Viganò (00 39 02 763 6151; www.luxuryportfolio.com)
Dubonnet
No list of pre-dinner drinks would be complete without Dubonnet, a blend of fortified wine, herbs and spices that includes a touch of quinine. Invented in Paris in 1846 by the French chemist Sir Joseph Dubonnet to mask the taste of the anti-malarials taken by French soldiers in North Africa, it was originally made on the site of the Palais Garnier in the 9th arrondissement. On this side of the Channel, it’s long been a favourite in royal circles. Both The Queen and the late Queen Mother have been described as enjoying it—and, last year, Dubonnet finally attained a Royal Warrant. Drink it at home… With two parts Dubonnet to one part gin, over ice with a slice of lemon, as per the reported royal preference. To commemorate The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, Cornish spirits maker
Aperitifs
Lillet Blanc
This citrussy, quintessentially French aperitif—a blend of white wine and liqueurs, distinguished from vermouth by the absence of wormwood—comes in a bottle straight out of a ToulouseLautrec painting, but with a global ingredients list: Spanish and Moroccan sweet oranges and bitter green orange peel from Haiti all feature. Lillet was the late-19th-century brainchild of two brothers, the Lillets, who worked as wine and spirit merchants in Bordeaux. Today, there are several Lillets: Blanc is sweeter and contains less quinine than the others. Drink it at home… The Vesper Martini, James Bond’s drink of choice, is described in Casino Royale (1953) as containing ‘three measures of Gordon’s, one of vodka [and] half a measure of Kina Lillet [Lillet Blanc’s predecessor, which was heavier on quinine and sugar than the modern version]’. Order one at the legendary Dukes Bar in Mayfair (www.dukeshotel.com) …and abroad In Bordeaux, of course, at La Brasserie Bordelaise, which has all the Gallic charm you could wish for, plus an extremely well-stocked vaulted cellar (www.brasserie-bordelaise.fr) Mainbrace has launched a Cornish Dry Gin with lemon verbena harvested from St Michael’s Mount—and it would fit the bill perfectly (£34.99; www.mainbracerum.com)
Alamy
…and abroad Parisians still remember the famous ‘Dubo, Dubon, Dubonnet’ posters that were ubiquitous all over the city and the Métro from the 1930s. The incomparably glamorous Ritz Paris’s Bar Hemingway on the Place Vendôme is the place to drink it (www. ritzparis.com) Live locally Paris, €2.55 million (£2.16m) It hardly gets more Parisian than an apartment available in a Haussmann building close to the Champ de Mars: the windows frame perfect views of the Eiffel Tower from all the street-facing rooms and the living room is the ideal place to soak up the panorama, aperitif in hand, of course. Knight Frank (020–3504 0730; www.knightfrank.co.uk)
Live locally Bordeaux, €980,000 (£829,000) Situated in a stone building at the beginning of the Quai des Chartrons, the elegant twobedroom apartment has many charming period features and a balcony overlooking the Garonne river. Mayfair International Realty’s associate Groupe Mercure (00 33 61 292 2534; www.groupe-mercure.fr)
Vermouth When they’re drunk neat, we tend to associate fortified wines with afterdinner digestifs. But although it’s an essential component of everything from martinis to Manhattans, vermouth also makes a wonderful sharpener without adornment, which is how it’s often drunk in Portugal, Spain, Italy and France. Enjoy it with ice and a slice of orange or the old-fashioned way with some sparkling water on the side. Drink it at home… Andrew Edmunds, a mainstay of bohemian Soho since
1986, serves an English spiced vermouth over ice as you peruse the menu (www. andrewedmunds.com). …and abroad Vermouth bars are big news in Barcelona. Locals’ favourite La Vermuteria del Tano has been around for what feels like forever; it still has barrels on the walls and its original marble counters. Pair your vermouth with crisps and conservas: top-notch tinned fish. Live locally Barcelona, €1.18 million (£1.5m) The two-bedroom apartment in Barcelona’s picturesque Barrio Gótico combines period features—not least the magnificent coffered ceiling in the living room—with a private garden. Savills’ associate Lucas Fox (00 34 933 562 989; www.savills.com)
Select Think spritzes are all about Aperol? Think again. Select, which was created in Venice in 1920 by Fratelli Pilla & C, lends itself to mixing with none of the sweetness of its more famous Day-Glo cousin. Don’t be fooled by its raspberry-pink hue: this is a herbaceous, near-savoury tipple with notes of juniper berries that give it a unique, almost resinous character. Drink it at home… In a Venetian Spritz with Prosecco, soda and olive at Celentano’s in Glasgow, a buzzy modern Italian in Cathedral House (www.celentanosglasgow.com). …and abroad Where else but Venice? Osteria Acquastanca on Murano makes a fine spot for a seafood lunch kicked off with Select Spritzes (www. acquastanca.it). Live locally Venice, €1.38 million (£1.17m) Laid out across two floors of a 14th-century building in Cannaregio, the duplex apartment is rich in charm, with a Gothic three-mullioned window in the living room, a marble staircase and a balcony overlooking the canal. Mayfair International Realty’s associate Edelweiss.Re (00 39 047 183 0316; www.mayfair internationalrealty.com) March 30, 2022 | Country Life | 43
Country Life International
Home in one
From golf to boating, a Mediterranean property is a perfect base to have fun, believes Toby Keel
Switzerland, price on application New Zealanders are always keen to point out how they can go surfing in the morning and skiing in the afternoon, yet (despite being land-locked) the Swiss could give them a run for their money. You may not be able to surf on Lake Lugano, but you could certainly spend the afternoon on the water after a morning’s skiing, enjoying one of Europe’s most beautiful settings. The slopes around the water aren’t the biggest in the Alps, but they’re still good skiing and, for year-round appeal and a chic atmosphere, Lugano is hard to beat. This magnificent villa in the slopes above the town itself offers almost 5,000sq ft of living space, but the views are the real selling point—that, and proximity to Lugano itself, with its wonderful restaurants, galleries and evening spots. Luxury Portfolio International’s associate Wetag Consulting (00 41 91 601 0450; www.luxuryportfolio.com) 46 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Toby Keel
France, from €800,000 (£667,300) It’s dawn in the Loire Valley. The morning mist rises off the lake, next to a perfectly manicured green. The sun rises behind the distant trees, as a swan paddles lazily here and there. Listen carefully and you hear the thwack of a ball, as a different type of early bird tees off. At these moments, Les Bordes feels like a particularly special place. What was once a private golf club with a fearsome reputation (its original course is among the hardest in the world) has been reimagined under new owners RoundShield Partners as a family-friendly ‘playground’. Newly built are the wonderful New Course and a nine-hole short course that’s probably the most fun pitch-and-putt in the world. There is an inland beach, a petting zoo, go-karts and riding, too. The houses are designed by Michaelis Boyd of Soho House fame, with interiors by Morpheus & Co and Six Senses amenities. Les Bordes (00 33 25 487 7213; www.lesbordes.com)
Stay and play Italy, price on application Visitors to Italy—and locals, too—have long debated which is the prettiest spot on the country’s western shores. Is it Portofino, with giddy hills sloping down towards the pocket-sized harbour? Or one of the polished gems of the Amalfi Coast? For many, the answer is Capri, a favourite of the great and the good for more than a half a century. In this property, it’s not hard to see the island’s appeal. There are two villas and a third house on the three-acre plot, with 15 bedrooms, almost 12,000 sq ft of living space and a pool carved into the rock. The best bit? The two villas are connected by their own funicular railway. Sotheby’s International Realty (00 39 067 925 8888; www.sothebysrealty.com) Spain, price on application It’s been 60 years since the first residential community was established at Sotogrande, a few miles along the coast from Gibraltar and a favourite of the jet-set from the first. There are beaches, pools, restaurants, riding, mountain biking and sailing at the famous Sotogrande Yacht Club and two of the finest golf courses on the Continent: Valderrama and Sotogrande, both of which have staged many big tournaments. Places to live on the estate range from small apartments to huge villas, but at the very top of the residential tree are seven new houses—dubbed The Seven—each designed by architects with international reputations. The Jensen (left) was created by Norwegian architects Jensen & Skodvin and offers a three-acre plot with a house of some 17,000 sq ft, plus a further 11,194 sq ft of terrace space, from which the views are nothing short of breathtaking. Sotogrande Estate (00 34 856 560 922; www.sotogrande.com)
Monaco, €25.5 million (£19.5m) The Casino, the harbour, the Formula 1 circus... nothing spells decadence like life in Monaco, the tiny principality in its own niche on the French Riviera. This apartment is in the Parc Saint Roman development, towards the city’s northern tip, set in gardens with an outdoor pool. It’s quieter than near the harbour, but the famed Monte Carlo Country Club and Larvotto beach are on the doorstep and each of the three bedrooms has its own terrace. There are even two parking spaces, so you can bring the Ferrari and the Aston Martin. Christie’s International Real Estate (00 377 9797 7929)
Greece, €4.9 million (£4.09m) Corfu’s distinctive combination of history and geography have made it a fascinating spot. The south of the island, with its huge beaches, is a favourite with holidaymakers and the old town is a Venetian-Greek hybrid with tales around every corner. On the north-eastern coast, the villas that hug the vertiginous slopes seem to defy the laws of physics, being ‘set like a dice on a rock already venerable with the scars of wind and water’, in the words of Lawrence Durrell, who lived in this area in the 1930s. Nature is all around and keeping a boat moored at the nearest jetty is all part of the appeal. Savills (00 30 210 699 6311; www.savills.com) March 30, 2022 | Country Life | 47
Country Life International
At home in the world British artist Aimee del Valle reveals why she loves French village life
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E didn’t choose our first home in France. We found it, almost by chance, after a roundabout route through many countries. I had always enjoyed taking in new cultures, the beauty of different landscapes, their scents and, because I was a freelancer, I’d work for six months or so, save up, then travel. During one of those trips, I met the man who would become my husband. After I got pregnant, we had to decide where to make our family happen and stood in front of a map, our fingers hovering over many countries. After spells in Georgia, US—in an apartment surrounded by horses and mice—Guatemala, where my husband is from, and the Netherlands, we moved to France, via England. We left our eldest child with my parents—by then, I was expecting our second baby—and went house-hunting, only to find that, as foreigners with no bank account and freelance careers, it was almost impossible to rent a house.
Village life is special. There’s an unspoken pact to help each other After 10 days traipsing up and down France, I was exhausted. We tried one more time at an estate agent’s in yet another village, when a lady scribbled a note and passed it to the agent who was talking to us. It turned out she had a house to rent and had a good feeling about us. When she said we could rent her house, we said: ‘Yay!’ and immediately added: ‘By the way, where are we?’ It was a tiny village in the Île-de-France and people were unbelievably welcoming. When I had my second child, they even offered to help pick up my older one from school so I could stay home with the baby. I found myself stopping passersby in the street and 48 | Country Life | March 30, 2022
Aimee del Valle’s life of travel and dance influences her art, including Dance Friends
constantly asking questions—simple things, such as ‘How do I get a paediatrician?’— and realised how much people enjoy helping others. Although we have now moved elsewhere, to a big farmhouse half an hour from Lille, I made very good friends in our first French home, with whom I keep in touch. I think, globally, the French have a different reputation from what they deserve. Village life in France is special. There’s almost an unspoken pact to help each other. I don’t think people are particularly more or less friendly than in the UK, but there is a little bit more of a sense of community in France, perhaps because villages are more isolated or because almost all the children go to one school, so you quickly get to know everyone. It helps that villages have their own pharmacists, farmers’ markets, cafés and, in our case, even a florist. There’s a little booklet listing nearby services, and I would definitely look within my village first—you tend to support local producers. The market culture is strong, which is great, not least because it reduces food miles. France in general has a lot I like—I love that I can travel and see the countryside, go skiing or go to the beach without having to cross borders. Unbelievably, the one thing I don’t much enjoy is the food. It can be a little too rich—you can’t have it all the time. In the UK, where there isn’t such a marked cuisine, you can get food from everywhere. In France, in many cities, you only get French food and, after a while, you want something else.
If I had to pick what I appreciate the most about living here, it’s the people—I feel especially comfortable with them. That’s not to say I haven’t felt comfortable elsewhere, but I feel more at home here. Although we live in one of the least sunny, wettest parts of France, I like to think I’m here to stay: I love my house and would like my children’s friends to be their friends for life. That said, my husband and I both have itchy feet and if he were to say ‘let’s move to Italy’, I’d find it hard to say no. Travelling and living abroad has inspired my artwork. I may not be copying anything directly, but the different architecture, the different lights, the cultural diversity all find their way into my pieces and make me more open-minded as an artist. My background in dance is also an influence and I always enjoy painting people. At the moment, I’m broadening into digital art with non-fungible tokens (digital files that have an encrypted contract and a certificate of authenticity). The platform allows me to play a bit more with my art. Above all, through travelling, I’ve learnt that there is no perfect place to live—and you shouldn’t be desperate for one. There are things I love and things I miss from every country I’ve been in. If I could piece together everything I love from every place, it would be paradisiacal, but I’ve really learned to appreciate what each country can offer me. A former dancer, Aimee del Valle is an artist who lives in northern France and specialises in watercolours (www.aimeedelvalle.com)
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