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Yesterday was my last day at work! :) Worth some celebration I reckon as I have taken a year off work to do some travelling. As we speak, I will be heading off to the airport for South America trip soon. Shall see you in April and please take good care in the meantime.
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About
The Dining Room of Napoleon III Apartment, Louvre Palace (Musée du Louvre), Paris, France
The Shot
3 exposure shots (+2..0..-2 EV) in RAW taken handheld
Camera :: Canon 5D Mark II
Lens :: Canon 15mm F/2.8 Fisheye
Photomatix
- Tonemapped generated HDR using detail enhancer option
Photoshop
- Added 2 layer mask effect of 'curves' for selective contrast
- Added 2 layer mask effect of 'saturation' (reds & yellows) for desaturating and darkening
- Added 1 layer mask effect of 'saturation' (greens & magentas) to remove chromatic aberrations
- Used 'free transform' (distort) to slightly correct fisheye distortion
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Finally, on this brief tour of the Royal Yacht Britannia, here’s the State Dining Room, where Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, on behalf of the United Kingdom, would formally entertain presidents, prime ministers, heads of state, government ministers and VIPs.
The room is 13m in length and 9m wide, and as many as 96 guests could be seated for a meal. Indeed, they still can: today, this room is available for private hire, with individually tailored menus and butler service plus live music ranging from a harp and flute to the full-on Band of His Majesty’s Royal Marines!
The house has been open during December and decorated in some of the rooms to show a Victorian Christmas.
On our diningtable, Pink Dutch Tulips
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
Falcon Eyes SKK-2150D flash set
Jinbei Diffusion jumbo umbrella and Westcott Silver umbrella.
IMG_7215ddp
Whit out cone and just a sock she's finally able to clean herself properly. And that's important for a little cat.
Mettersi a tavola è un modo di far ordine, di arginare il caos, di dedicare alla nostra carne, fragile, peritura e destinata a corrompersi, l'attenzione e il rispetto che essa – in alcuni momenti «gloriosa», come dice la fede – merita.
Claudio Magris
In Explore (Dec 20, 2014)
On our diningtable, "Pink Peony"
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
I used the Elinchrom Golden umbrella to create a warm atmosphere and even more the accent on the flower.
Falcon Eyes SKK-2150D flash set with Elinchrom Gold umbrella.
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75/100
Taken at The Regency, Laguna Woods, Orange County,
California. © 2017 All Rights Reserved.
My images are not to be used, copied, edited, or blogged without my explicit permission.
Please!! NO Glittery Awards or Large Graphics...Buddy Icons are OK. Thank You!
Many thanks for every kind comment, fave, your words of encouragement, and the inspiration of your fine photography,
my friends! You make my day every day!
On our diningtable, "Anemone"
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
I used the Elinchrom Golden umbrella to create a warm atmosphere and even more the accent on the flower.
Falcon Eyes SKK-2150D flash set with Elinchrom Gold umbrella.
IMG_7565ddp
On our diningtable, another "Orange Gerbera"
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
FalconEyes SKK-2150D flash set
Falcon Eyes Silver/Gold umbrella, Westcott Silver umbrella.
IMG_6968ddp
Her friends are all gone for the summer. I guess it's just her and that teen idol.
~Nelonie A. Crelencia ©2009
| lancelonie photography © All Rights Reserved. DO NOT COPY. |
*EXPLORED*
We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch - we are going back from whence we came.
John F. Kennedy
On our diningtable, "Orange Gerbera"
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
FalconEyes SKK-2150D flash set
Falcon Eyes Silver/Gold umbrella, Westcott Silver umbrella.
IMG_6961ddp
"beauty on the diningtable", Anemone
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
Falcon Eyes SKK-2150D flash set with Elinchrom Gold umbrella
IMG_8242ddp
The Dining Table at Chatsworth, laid for a Christmas feast.
The "mischievous mice" from the children's story are helping themselves to the cheese in the comment below.
The beautiful pewter tableware in the Dining room at The Habitation.
The Port-Royal National Historic Site is a National Historic Site of Canada located on the north bank of the Annapolis Basin in the community of Port Royal,Nova Scotia. This National Historic Site is the location of the Habitation at Port-Royal.
The Habitation at Port-Royal was established by France in 1605 and was that nation's first successful settlement in North America. Port-Royal served as the capital of Acadia until its destruction by British military forces in 1613. France relocated the settlement and capital 8 km (5.0 mi) upstream and to the south bank of the Annapolis River; the site of the present-day town of Annapolis Royal.
Some crochet doilies I made myself and some vintage finds I was forced to buy. (-: read the full story here :-)
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Today we are in Lettice’s chic, dining room, which stands adjunct to her equally stylish drawing room. She has decorated it in a restrained Art Deco style with a smattering of antique pieces. It is also a place where she has showcased some prized pieces from the Portman Gallery in Soho including paintings, her silver drinks set and her beloved statue of the ‘Modern Woman’ who presides over the proceedings from the sideboard.
Lettice is hosting a luncheon for her future sister-in-law Arabella Tyrwhitt who will soon marry her eldest brother Leslie. As Arabella has no sisters, and her mother is too unwell at present to travel up to London from Wiltshire, Lettice has taken it upon herself to help Arabella shop and select a suitable trousseau. So, she has brought her to London to stay in Cavendish Mews, rather than opening up the Tyrwhitt’s Georgian townhouse in Curzon Street for a week, so from there she can take Arabella shopping in all the best shops in the West End, and take her to her old childhood chum and best friend Gerald Bruton’s couturier in Grosvenor Street for her wedding dress. Lettice has invited a few of her friends from her Embassy Club coterie whom Arabella met there the other night. Lettice has asked her best girlfriend, the recently married Margot Channon and one of her other dear friends Minnie Palmerston. As both ladies are married, Lettice is hoping they may be able to shed some light on what life is like as a married woman with Arabella whilst also sharing in an afternoon of delicious food and delightful gossip.
“Oh Gerald will make you the most wonderful wedding dress, Bella,” Margot enthuses to Arabella. “Believe me! He made me the most stylish gown for my wedding last year. You’ll be the talk of the Wiltshire downs.”
“I think your mother is a wonderful sport letting Lettice help you pick your wedding gown, Bella.” exclaims Minnie. “My mother wouldn’t let me choose so much as a button without her say so, and my wedding dress wasn’t anywhere near as modern and fashionable as I would have liked. It wasn’t even made by the couturier I wanted! I had to settle for old fashioned Lucille*.”
“Well,” Arabella says a little awkwardly. “My mother, err, she isn’t all that well at present, you see.”
“So,” Lettice quickly pitches in to avoid Arabella any awkward explanations. “I’m doing Lady Tyrwhitt the biggest favour whilst she is indisposed, by hosting Bella here in my flat and taking her shopping.” Arabella smiles in relief at her future sister-in-law who sits to her right at the head of the table. “I mean, what’s the point in opening up their London townhouse for just a few days when Bella is welcome here at any time?”
“And where everything is so lovely and welcoming.” Arabella says gratefully.
“Hhmm… that’s most sensible, Lettice.” Minnie says.
“And this way, I can take Bella to places like the Embassy Club whilst she’s up here, as well as take her frock shopping.” Lettice giggles with a wink at Bella. “I can show here what she’s missing being stuck in dull old Wiltshire.”
“Oh, it’s not as dull as all that, Tice,” Arabella remarks, her face flushing with mild embarrassment as she feels so unworldly in comparison to Lettice and her smart London friends. “After all, we have cattle shows, garden parties and…”
“Cattle shows!” baulks Margot, her left hand pressing over her mouth in horror, her diamond engagement ring glinting under the light of the dining room. “How beastly! I do hope that there aren’t any cattle shows I have to go on Cornwall! I should dislike that intensely.”
“I agree!” nods Minnie, her green glass chandelier earrings bobbing about as they dangle from her lobes.
“You both grew up in London, so of course a cattle show is beastly to you two,” Lettice replies. “But Bella and I both grew up in the country, so we are used to life there. Cattle shows are part of county social life.”
“If I had to go and look at beastly… well beasts, in order to meet eligible men,” Minnie says with an air of distaste as she wrinkles her nose. “I think I’d rather stay single.”
“Good job the closest thing you’ve come to the countryside is Hyde Park on a summer’s day then isn’t it, Minnie?” retorts Lettice with a playful smile.
“I quite enjoy the county social round,” Arabella admits with a shy smile. “And whilst I’m so grateful for you taking me to nightspots around London, Tice, I don’t think I’ll ever be a nightclub kind of girl.”
“Poor darling,” Lettice teases her good naturedly as she speaks out to her other friends at the table. “She doesn’t know yet how deliciously addictive nightclubs can be.”
“We’ll fix that,” giggles Margot, reaching out a hand across the table, past the central floral arrangement of lightly fragrant white roses in a glass bowl and enveloping Arabella’s smaller hand with her own. “Don’t you worry about that Lettice.”
Picking up her thoughts on life in Wiltshire, Bella adds, “Wiltshire isn’t quite the ends of the earth socially. Don’t forget, we do have balls and parties to go to there, like your mother’s glittering Hunt Ball.”
“Yes,” titters Minnie. “Where Lettice met that dishy Selwyn Spencely!”
Margot joins in with Minnie’s girlish peals.
“Oh do stop you two!” Lettice says with a playful wave of her hand. “I’ve only had to opportunity to have luncheon with him once thus far since the ball.”
“But you are planning to see him again, aren’t you Tice?” asks Arabella.
“Of course she is,” teases Margot with a wag of her bejewelled finger. “You can see it written all over her face!”
“Lettice!” Minnie cries, pointing her her elegant finger at her friend across the table. “You’re holding out on us. You’ve arranged to see him again, haven’t you?”
“Lettice!” gasps Margot. “Not fair! Spill the beans at once!”
“Well,” Lettice admits. “He did ring me this morning.”
“And?” Margot and Minnie ask, their breath baited with excitement.
“And we’ve arranged to have luncheon again after Bella returns home to Wiltshire.”
Margot and Minnie squeal and clap with delight, gushing forth congratulations as though Lettice had just announced her engagement to Selwyn.
“I hope you aren’t putting off seeing him just because I’m here, Tice.” Bella says quietly, a guilty look crossing her pretty face.
“Not at all, Bella!” Lettice reaches over and squeezes Arabella’s hand comfortingly. “He telephoned whilst you were in the bathroom this morning. You are my guest and as such, you have my undivided attention. Mr. Selwyn Spencely can wait a few days.”
“Well, they do say that absence makes the heart grow fonder.” remarks Margot. “It certainly did for Dickie and I.”
“Where are you going, Lettice?” asks Minnie eagerly.
“I’ll tell you where, but not what day.” Lettice agrees. “The last thing I want is for you and Charles to be sitting, goggle eyed at the next table.”
“As if I would!” Minnie gasps, pressing a hand dramatically to her chest.
“As if you wouldn’t, more like!” Lettice retorts.
“Well,” Minnie looks across an Margot guiltily. “Yes, we would.”
The pair giggle conspiratorially.
“So where?” Minnie asks.
“The Café Royal.**”
“Oh how deliciously luxurious, Lettice darling!” Margot enthuses.
“I shall have Charles book us a table there every night for the fortnight after Bella leaves.” giggles Minnie teasingly, but her wink to Lettice assures her that she won’t.
“Oh Minnie!” Margot laughs. “You are awful!”
Just as Margot and Minnie break into more girlish titters, Edith, Lettice’s maid, emerges from the kitchen through the green baize door and walks towards the table with a tray on which she carries four of her home made orange curd tarts.
“Ah! What good timing!” Lettice claps her hands. “Edith, you are a brick! Ladies, dessert!”
Edith bobs a curtsey to her mistress and begins to serve the desserts to her guests first by carefully holding the tray on an angle to Arabella’s left, so she may easily help herself to one without the whole tray tipping forward and the tarts spilling onto the polished parquetry dining room floor.
“Thank you for that roast beef luncheon, Edith,” Arabella remarks as she selects the tart closest to her. “It was quite delicious.”
“You’re welcome, Miss Tyrwhitt.” Edith murmurs in reply, her face flushing with pleasure at the compliment.
Edith moves on and serves Minnie and then Margot, before finally coming back to Lettice who selects the one remaining tart from the tray. Ensuring that everyone has a replenished drink, Edith retreats to the kitchen, allowing the four ladies to carry on their conversation undisturbed by her presence.
“This looks delicious, Lettice darling.” remarks Margot as she looks down at the tart before her, the pastry a pale golden colour, a twist of candied orange and a dollop of whipped cream decorating its top.
“Yes,” concurs Minnie. “You’re so lucky Lettice. I don’t know how you manage to find such good staff in London.”
“I told you, Minnie. Mater gave me the telephone number of an excellent agency. That’s where I got Edith from. I’ll give it to you.”
“Oh,” Minnie sulks. “I think even if I employed the most perfectly qualified maid, I’d do something to muck the whole arrangement up. I usually do.”
“Good heavens, whatever are you talking about, Minnie?” Lettice exclaims.
“She’s only saying that because of her dining room faux pas.” Margot elucidates as she picks up her spoon and fork to commence eating her tart.
“What dining room faux pas?” Lettice asks.
Minnie looks around Lettice’s dining room at the restrained black japanned furnishings, white Art Deco wallpaper and elegant decorations. “I should just have done what Margot did and engaged you to decorate it for me.” she remarks as she picks up her own spoon and fork and begins to disseminate her dessert.
“What dining room faux pas?” Lettice asks again.
“At least you have taste, Lettice, unlike me.” Minnie continues uninterrupted.
“Nonsense Minnie darling, you have one of the most tasteful and fashionable wardrobes in London!” Margot counters.
“Well, it obviously doesn’t extend to my ability as an interior decorator.” Minnie grumbles back as she stabs her tart with her fork.
“Minnie, what dining room faux pas?” Lettice asks again, the smallest lilt in her raised voice betraying her frustration at being ignored.
“Well, you know how Charles’ grandfather left us the house in St John’s Wood?” Minnie asks.
“Yes,” Lettice says, laying aside her spoon and fork, leaving her trat untasted as she looks intently into the green eyes of her redheaded friend.
“When we moved in, it was full of all of old Lady Arundel’s ghastly furniture. Charles’ grandfather hadn’t done a single thing to update the place, so it was all dusty of festoons and potted palms.”
“So pre-war Edwardian!” adds Margot just before she pops the daintiest piece of tart into her mouth, smiling as she tastes it.
“Charles says to me when I complain about how dark and cluttered it is: ‘Minnie darling, why don’t you redecorate’. So of course I thought to myself that if you could do it so effortlessly, why couldn’t I?”
“I wouldn’t say effortlessly, Minnie darling.” Lettice corrects her friend. “Anyway, do go on. I’m all ears.”
“Well, I was delighted! My first real project as a wife, making a comfortable home for my husband. I asked Charles what room I should start with, and he suggested the dining room. After all, bringing potential business partners home to his dead grandmother’s fusty old dining room wouldn’t look very good, would it?”
“Indeed not, Minnie darling.” Lettice agrees, her lids lowering slightly as she concentrates on her friend’s story.
“He said that perhaps rather than throw out Lady Arundel’s dining table, I might start by picking some papers that went well with the dark furniture and red velvet seats, but would match our wonderful modern paintings which we hung in place of the muddy oils that were in there.”
“You could see where the old paintings had been by the non-faded patches of red flocked wallpaper.” Margot titters.
“That sounds ghastly,” Lettice remarks. “How sensible Charles was to suggest the walls first. Then you can decide what your new dining room furnishings will be once you are ready, and there’s no rush to fling out what you have at present.”
“Very well observed, Lettice darling.” Margot agrees.
“So where is the faux pas in that, then?” asks Lettice, looking across the roses of the centrepiece at her two friends in a perplexed fashion.
“The faux pas is what I chose!” pouts Minnie. “I’d started off so well too. I had the old black marble fireplace torn out and replaced with a lovely new surround.”
“Very streamline and modern,” Margot agrees, taking another mouthful of tart.
“Oh yes!” Minnie exclaims. “Quite to die for. Then I went to Jeffrey and Company*** looking for papers. It’s where my mother got our wallpapers for our homes when I was growing up.”
“Mine too.” affirmed Margot.
“And the assistant showed me the most divine poppies pattern on a geometric background. I thought to myself that being red, the poppies were a perfect choice for the walls.”
“It sounds perfect to me, Minnie darling.” Lettice says. “I still don’t see where the faux pas is?”
“You haven’t seen it on the walls.” Margot remarks half under her breath, looking apologetically at Minnie.
“No, it’s true Margot.” Minnie admits defeatedly with a sigh. “It sounds wonderful, but it looks positively awful!”
“Oh I wouldn’t have said that,” Margot counters. “It is rather busy and rather draws attention away from your paintings, but it isn’t awful.”
“Well Charles thinks it is! He says it’s like eating in a Maida Vale**** dining room! He doesn’t even want to eat in there now, and he certainly won’t bring any potential business partners around for dinner. He’s rather take them to his club!” Minnie whines. She drops her cutlery with a clatter onto the black japanned dining room table’s surface and hurriedly snatches her napkin from her lap. Carefully she dabs at the corners of her eyes.
“Oh Minnie!” Margot says, quickly getting up from her seat, dropping her own napkin on the seat of her chair and walking around to her friend where she wraps her arms around her shoulders comfortingly.
“Minnie darling. Please don’t cry.” Lettice gasps, standing up in her seat.
“You have modern wallpaper, but it doesn’t feel like Maida Vale in here.” Minnie says tearfully, thrusting her arms around in wild gesticulations.
Discreetly, Arabella moves Minnie’s half empty champagne flute out of her immediate reach to avoid any adding any drama with the spilling of drinks or shattering of glass to what is already an uncomfortable enough situation with the young woman sobbing in her seat whilst being comforted by her friends. Quietly Arabella wonders if the hot rush of London life with all its drama is all that good for the constitution if people behave this way over luncheon tables in the capital, and she secretly longs to retreat to the safety of her much quieter home of Garstanton Park back in Wiltshire.
“Do you need the smelling salts, Miss?” Edith, who unnoticed with Minnie’s loud crying and moaning, has slipped back into the dining room from the kitchen.
“What?” Lettice turns and registers her maid’s presence. “Ahh, no. No thank you Edith. Mrs. Palmerston is just having another one of her momentary dramas.”
“I am not!” bursts out Minnie, causing her already flushed face to go even redder as another barrage of tears and moaning escapes her shuddering frame.
“Of course you are, Minnie darling.” Lettice counters calmly in a good natured way. Turning back to her anxious maid she adds, “It will be over in a minute. Thank you, Edith.”
“Very good Miss.” Edith replies bewilderingly with raised eyebrows and an almost imperceptible shake of her head as she looks again at Mrs. Palmerston, red faced and weeping in her chair, her bare arms being rubbed by Mrs. Channon who coos and whispers quietly into her ears.
“Minnie has always been highly strung.” Lettice quietly assures Arabella whom she notices is looking particularly uncomfortable in her seat. “It will pass in a moment, and then we’ll get on with luncheon.”
After a few minutes of weeping, Minnie finally calms down, and both Lettice and Margot return to their seats to finish their desserts, all three behaving as if Minnie’s outburst had never occurred, and that such behaviour was not only understandable, but perfectly normal. Arabella, with her head down, eyes focussed squarely upon her half eaten tart says nothing and follows suit. For a few moments, nothing breaks the silence but the sound of cutlery scraping against crockery.
“I know, Minnie darling,” Lettice breaks the embargo on speaking cheerfully. “Why don’t I come and look at your dining room.”
“Oh would you?” exclaims Minnie with a sigh of relief. “Could you? Oh! That would be marvellous! What a brick you are, Lettice.” Then she pauses, her sudden happy energy draining away just as quickly. “But you can’t.” She shakes her head. “You’re redecorating Margot’s.”
Arabella unconsciously holds her breath, waiting for Minnie to start crying again.
“Well, yes I am,” Lettice agrees. “But there’s no reason why I can’t have two clients at once.”
“She’s not actually doing anything at ‘Chi an Treth’ at present,” Margot says, picking up her wine glass and draining it. “Are you Lettice darling?”
“Well I can’t right now, you see Minnie.” Lettice elucidates. “Funnily enough I’m waiting for Margot’s wallpapers to be printed by Jeffrey and Company, but they won’t be ready for a few weeks. So I can come and have a look, maybe make some recommendation for you and Charles to consider. Then if you’re happy, I can commence work after I’ve finished Margot’s.”
“Oh, but what about Bella? You’re helping her shop for her trousseau.” Minnie protests.
“I can assure you, I don’t need any help shopping for clothes.” Arabella says, releasing her pent-up breath. “Tice has pointed me in the direction of Oxford Street, so I can take myself there.”
“As it happens, we’re visiting Gerald on Thursday for Bella’s first consultation for her wedding dress. Why don’t I come on Thursday for luncheon whilst Bella and Gerald consult? She doesn’t need me to help her decide what she wants. She already has a good idea, don’t you Bella?”
Arabella nods emphatically.
“Well Thursday is cook’s afternoon off, but if you think you could cope with some sandwiches.” Minnie says hopefully.
“That’s settled then!” Lettice says with a sigh.
Suddenly the mood in the room lightens and spontaneous conversation begins to bubble about Lettice’s dining table again as Margot and Minnie ask Arabella about her plans for her wedding dress.
*Lucile – Lucy, Lady Duff Gordon was a leading British fashion designer in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries who use the professional name Lucile. She was the originator of the “mannequin parade”, a pre-cursor to the modern fashion parade, and is reported to have been the person to first use the word “chic” which she then popularised. Lucile is also infamous for escaping the Titanic in a lifeboat designed for forty occupants with her husband and secretary and only nine other people aboard, seven being crew members. When hemlines rose after the war, her fortunes reversed as she couldn’t change with the times, always wanting to use too much fabric on gowns that were too long and too fussy and pre-war.
**The Café Royal in Regent Street, Piccadilly was originally conceived and set up in 1865 by Daniel Nicholas Thévenon, who was a French wine merchant. He had to flee France due to bankruptcy, arriving in Britain in 1863 with his wife, Célestine, and just five pounds in cash. He changed his name to Daniel Nicols and under his management - and later that of his wife - the Café Royal flourished and was considered at one point to have the greatest wine cellar in the world. By the 1890s the Café Royal had become the place to see and be seen at. It remained as such into the Twenty-First Century when it finally closed its doors in 2008. Renovated over the subsequent four years, the Café Royal reopened as a luxury five star hotel.
***Jeffrey and Company was an English producer of fine wallpapers that operated between 1836 and the mid 1930s. Based at 64 Essex Road in London, the firm worked with a variety of designers who were active in the aesthetic and arts and crafts movements, such as E.W. Godwin, William Morris, and Walter Crane. Jeffrey and Cmpany’s success is often credited to Metford Warner, who became the company’s chief proprietor in 1871. Under his direction the firm became one of the most lucrative and influential wallpaper manufacturers in Europe. The company clarified that wallpaper should not be reserved for use solely in mansions, but should be available for rooms in the homes of the emerging upper-middle class.
****Although today quite an affluent suburb of London, in 1922 when this scene is set, Maida Vale was more of an up-and-coming middle-class area owing to its proximity to the more up market St John’s Wood to its west. It has many late Victorian and Edwardian blocks of mansion flats. Charles’ remark that he felt like he was in a Maida Vale dining room was not meant to be taken as a compliment considering they live in St John’s Wood.
Lettice’s fashionable Mayfair flat dining room is perhaps a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures I have collected over time.
Fun things to look for in this tableau include:
The orange curd tarts with their twist of orange atop each are made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in the United Kingdom. The empty wine glasses and the glass bowl in the centre of the table are also 1:12 artisan miniatures all made of hand spun and blown glass. They too are made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures. The vase is especially fine. If you look closely you will see that it is decorated with flower patterns made up of fine threads of glass. The cream roses in the vase were also hand made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures. The Art Deco dinner set is part of a much larger set I acquired from a dollhouse suppliers in Shanghai, as is the cutlery set. The champagne flutes that are filled with glittering golden yellow champagne were made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom. The candlesticks were made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.
In the background on the console table stand some of Lettice’s precious artisan purchases from the Portland Gallery in Soho. The silver drinks set is made by artisan Clare Bell at the Clare Bell Brass Works in Maine, in the United States. Each goblet is only one centimetre in height and the decanter at the far end is two- and three-quarter centimetres with the stopper inserted. Lettice’s Art Deco ‘Modern Woman’ figure is actually called ‘Christianne’ and was made and hand painted by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland. ‘Christianne’ is based on several Art Deco statues and is typical of bronze and marble statues created at that time for the luxury market in the buoyant 1920s.
Lettice’s dining room is furnished with Town Hall Miniatures furniture, which is renown for their quality. The only exceptions to the room is the Chippendale chinoiserie carver chair (the edge of which just visible on the far left-hand side of the photo) which was made by J.B.M. Miniatures.
The carpet beneath the furniture is a copy of a popular 1920s style Chinese silk rug hand made by Mackay and Gerrish in Sydney, Australia. The paintings on the walls are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States. The geometric Art Deco wallpaper is beautiful hand impressed paper given to me by a friend, which inspired the whole “Cavendish Mews – Lettice Chetwynd” series.
On the diningtable, "Celosia"
Canon 70D with EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
FalconEyes SKK-2150D flash set
Jinbei Diffusion jumbo umbrella and Falcon Eyes Diffusion umbrella.
IMG_5397ddp
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Tonight however, we are at Simpson’s-in-the-Strand*, near Covent Garden and the theatre district of London’s West End. Here, amidst the thoroughly English surrounds of wooden panelling, beautifully executed watercolours of British landscapes and floral arrangements in muted colours, men in white waistcoats and women a-glitter with jewels are ushered into the dining room where they are seated in high backed chairs around tables dressed in crisp white tablecloths and set with sparkling silver and gilt china. The large room is very heavily populated with theatre patrons enjoying a meal before a show and therefore it is full of vociferous conversation, boisterous laughter, the clink of glasses and the scrape of cutlery against crockery as the diners enjoy the traditional English repast that Simpson’s is famous for. Seated at a table for two along the periphery of the main dining room, Lettice and Selwyn are served their roast beef dinner by a carver. Lettice is being taken to dinner by Selwyn to celebrate the successful completion of his very first architectural commission: a modest house built in the northern London suburb of Highgate built for a merchant and his wife. Lettice has her own reason to celebrate too, but has yet to elaborate upon it with Selwyn.
“I do so like Simpson’s.” Lettice remarks as the carver places a plate of steaming roast beef and vegetables in front of her. Glancing around her, she admires the two watercolours on the wall behind her and the jolly arrangement of yellow asters and purple and yellow pansies on the small console to her right.
“I’m glad you approve.” Selwyn laughs, smiling at his companion.
“I’m always put in mind of Mr. Wilcox whenever it’s mentioned, or I come here.”
“Who is Mr. Wilcox?” Selwyn asks, his handsome features showing the signs of deep thought.
“Oh,” Lettice laughs and flaps her hand, the jewels on her fingers winking gaily in the light. “No-one. Well, no one real, that is.” she clarifies. “Mr. Wilcox is a character in E. M. Forster’s novel, ‘Howard’s End’**, who thoroughly approves of Simpson’s because it is so thoroughly English and respectable, just like him.”
“I can’t say I’ve read that novel, or anything by him.” Selwyn admits as the carver places his serving of roast beef and vegetables before him. “My head has been too buried in books on architecture.” Selwyn reaches into the breast pocket of his white dinner vest and takes out a few coins which he slips discreetly to the man in the crisp white uniform and chef’s hat.
“Thank you, Your Grace,” the carver says, tapping the brim of his hat in deference to the Duke of Walmsford’s son before placing the roast beef, selection of vegetables in tureens and gravy onto the crisp white linen tabletop, and then wheeling his carving trolley away.
Lettice giggles as she picks up the gravy boat and pours steaming thick and rich dark reddish brown gravy over her dinner.
“Well, what’s so funny, my Angel?” Selwyn asks with a querying look as he accepts the gravy boat from Lettice’s outstretched hands and pours some on his own meal.
“Oh you are just like Mr. Wilcox.”
“You know,” He picks up his silver cutlery. “And please pardon me for saying this, but I didn’t take you for reading much more than romance novels.”
“Oh!” Lettice laughs in mild outrage. “Thank you very much, Selwyn!”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Selwyn defends himself, dropping his knife and fork with a clatter onto the fluted gilt edged white dinner plate.
“Then what do you mean?” Lettice asks, trying to remain serious as she looks into the worried face of her dinner companion, which makes her want to reach out and stroke his cheek affectionately and smile.
“I… I merely meant that most ladies of your background have had very little education, or inclination to want to read anything more than romance novels.”
“Well,” Lettice admits. “I must confess that I do quite enjoy romance novels, and I wouldn’t be as well read if it weren’t for Margot.”
“Aha!” Selwyn laughs, popping some carrots smeared in gravy into his mouth.
“But,” Lettice quickly adds in her defence. “I’ll have you know that my father is a great believer in the education of ladies, and so was my grandfather, and I applied myself when I studied, and I enjoyed it.”
“It shows my Angel,” Selwyn assures her. “You are far more interesting than any other lady I’ve met in polite society, most of whom haven’t an original thought in their heads.”
“I take after my Aunt Egg, who learned Greek amongst other languages, which served her well when she decided to go there to study ancient art. Although Mater insisted that I not go to a girl’s school, so I would not become a bluestocking*** and thereby spoil my marriage prospects by demonstrating…”
“That’s what I was implying,” Selwyn interrupts in desperate defence of his incorrect assumptions about Lettice. “Most girls I have met either feign a lack of intelligence, or more often genuinely are dim witted. Admittedly, it’s not really their fault. With mothers like yours, who believe that the only position for a girl of good breeding is that of marriage, they seldom get educated well, and their brains sit idle.”
“Well, I have a brain, and I know how to use it. Pater and Aunt Egg drummed into me the importance of intelligence as well as good manners and looks in women of society.”
“Well, there are a great many ladies whom I have met who could take a leaf out of your book. I know you have a mind of your own, my Angel,” Selwyn purrs. “And that’s one of the many attributes about you that I like. Having a conversation with you about art, or my passion of architecture, is so refreshing in comparison to speaking about floral arrangements or the weather, as I shall soon have to when I start escorting my cousin Pamela for the London Season.”
Lettice cannot help but shudder silently at the mention of Selwyn’s cousin, Pamela Fox-Chavers, for she is immediately reminded of what Sir John Nettleford-Hughes said to her at the society wedding of her friend Priscilla Kitson-Fahey to American Georgie Carter in November. He pointed out to her that Selwyn’s mother, Lady Zinnia, plans to match Selwyn and Pamela. From his point of view, it was already a fait accompli.
“I like my cousin,” Selwyn carries on, not noticing the bristle pulsating through Lettice. “But like so many of the other debutantes of 1923, she is lacking interests beyond the marriage market and social gossip and intrigues. You, on the other hand, my Angel, are well informed, and have your own opinions.”
“Well, you can thank Pater for instilling that in me. He hired some very intelligent governesses to school my sister and I in far more than embroidery, floral arranging and polite conversation.”
“And I’m jolly glad of it, my darling.”
“And Aunt Egg told me that I should never be afraid to express my opinion, however different, so long as it is artfully couched.”
“I like the sound of your Aunt Egg.”
“I don’t think your mother would approve of her, nor of me having a brain, Selwyn. Would she? I’m sure she would prefer you to marry one of those twittering and decorous debutantes.” She tries her luck. “Like your cousin Pamela, perhaps?”
“Oh, come now, Lettice darling!” Selwyn replies. If she has thrown a bone, he isn’t taking it as he rests the heels of his hands on the edge of the white linen tablecloth, clutching his cutlery. He chews his mouthful of roast beef before continuing. “That isn’t fair, even to Zinnia. She’s a very intelligent woman herself, with quite a capacity for witty conversation about all manner of topics, and she reads voraciously on many subjects.”
“I was talking to Leslie about what his impressions of your mother were when I went down to Glynes**** for his wedding in November.”
“Were you now?” Selwyn’s eyebrows arch with surprise over his widening eyes.
“Yes,” Lettice smirks, taking a mouthful of roast potato drizzled in gravy which falls apart on her tongue. Chewing her food, she feels emboldened, and sighs contentedly as she wonders whether Sir John was just spitting sour grapes because she prefers Selwyn’s company rather than his. Finishing her mouthful she elucidates, “Leslie is a few years older than us, and of course, I only remember her as that angry woman in black who pulled you away after we’d played in the hedgerows.”
“Well, she obviously left a lasting impression on you!” Selwyn chortles.
“But it isn’t a fair one, is it?” she asks rhetorically. “So, I asked Leslie what he remembered of her from time they spent together in the drawing room whilst you and I were tucked up in bed in the nursery.”
“And what was Leslie’s impression of Zinnia?”
“That, as you say, she is a witty woman, and that she liked to hold men in her thrall with her beauty, wit and intelligence.”
“Well, he’s quite right about that.”
“But that she didn’t much like other ladies for company, especially intelligent ones who might draw the gentlemen’s attention away from her glittering orbit.”
Selwyn chews his mouthful of dinner and concentrates on his dinner plate with downcast, contemplative eyes. He swallows but remains silent for a moment longer as he mulls over his own thoughts.
After a few moments of silence, Lettice airs an unspoken thought that has been ruminating about her head ever since Selwyn mentioned her. “You know, I’d love to meet Zinnia.”
Selwyn chuckles but looks down darkly into his glass of red wine. “But you have met her, Lettice darling. You just said so yourself. She was that angry woman yelling at you as I was dragged from the hedgerows of your father’s estate.”
“I know, but that doesn’t count! We were children. No, I’ve heard of her certainly over the years, but now that I’ve become reacquainted with you as an adult, and now that we are being serious with one another.” She pauses. “We are being serious with one another, aren’t we Selwyn?”
“Of course we are, Lettice.” Selwyn replies, unable to keep his irritation at her question out of his voice. “You know we are.” Falling back into silence, he runs his tongue around the inside of his cheek as he retreats back into his own inner most thoughts.
“Then I’d so very much like to meet her. You have met my toadying mother. Why shouldn’t I meet yours?”
“Be careful what you wish for, my Angel.” he cautions.
“What do you mean, Selwyn darling?”
Selwyn doesn’t answer straight away. He absently fiddles with the silver salt shaker from the cruet set in front of him, rolling its bulbous form about in his palm, as if considering whether it will give him an answer of some kind.
“Selwyn?” Lettice asks, leaning over and putting a hand on her companion’s broad shoulder.
“Just that you may not like her when you meet her.” He shrugs. “That’s all. Toadying is certainly not a word I would associate with Zinnia on any given day, that’s for certain.”
“Or you might be implying she might not like me.” Lettice remarks downheartedly. “Is that it?”
Softening his tone, Selwyn assures her, “I like you, and I’m sure she will too. You will get to meet her soon enough, Lettice darling. I promise. But not yet.” He suddenly snaps out of his contemplations and starts to cut a piece off his roast beef, slicing into the juicy flesh with sharp jabs of his knife. “We have plenty of time for all that. Let’s just enjoy us for now, and be content with that.”
“Oh of course, Selwyn darling,” Lettice stammers. “I didn’t… I didn’t mean, now.”
“I know you didn’t may angel.” He sees the look of concern she is giving him as she stiffens and sits back in her straight backed chair, afraid that she has offended him. “I just like it being just us for now, without the complication of Zinnia.”
“Is she complicated?”
“More than you’ll ever know, my angel. Aren’t most mothers?”
“I suppose.”
“Anyway, enough about Zinnia! I don’t want this evening to be about Zinnia! I want it to be about us. So not another word about her. Alright?” When Lettice nods shallowly, he continues, “I’m here to celebrate the success of Mr. and Mrs. Musgrave of Highgate being happy with their newly completed home.”
“Oh yes! Your first architectural commission completed and received with great success!” Lettice enthuses. “Let’s raise a toast to that.” She picks up her glass of red wine, which gleams under the diffused light of the chandeliers in Simpson’s dining room. “Cheers to you Selwyn, and your ongoing success.”
Their glasses clink cheerily.
“And what of Bruton?”
“Oh, Gerald is doing very well!” Lettice assures Selwyn, returning her glass to the tabletop. “His couture business is really starting to flourish.”
“It’s a bit of rum business*****, a chap making frocks for ladies, isn’t it?” Selwyn screws up his nose in a mixture of a lack of comprehension and distaste.
“It’s what he’s good at,” Lettice tugs at the peacock blue ruched satin sleeve of her evening gown as proof, feeling proud to wear one of her friend’s designs. “And he’s hardly the first couturier who’s a man, is he, Selwyn Darling?”
“I suppose not. Zinnia does buy frocks from the house of Worth******, and he was a man.”
“Exactly.” Lettice soothes. “And who would know what suits a lady better than a man?”
“Yes, and I must say,” Selwyn says, looking his companion up and down appreciatively in her shimmering evening gown covered in matching peacock blue bugle beads. “You do look positively ravishing in his creation.”
“Thank you, Selwyn.” Lettice murmurs, her face flushing at the compliment.
“We never see him at the club any more. I think the last time I saw him was the night I met you at your parents’ Hunt Ball, and that was almost a year ago.”
“Oh well,” Lettice blusters awkwardly, thinking quickly as to what excuse she can give for her dearest friend. She knows how dire Gerald’s finances are, partially as a result of his father’s pecuniary restraints, and she suspects that this fact is likely the reason why Gerald doesn’t attend his club any longer, even if he is still a member. Even small outlays at his club could tilt him the wrong way financially. However she also knows that this is a fact not widely known, and it would embarrass him so much were it to become public knowledge, especially courtesy of her, his best friend. “Running a business, especially in its infancy like Gerald’s and mine, can take time, a great deal of time as a matter of fact.”
“But you have time, my Angel, to spend time with me.” He eyes her. “Are you covering for Bruton?”
Lettice’s face suddenly drains of colour at Selwyn’s question. “No… no, I.”
Lowering his voice again, Selwyn asks, “He hasn’t taken after his brother and found himself an unsuitable girl, has he?”
Lettice releases the breath she has held momentarily in her chest and sighs.
“I know Gerald wouldn’t go for a local publican’s daughter, like Roland did, but being artistic like he is, I could imagine him with a chorus girl, and I know if news of that ever got back to Old Man Bruton, there would be fireworks, and it would be a bloody******* time for Bruton. Poor chap!”
“No, no, Selwyn darling!” Lettice replies with genuine relief. “I can assure you,” And as she puts her hand to her thumping heart, she knows she speaks the truth. “Gerald hasn’t taken up with a chorus girl. He genuinely is busy with his couture business. Establishing oneself, as you know only too well, isn’t easy, even for a duke’s son, much less a lower member of the aristocracy without the social profile. And my business is ticking along quite nicely now, so I don’t need to put in as much effort as Gerald does.”
“But how selfish of me, my Angel!” Selwyn exclaims, putting his glass down abruptly and looking to his companion. “What a prig I’m being, aggrandising myself and bringing up Bruton, when you said that you had something to celebrate tonight too. What is it?”
“Oh, it’s nothing like you’ve done, by finishing a house for someone.” Lettice says, flapping her hand dismissively.
“Well, what is it, Lettice darling?” Selwyn insists. “Tell me!”
Lettice looks down at her plate for a moment and then remarks rather offhandedly, “It was only that I had a telephone call from Henry Tipping******** the other day, and received confirmation that my interior for Dickie and Margot Channon’s Cornwall house ‘Chi an Treth’ will be featured in an upcoming edition of Country Life.”
“Oh may Angel!” Selwyn exclaims. “That’s wonderful!” He leans over and kisses her affectionately, albeit with the reserve that is expected between two unmarried people whilst dining in a public place, but with no less genuine delight for her. “That’s certainly more than nothing, and is something also worth celebrating!” I say, let’s raise a toast to you.” He picks up his glass of red wine again. “Cheers to you Lettice, and may the article bring you lots of recognition and new business.”
The pair clink glasses yet again and smile at one another.
*After a modest start in 1828 as a smoking room and soon afterwards as a coffee house, Simpson's-in-the-Strand achieved a dual fame, around 1850, for its traditional English food, particularly roast meats, and also as the most important venue in Britain for chess in the Nineteenth Century. Chess ceased to be a feature after Simpson's was bought by the Savoy Hotel group of companies at the end of the Nineteenth Century, but as a purveyor of traditional English food, Simpson's has remained a celebrated dining venue throughout the Twentieth Century and into the Twenty-First Century. P.G. Wodehouse called it "a restful temple of food"
**Howards End is a novel by E. M. Forster, first published in 1910, about social conventions, codes of conduct and relationships in turn-of-the-century England. Howards End is considered by many to be Forster's masterpiece. The book was conceived in June 1908 and worked on throughout the following year; it was completed in July 1910
***The term bluestocking was applied to any of a group of women who in mid Eighteenth Century England held “conversations” to which they invited men of letters and members of the aristocracy with literary interests. The word over the passing centuries has come to be applied derisively to a woman who affects literary or learned interests.
****Glynes is the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds in Wiltshire, and the home of Lettice’s parents, the presiding Viscount and Countess of Wrexham and the heir, their eldest son Leslie.
*****Rum is a British slang word that means odd (in a negative way) or disreputable.
******Charles Frederick Worth was an English fashion designer who founded the House of Worth, one of the foremost fashion houses of the Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries. He is considered by many fashion historians to be the father of haute couture. Worth is also credited with revolutionising the business of fashion. Established in Paris in 1858, his fashion salon soon attracted European royalty, and where they led monied society followed. An innovative designer, he adapted 19th-century dress to make it more suited to everyday life, with some changes said to be at the request of his most prestigious client Empress Eugénie. He was the first to replace the fashion dolls with live models in order to promote his garments to clients, and to sew branded labels into his clothing; almost all clients visited his salon for a consultation and fitting – thereby turning the House of Worth into a society meeting point. By the end of his career, his fashion house employed 1,200 people and its impact on fashion taste was far-reaching.
*******The old fashioned British term “looking bloody” was a way of indicating how dour or serious a person or occasion looks.
********Henry Tipping (1855 – 1933) was a French-born British writer on country houses and gardens, garden designer in his own right, and Architectural Editor of the British periodical Country Life for seventeen years between 1907 and 1910 and 1916 and 1933. After his appointment to that position in 1907, he became recognised as one of the leading authorities on the history, architecture, furnishings and gardens of country houses in Britain. In 1927, he became a member of the first committee of the Gardens of England and Wales Scheme, later known as the National Gardens Scheme.
Comfortable, cosy and terribly English, the interior of Simpson’s-in-the-Strand may look real to you, but it is in fact made up of pieces from my 1:12 miniatures collection, including pieces from my childhood.
The dining table is correctly set for a four course Edwardian dinner partially ended, with the first course already concluded using cutlery, from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in the United Kingdom. The delicious looking roast dinner on the dinner plates, the bowls of vegetables, roast potatoes, boat of gravy and Yorkshire puddings and on the tabletop have been made in England by hand from clay by former chef turned miniature artisan, Frances Knight. Her work is incredibly detailed and realistic, and she says that she draws her inspiration from her years as a chef and her imagination. The red wine glasses bought them from a miniatures stockist on E-Bay. Each glass is hand blown using real glass. The silver cruet set in the middle of the table has been made with great attention to detail, and comes from Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The silver meat cover you can just see in the background to the left of the photo also comes from Warwick Miniatures.
The table on which all these items stand is a Queen Anne lamp table which I was given for my seventh birthday. It is one of the very first miniature pieces of furniture I was ever given as a child. The Queen Anne dining chairs were all given to me as a Christmas present when I was around the same age.
The vase of flowers in the background I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls House Miniatures in the United Kingdom.
The wood panelling in the background is real, as I shot this scene on the wood panelled mantle of my drawing room. The paintings hanging from the wooden panels come from an online stockist on E-Bay.
The dining room at Blickling Hall, the magnificent Jacobean country house, with the 18th century table set for Christmas lunch.
In today's austere and straitened times, it's hard to imagine that at one time this was the 'norm' for gentrified families across the British Isles – and, of course, in some cases it still is.
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Today however we are not in Lettice’s flat. Instead, we are in central London, near the palace of Westminster and the Thames embankment at the very stylish Metropole Hotel*, where Lettice is finally having her first assignation with the eldest son of the Duke of Walmsford, Selwyn Spencely after he telephoned her last week. After she hung up the receiver on the cradle, Lettice was beside herself with joy, causing somewhat of a kerfuffle with her downstairs neighbour, Mrs. Clifford after her jumping up and down caused the lady’s pendant lamps to rattle and sway from the ceiling above. Since then, Lettice has spent hours of her life over the ensuing days going through her wardrobes, trying on outfit after outfit, much to the irritation of her maid, Edith, who has to pick up after her. In a whirl of excitement and nerves, Lettice has gone from deciding to wear pale pink organdie, to navy serge, then to peach and rose carmine satin, to black velvet with white brocade trim. Yet now, as she shrugs her coat from her shoulders into the waiting arms of the liveried cloak room attendant of the Metropole, Lettice knows that her choice of a soft pale blue summery calf length dress with lace inserts accessories by a blue satin sash and her simple double strand of perfectly matched pearls is the perfect choice. The colour suits her creamy skin and blonde chignon, and the outfit is understated elegance, so she appears fashionable and presentable, yet doesn’t appear to be trying to hard to impress. Breathing deeply to keep the butterflies in her stomach at bay she immediately sees her companion for luncheon lounging nonchalantly against a white painted pillar.
“Darling Lettice!” Selwyn exclaims as he strides purposefully across the busy lobby of the Metropole. “You look positively ravishing.”
Lettice smiles as she sees the glint of delight in his blue eyes as he raises her cream glove clad right hand to his lips and chivalrously kisses it. “Thank you, Selwyn.” she replies, lowering her lids as she feels a slight flush fill her cheeks at the sensation of his lips pressing through the thin, soft kid of her glove. “That’s very kind of you to say so.”
“I’ve secured us a discreet table for two, just as you requested, my angel.” He proffers a crooked arm to her. “Shall we?”
Lettice smiles at his words, enjoying the sound of his cultured voice call her by a pet name. She carefully winds her own arm though his and the two stroll blithely across the foyer, unaware of the mild interest that she and Selwyn create as a handsome couple.
“Good afternoon Miss Chetwynd,” the maître d of the Metropole restaurant says as he looks down the list of reservations for luncheon. “It’s a pleasure to see you again.” Ticking the entry off the reservation list he takes up two menus. “Right this way, Your Grace.”
He leads the couple through the busy dining room of the hotel where the gentle burble of voices fills the lofty space and mixes with the sound of silver cutlery against the blue banded gilt hotel crockery, the clink of glasses raised and the strains of popular Edwardian music from the small palm court quartet playing discreetly by a white painted pillar.
“Your Grace.” Lettice says in a lofty fashion, giggling as she makes a joking bob curtsey to Selwyn as they follow the maître d.
Selwyn scoffs and rolls his eyes up to the ornately plastered ceiling above. “You know it’s only because of Daddy**.”
“I know,” Lettice giggles again. “But isn’t it a scream: ‘Your Grace’.”
“I’m not ‘Your Grace’ to you, my angel,” he smiles in return. “Just Selwyn will be fine.”
“As you wish, Just Selwyn.”
The crisply uniformed maître d stops before a small table for two surrounded by tables of suited politicians and a smattering of older, rather tweedy women. He withdraws a dainty Chippendale style chair from the table and Lettice takes a seat. The older man expertly pushes the chair in with her as she settles before the crisp white linen covered table.
“Does this table suit you, Lettice darling?” Selwyn asks a little nervously. “Discreet enough for you?”
“Oh yes, thank you Selwyn.” Lettice replies as she observes all the diners around them, busily involved in their own discussions with never a thought for the two of them, although she does notice an older couple at a table a short distance away observing them discreetly. The woman turns to her husband, indicating something about Lettice’s wide brimmed pale blue hat, judging by her gesticulation and his withering glance in response.
“Could that be one of your mother’s spies?” Selwyn asks, breaking into her quiet thoughts.
“What?” Lettice gasps. “Where?”
“There.” Selwyn gestures towards a potted palm, the fronds trembling with the movement of a passing waiter carrying two plates of roast beef to a nearby table scurrying past.
“Oh Selwyn!” Lettice slaps his hand kittenishly. “You are awful! Don’t be a tease and startle me like that.” She smiles as she returns to perusing her menu. “You know my mother’s spies are everywhere.”
“As are Lady Zinnia’s.” he replies.
Selwyn looks around the room taking in the Georgian revival furnishings, the restrained Regency stripe wallpaper, the watercolours of stately British homes in gilt frames as much as his architect’s eye pays close attention to the restrained fluted columns, ornately plastered ceilings and general layout of the room. “It’s so thoroughly English, don’t you think?” he concludes as he picks up the menu to peruse it.
“Oh,” Lettice says a little deflated as she lowers her menu. “You’d prefer something a little more, European? Should we have dined at a French restaurant?”
“Oh no Lettice darling,” he assures her with a defending hand. “I was just remarking. As I think I told you on the telephone, I haven’t been here since before the war, and I think the décor is much improved. It’s so much lighter and free of that ghastly old Victorian look.”
“I was saying the same thing to Miss Wanetta Ward the last time I came here.” Lettice remarks.
“Wanetta Ward? Isn’t she the moving picture star?” Selwyn looks over the top of his menu at his luncheon companion.
“The very one!” Lettice elucidates. “Do you ever go?”
“To the kinema***? No.” He shakes his head vehemently. “Do you?”
“No, I don’t either, but Miss Ward insists that I must experience it some day. Not that Mater or Pater would approve if I ever worked up the gumption to go.”
“Surely you don’t need to tell them if you do go.”
“Are you encouraging me to be devious, Selwyn?”
“No,” Selwyn laughs, his eyebrows lifting over his sparking blue eyes. “I’m simply suggesting that you are of age, and your own person with your own life in London, whilst they live their lives in far away Wiltshire. You can go to kinema if you wish. No-one need see you. In saying that, my parents feel the same about it, especially Mummy. She is very much against what she calls ‘painted women who are a poor and cheap copy of great art, moving about overdramatically on screen’.”
“I’ll be sure not to tell Miss Ward your mother’s opinion of her the next time I see her.”
“My mother’s opinion is entirely uneducated, Lettice, I assure you. After all, like both you and I, she has never actually seen a moving picture before.”
“Well, considering that both my maid and my charwoman*** go to the pictures, I very much doubt that I ever will.” Lettice concludes. “How would it be if I sat next to them? Besides, I have heard picture theatres called fleapits***** before, which sounds none too promising when compared with a lovely evening at Covent Garden.”
“Well, I don’t know about you,” Selwyn announces, changing the subject. “But I rather like the look of the roast beef with Yorkshire pudding for luncheon. What will you have?”
Lettice looks disappointedly at her menu. “When I came here with Miss Ward, we shared a rather magnificent selection of savories and little deadlies******, but I suppose they must reserve them for afternoon tea, here.”
“Fear not!” Selwyn says, giving Lettice a beaming smile. He carefully catches the eye of the maître d and summons him with an almost imperceptible nod of his head.
“How may I serve Your Grace?” the maître d asks with a respectful bow as he approaches the table.
“Look here, my companion Miss Chetwynd had some sweet and savoury petit fours when she last came here and speaks very highly of them. I’d taken a fancy to trying them for myself, so might we have a selection for two, please?”
“Well Your Grace,” the maître d begins apologetically. “They are from our afternoon tea menu.”
“Oh, I’m sure you could have word to your chefs, especially to please such a charming guest.” He gestures with an open hand to Lettice as she sits rather awkwardly holding her menu, her eyes wide as she listens to Selwyn direct the manager of the restaurant. “It would please her,” He then plays his trump card with a polite, yet firm and businesslike smile that forms across his lips like a darkened crease. “Both of us really, if you could perhaps see about furnishing us with a selection from your afternoon tea menu.”
“Well I…” stammers the maître d, but catching the slight shift in Selwyn’s eyes and the twitch at the corner of his mouth he swallows what he was going to say. “Certainly, Your Grace.”
“Good man!” Selwyn replies, his eyes and his smile brightening. “And some tea I think, wouldn’t you agree, Lettice my dear?”
“Oh, oh… yes.” Lettice agrees with an awkward smile of her own.
As the uniformed manager scuttles away, shoulders hunched, with Selwyn’s request, Lettice says, “Oh you shouldn’t have done that, Selwyn. Poor man.”
“What? Are you telling me that you are displeased that you are getting what you desire for luncheon, even though it doesn’t appear on the menu?”
“Well, no.” Lettice admits sheepishly.
“See, there are advantages to having luncheon with a ‘Your Grace’.” He gives her a conspiratorial smile.
“You do enjoy getting your way, don’t you Selwyn?”
He doesn’t reply but continues to smile enigmatically back at her.
Soon a splendid selection of sweet petit fours and large and fluffy fruit scones with butter, jam and cream has been presented to them on a fluted glass cake stand by a the maître d along with a pot of piping hot tea in a blue and gilt edged banded teapot.
“So,” Selwyn says as he drops a large dollop of thick white cream onto half a fruit scone. “At the Hunt Ball we spent a lot of time talking about our childhoods and what has happened to me over the ensuing years,” He shakes a last drop off the silver spoon. “Yet I feel that you are at an unfair advantage, as you shared barely anything about yourself al evening.”
“Aahh,” Lettice replies as she spreads some raspberry jam on her two halves of fruit scones with her knife. “My mother taught me the finer points about being a gracious hostess. She told me that I must never bore my guests with trifling talk about myself. What I have to say or what I do is of little or no consequence. The best way to keep a gentleman happy is to occupy him with talk about himself.”
“You don’t believe that do, my angel?”
“Not at all, but I found it to be a very useful tactic at the Hunt Ball when I was paraded before and forced to dance with a seemingly endless array of eligible young men. It saved me having to do most of the talking.”
“I hope you didn’t feel forced to dance with me, Lettice darling.” Selwyn picks up his teacup and takes a sip of tea. “After all you did dance quite a bit with me.”
“You know I didn’t mind, Selwyn.” She pauses, her knife in mid-air. “Or I hope you didn’t think that.”
“I suppose a healthy level of scepticism helps when you are an eligible bachelor who happens to be the heir to a duchy and a sizeable private income. Such things can make a man attractive to many a woman.”
“Not me, Selwyn. I am after all a woman of independent means, and I have my own successful interior design business.”
“Ah, now that is interesting.” he remarks. “How is it that the daughter of a viscount with her own private income, a girl from a good family, can have her own business? It surely isn’t the done thing.”
“Well, I think if circumstances were different, I shouldn’t be able to.”
“Circumstances?”
“Well for a start, I am the youngest daughter. My elder sister, Lallage, is married and has thankfully done her bit for her husband’s family by producing an heir, and given our parents the welcome distraction of grandchildren, thus alleviating me of such a burden.”
“She and Lanchenbury just had another child recently didn’t they?”
“My, you are well informed. Yes, Lally and Charles had another son in February, so now my sister has provided not only an heir, but a spare as well.” She pauses for a moment before continuing. “Secondly, and perhaps what works most in my favour is that I am my father’s favourite child. If it were up to my mother, I should have been married and dispatched off by the end of the first Season after the war. But Pater enjoys indulging his little girl, and I know just how to keep him continuing to do so, and keeping Mater and her ideas at bay just enough.”
“And how do you achieve this miracle, my angel?”
“I decorate mostly for the great and the good of this fair isle,”
“I don’t think I’d call a moving picture star a member of the great and good!” laughs Selwyn heartily.
“Yes, well…” Lettice blushes and casts her eyes down into her lap sheepishly. “I did rather get in trouble for that, but only because my mother’s awful cousin Gwendolyn, the Duchess of Whitby, told tales behind my back. Anyway, I design and decorate mostly for people my parents approve of, and I play my part socially and pretend to be interested in the things my mother wants for me.”
“Like marriage?”
“Like marriage.”
“So, if you aren’t interested in marriage, why are we having luncheon then, my angel?”
“I never said I wouldn’t get married someday, Selwyn,” Lettice defends with a coy smile. “I just want to do it in my own fashion, and I believe that marriage should begin with love. If I am to get married to a man I love, I need to know him first.” She pauses again and stares firmly into her companion’s sparkling blue eyes. “I’m sure you agree.”
“I’m quite sure my mother, Lady Zinnia, wouldn’t agree with you and your modern ideas about marriage.”
“Any more than my own mother does. When I told her that I wanted to do this my own way, by arranging to meet you myself she told me ‘marriages are made by mothers, you silly girl’.”
“And you don’t agree with that?” he asks almost unsurely.
“Would I be here if I did, Selwyn?” Lettice takes up the bowl of cream and begins to drop some on her scones.
Selwyn starts chuckling in a relieved fashion, consciously trying to smother his smile with his left hand, a hold and ruby signet ring glinting in the diffused light cast from the chandeliers above. He settles back more comfortably in his seat, observing his female companion as she stops what she is doing and puts down both the spoon and bowl of cream self-consciously.
“What? What is it Selwyn? What have I done?”
“You haven’t done anything other than be you, my angel, and that is a great blessed relief.”
“Relief?” Lettice’s left hand clutches at the two warm strands of creamy pearls at her throat.
“Yes,” Selwyn elucidates, sitting forward again and reaching out his hand, encapsulating Lettice’s smaller right hand as it rests on the white linen tablecloth. “You see, I was worried that it was a mixture of champagne and the romance of the Hunt Ball that made you so attractive. You were so naturally charming.”
Lettice bursts out laughing, the joyous peal mixing with the vociferous noise around them. “I was dressed as Cinderella in an Eighteenth Century gown and wig. I’d hardly call that natural, Selwyn.”
“Aahh, but you were my darling, beneath all that. I must confess that when I suggested luncheon today it was with a little of that healthy scepticism that I came here.”
“But I don’t need your income, Selwyn, I have my own.”
“But you do have a scheming mother, and many a mother like Lady Sadie want their daughters to marry a fine title, especially one that they may have desired for themselves. A Duchess is a step up from a Countess, I’m sure you agree.”
“Oh I don’t care…”
“Shh, my angel,” Selwyn squeezes her hand beneath his. “I know. However, that also makes you a rather exceptional girl, so I’m glad that my misgivings were misplaced. I’m pleased to hear that you’re in no rush to get married, and that you have set yourself some expectations and rules as to how you wish to live. Perhaps you were born at just the right time to manage as a woman in this new post-war era.”
“Please don’t tell Mater that,” Lettice says, lowering her spare hand from worrying her pearls. “She’ll be fit to be tied.”
“I promise I shan’t say a word to Lady Sadie, or my own mother. Both are cut from the same cloth in that respect.” He releases her hand and settles back in his chair. Picking up a scone he takes a bite. After swallowing his mouthful and wiping his mouth with his serviette he continues, “Now, do tell me about your latest piece of interior design. I should like to know more about it.”
Lettice sighs as she feels the nervous tickles in her stomach finally start to dissipate as she settles back in her own seat and starts to tell him about ‘Chi an Treth’ the Regency house in Penzance that belongs to her friends, the newly married Dickie and Margot Channon.
*Now known as the Corinthia Hotel, the Metropole Hotel is located at the corner of Northumberland Avenue and Whitehall Place in central London on a triangular site between the Thames Embankment and Trafalgar Square. Built in 1883 it functioned as an hotel between 1885 until World War I when, located so close to the Palace of Westminster and Whitehall, it was requisitioned by the government. It reopened after the war with a luxurious new interior and continued to operate until 1936 when the government requisitioned it again whilst they redeveloped buildings at Whitehall Gardens. They kept using it in the lead up to the Second World War. After the war it continued to be used by government departments until 2004. In 2007 it reopened as the luxurious Corinthia Hotel.
**The title of Duke sits at the top of the British peerage. A Duke is called “Duke” or “Your Grace” by his social equals, and is called only “Your Grace” by commoners. A Duke’s eldest son bears his courtesy title, whilst any younger children are known as Lords and Ladies.
***In the early days of moving pictures, films were known by many names. The word “cinema” derives from “kinema” which was an early Twentieth Century shortened version of “kinematograph”, which was an early apparatus for showing films.
****A charwoman, chargirl, or char, jokingly charlady, is an old-fashioned occupational term, referring to a paid part-time worker who comes into a house or other building to clean it for a few hours of a day or week, as opposed to a maid, who usually lives as part of the household within the structure of domestic service. In the 1920s, chars usually did all the hard graft work that paid live-in domestics would no longer do as they looked for excuses to leave domestic service for better paying work in offices and factories.
*****Early cinemas were often derisively referred to as “fleapits”, however the name given them was for very good reason. As cheap entertainment for the masses, with entry costing a paltry amount, early moving picture theatres often had problems with fleas infesting themselves on patrons who were free of them from those who had them. This was especially common in poorer areas where scruffier cinemas did not employ cleanliness as a high priority. Even as late as the 1960s, some filthy picture houses employed the spraying of children with DDT when they came en masse to watch the Saturday Morning Westerns!
******Little deadlies is an old fashioned term for little sweet cakes like petit fours.
An afternoon tea like this would be enough to please anyone, but I suspect that even if you ate each sweet petit four or scone on the cake plate, you would still come away hungry. This is because they, like everything in this scene are 1:12 size miniatures from my miniatures collection.
Fun things to look for in this tableau:
The sweet petite fours on the lower tier of the cake stand and the scones on the upper tier and on Lettice and Selwyn’s plates have been made in England by hand from clay by former chef turned miniature artisan, Frances Knight. Her work is incredibly detailed and realistic, and she says that she draws her inspiration from her years as a chef and her imagination. Each petit four is only five millimetres in diameter and between five and eight millimetres in height!
The blue banded hotel crockery has been made exclusively for Doll House Suppliers in England. Each piece is fashioned by hand and painted by hand. Made to the highest quality standards each piece of porcelain is very thin and fine. If you look closely, you might even notice the facets cut into the milk jug and the steam hole in the teapot.
The fluted glass cake stand, the glass vase on Lettice and Selwyn’s table and the red roses in it were all made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. The cake stand and the vase have been hand blown and in the case of the stand, hand tinted. The red roses in the vase are also made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures.
The Chippendale dining room chairs are very special pieces. They came from the Petite Elite Miniature Museum, later rededicated as the Carol and Barry Kaye Museum of Miniatures, which ran between 1992 and 2012 on Los Angeles’ bustling Wiltshire Boulevard. One of the chairs still has a sticker under its cushion identifying which room of which dollhouse it came. The Petite Elite Miniature Museum specialised in exquisite and high end 1:12 miniatures. The furnishings are taken from a real Chippendale design.
The vases of flowers on the stands in the background are beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium. The three plant stands are made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq, whilst the sideboard is made by high-end miniature furniture maker JBM. The paintings come from an online stockist on E-Bay.
Thank you for Explore : )
...how often do we say " you & me " instead of " me & you "...."you" standing here not only for our loved ones but also for people other than "us"....
...how often do we show understanding for other people's problems instead of judging...
...how often are we compassionate towards other people's missfortunes...
...how often do we look inside ourselves and take care of our own imperfections, before pointing the finger to the ones of others...
...how often do we simply stay q u i e t just to l i s t e n....
...too much talking is a defense mechanism against taking responsibility for who we really are, accepting ourselves despite and with our imperfections and being brave enough to actually grow by taking action.
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Tonight however we have headed east of Cavendish Mews, down through St James’, past Trafalgar Square and down The Strand to one of London’s most luxurious and fashionable hotels, The Savoy*, where, surrounded by mahogany and rich red velvet, gilded paintings and extravagant floral displays, Lettice is having dinner with the son of the Duke of Walmsford, Selwyn Spencely. The pair have made valiant attempts to pursue a romantic relationship since meeting at Lettice’s mother, Lady Sadie’s, Hunt Ball the previous year. Yet things haven’t been easy, their relationship moving in fits and starts, partially due to the invisible, yet very strong influence of Selwyn’s mother, Lady Zinnia, the current Duchess of Walmsford. Although Lettice has no solid proof of it, she is quite sure that Lady Zinnia does not think her a suitable match for her eldest son and heir. From what she has been told, Lettice also believes that Lady Zinnia is matchmaking Selwyn with his cousin Pamela Fox-Chavers. In an effort to see what her potential rival for Selwyn’s affections is like, Lettice organised an ‘accidental’ meeting of she, Pamela and Selwyn at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Great Spring Show** a few weeks ago. As a result of this meeting, Selwyn has finally agreed to explain to Lettice his evident reluctance to introduce her to his mother as a potentially suitable match. Yet as she walks beneath the grand new Art Deco portico of the Savoy and the front doors are opened for her by liveried doormen, Lettice is amazed that surrounded by so many fashionable people, Selwyn thinks the Savoy dining room is the place to have a discreet dinner, especially after they have been very discreet about their relationship for the past year.
Lettice is ushered into the grand dining room of the Savoy, a space brilliantly illuminated by dozens of glittering electrified chandeliers cascading down like fountains from the high ceiling above. Beneath the sparkling light, men in white waistcoats and women a-glitter with jewels and bugle bead embroidered frocks are ushered into the dining room where they are seated in high backed mahogany and red velvet chairs around tables dressed in crisp white tablecloths and set with sparkling silver and gilt china. The large room is very heavily populated with theatre patrons enjoying a meal before a show and London society out for an evening. The space is full of vociferous conversation, boisterous laughter, the clink of glasses and the scrape of cutlery against crockery as the diners enjoy the magnificent repast served to them from the hotel’s famous kitchens. Above it all, the notes of the latest dance music from the band can be heard as they entertain diners and dancers who fill the parquet dance floor.
A smartly uniformed waiter escorts Lettice to a table for two in the midst of the grand dining salon, where Selwyn, dressed in smart white tie stands and greets Lettice.
“My Angel!” he gasps, admiring her as she stands before him in a champagne coloured silk crepe gown decorated with sequins with a matching bandeau set amidst her Marcelled** hair. “Don’t you look ravishing!”
“Thank you, Selwyn.” Lettice purrs in pleasure as she allows the waiter to carefully slide the seat of the chair beneath her as she sits. “That’s very kind of you to say so.” She gracefully tugs at her elbow length white evening gloves.
Sparkling golden French champagne is poured into their crystal flutes from a bottle sitting in a silver cooler on the linen covered table by their obsequious waiter. The expansive menu is consulted with Lettice selecting Pied de Veau*** and Selwyn choosing Cambridge Sausages**** both dishes served with a light Salade Romaine*****. Polite conversation is exchanged between the two. Lettice is given congratulations on the great success of the publication of her article in ‘Country Life’******, which Selwyn has finally seen. Selwyn is asked how Pamela’s coming out ball went. The pair dance elegantly around the true reason they are there.
It is only when a large silver salver of cheeses is put down and they are served Vol-au-Vent de Volaille à la Royale******* on the stylish gilt edged white plates of the Savoy that Lettice finally plucks up the courage to start the conversation that they have been trying to avoid.
Cutting a small piece of flaky golden pastry and spearing it with a piece of tenderly cooked chicken and a head of mushroom Lettice inserts it into her mouth and sighs with delight.
“There is nothing nicer than dinner at the Savoy, is there my Angel?” Selwyn addresses his dinner partner.
“Indeed no,” Lettice agrees after swallowing her dainty mouthful. “However, I must confess that I was surprised that you chose the Savoy dining room for us to meet. It’s the most indiscreet place to have a discreet dinner.” She deposits her polished silver cutlery onto the slightly scalloped edge of her plate. “We’ve been so careful up until now, choosing places where we are less likely to garner attention. Here we sit amongst all the most fashionable people of London society. There are bound to be friends of both your parents and mine who will see us sitting here together at a table for two.” She glances around at the bejewel decorated ladies looking like exotic birds in their brightly coloured frocks and feathers and their smartly attired male companions. “There are even photographers here this evening.”
“I know my Angel.” Selwyn replies matter-of-factly before putting a small amount of his own vol-au-vent into his mouth.
“Whilst I know my mother won’t mind seeing my name associated with yours, or a picture of the two of us together at the Savoy,” She glances nervously at Selwyn as he serenely chews his second course. “I thought we were trying to avoid Zinnia’s attention.”
Selwyn finishes his mouthful and then takes a slip of champagne before elucidating somewhat mysteriously. “A change of plans, my Angel.”
“A change of plans, Selwyn?” Lettice queries, running her white evening glove clad fingers over the pearls at her throat as she worries them. “What does that mean? I don’t understand.”
“You and I have had some rather awkward conversations over my refusal to introduce you to Zinnia, haven’t we, Lettice?”
“We have, darling Selwyn. And I thought that was what we were going to talk about this evening.”
“And so we will, but I also want this evening to be a statement of intention.”
“A statement of intention?” Lettice’s heart suddenly starts to beat faster as she licks her lips.
“Yes. . I invited you here this evening because it is one of the most fashionably public places to be seen. I want people to see us together this evening, my darling, whether it be Zinnia’s spies amongst us, or just the general citizenry of society. I also thought that since there is a rather ripping band playing tonight, that you and I might cut a rug******** a bit later and that perhaps we might get photographed. Zinnia won’t want to meet you, unless your presence is waved in front of her like a red rag to a bull.”
“I’m not sure I like that term when used in conjunction with your mother, Selwyn darling.” Lettice says warily.
“But it’s true. For all her forthrightness and ferocity, Zinnia is very good at playing ostriches when she wishes, and pretending not to see things she doesn’t want to see.” Selwyn explains before taking another sip of champagne. “I should have done this earlier, like when we agreed that I would escort you to your friend Priscilla’s wedding in November last year. However, I wasn’t man enough to stand up to her. Now I want to make a statement about you, about us,” He reaches out and places his pale and elegant right hand bearing a small signet ring over Lettice’s evening glove clad left hand, staring Lettice directly in the eye. “And I need Zinnia to sit up and take notice.”
Lettice picks up her champagne flute in her right hand and quickly sips as small amount of the effervescent beverage to whet her suddenly dry throat. She considers what Selwyn has just said along with other things people have said to her about Selwyn and Lady Zinnia over the last year since she reacquainted herself with Selwyn.
“The day I attended Priscilla’s wedding without you,” Lettice begins. “I met Sir John Nettleford-Hughes.”
“Sir John!” Selwyn scoffs, releasing Lettice’s hand, leaving a warm patch that Lettice can still feel through the thin fabric of her white glove. “He’s one of Zinnia’s cronies. I’m quite sure that they had,” Selwyn pauses whilst he finds the right word. “An understanding, shall we say, when they were both younger.” He looks at Lettice again. “I hope I didn’t shock you, my Angel.”
“Not at all, Selwyn darling.” Lettice assures him. “After all, I am twenty-three now, and a lady who has set forth into the world.”
“I’m glad my Angel. I’d never want to shock you with something like that.”
“It doesn’t shock me, Selwyn darling, but it would explain some things he said to me that day when I was cornered by him.”
“Cornered?”
“Yes. I now think he deliberately sought me out and cornered me so he could tell me what he did.”
“What did Sir John say?” Selwyn queries.
“I didn’t really pay that much attention to it,” Lettice begins, glancing down at her partially eaten vol-au-vent. “At least not at first. I thought he was just spitting venom at me because I spurned his affections the evening of Mater’s Hunt Ball when I met you.”
“What did he say?” Selwyn presses anxiously.
“When I explained your absence as my escort – he only knew because he is related to Cilla’s mother and she had been crowing to him about your attendance at the wedding – he laughed when I said that you were at Clendon********* meeting Pamela. He said it was not a coincidence that you were forced to cancel your own plans in preference for spending time with your cousin. He said that your mother had orchestrated it.”
“And so she had, my Angel.” Selwyn conforms. “And that is why I said that I should have been more of a man and stood up to Zinnia at that time. However,” He releases a pent up breath which he exhales shudderingly. “Zinnia is not someone to cross, especially when she is determined, or in a foul mood, of which she was both.”
“Sir John said that even though we had been discreet about spending time together, that your mother already knew about our assignations.”
“I would imagine him to be quite correct.”
“I accused him of telling her, but he denied it.”
“I would doubt that even as a crony of Zinnia, he would have had the pleasure of breaking the news of your existence as a potential future daughter-in-law to her. Zinnia’s talons reach far and wide, and her spies exist in some of the most unlikely places. What else did Sir John have to say?”
“He said that your mother is the one who would undoubtedly arrange your marriage to suit her own wishes. He implied that I ought not tip my cap at you since you were not free to make your own decision when it came to the subject of marriage. He said that even your father wouldn’t cross your mother on that front.”
Selwyn chuckles sadly. “Sir John is well informed.”
“So it’s true then?”
“What is, darling?”
“That you aren’t free to marry.”
“No, of course not. Not even Zinnia with all her bluster can force me to marry someone I don’t want to.”
Lettice releases a breath she didn’t even realise she was holding in her chest beneath the silk crepe and sparkling beading of her gown.
“However, Zinnia and my Uncle Bertrand have their own plans as regards Pammy and her relationship to me, and they are both applying pressure to both of us.”
“Sir John said that too.” Lettice utters deflatedly.
“I should like to point out, my Angel, that I was not aware as to the plans and plotting afoot for Pammy and I when I met you again at your mother’s ball.” Selwyn assures Lettice. “I didn’t even know about it in the lead up to Priscilla’s wedding. It was only that weekend at Clendon when I was first reintroduced to Pammy and I inadvertently overheard snippets of private conversations Zinnia and my uncle that I realised that they had been hatching their plot to bind us into a marriage of convenience to bind our families closer together for almost as long as Pammy has been alive.”
“So this wasn’t something new, then?”
“It was to me, Lettice darling, but not to them. Do you remember I told you at the Great Spring Show that my real aunt, Bertrand’s first wife, Miranda, was a bolter**********?”
“Yes Selwyn.”
“And that he fled to America and that was where he met Rosalind?”
“Yes Selwyn.”
“Well, the reason why he fled to New York was because the failure of his marriage to Miranda and her desertion of him led to quite a scandal. The scandal clung to Pammy, long after Miranda was gone, and I think after a he married Rosalind, being connected to an element of scandal herself, being a divorcée, she hatched the plan with Uncle Bertrand and Zinnia with Pammy’s social well being at heart.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I mean that from the outside, there is nothing unusual or untoward about two distant cousins marrying. The fact that the Spencely and Fox-Chavers happen to be two very distinguished and wealthy old families who would doubtless look to intermarry across the generations also throws off any whiff of scandal.”
“Are you saying they planned to marry you two so that Pamela would be untarnished by her mother’s actions?”
“Yes.”
“But how is the child responsible for her mother’s sins, Selwyn?”
“You know as well as I do, coming from a family as old and well established as your own, Lettice, that scandal sticks like glue.”
“Then why throw a ball for Pamela? Why introduce her to society?”
“Because as the next Duke of Walmsford, it is only fitting that I should marry a suitable girl from a suitable family who has been presented in society. Certain families won’t allow their daughters to socialise with poor Pammy, and I’m quite sure that whilst they send their eligible sons, just as many would never countenance a marriage between them and Pammy.”
“So if Pamela marries well, into a family who would welcome her, she is absolved of any wrongdoings of her mother. There is no whiff of scandal and she rises above reproach.”
“Exactly.” Selwyn sighs. “Clever girl.”
Lettice takes a larger than usual gulp of champagne as she allows the thoughts just formed from their conversation to sink in. “And how does Pamela feel about this? Does she even know that she is being matched with you, Selwyn?”
“Yes she does,” Selwyn explains. “Although I was the one who told her. However, like me, she has no desire to see us to get married. She barely knows me, and both of us treat each other like siblings rather than potential romantic marriage prospects.”
“Does she know why your mother, aunt and uncle hatched this plan?”
“Well,” Selwyn replies uncertainly. “She knows her mother deserted Uncle Bertrand, but I don’t think she realises that Miranda’s legacy to her is a tainted one, and I’m quite sure she doesn’t know about some of the other debutante’s families attitudes towards her because of Miranda’s actions.”
“So what is she to do, if no decent bachelor will have her, and you won’t marry her?”
“I didn’t say that no eligible bachelors would consider marriage with Pammy, Angel, only some.” Selwyn says with a smile. “And half of those who won’t marry her would only have wanted to marry her for her money.”
“You sound as if you know something.” Lettice remarks, giving her dinner partner a perplexed look.
“Oh I wouldn’t go as far as to say that, my Angel.” he replies mysteriously.
“So, what would you say then, Selwyn darling?” Lettice prods.
“I’d go so far as to say that being the happy and pretty young thing that she is, Pammy is in no short supply of admirers whose families would overlook her mother’s status as a bolter.”
“Because they want to marry her for her Fox-Chavers money?”
“Well, there are a few of those, I’ll admit,” Selwyn agrees. “But that is why her dear cousin Selwyn is escorting her to all these rather tedious London Season occasions. I can keep those wolves away. However even if we discount them, there are still a few rather decent chaps who are vying for Pammy’s attentions.”
“Are there any that Pamela is interested in?” Lettice asks hopefully.
“As a matter of fact there are two young prospects whom she is quite keen on, or so she confides in me.”
“Oh that’s wonderful, Selwyn!” Lettice deposits her glass on the linen covered surface of the table and claps her hands in delight, beaming with a smile of happy relief. The her face falls. “But then, what are we all to do? Hasn’t your mother charged you with chaperoning Pamela throughout the Season?”
“Well, that was the other reason why I decided to bring you to the Savoy, my Angel.” Selwyn remarks. “We need to be seen together about town, and the best way to do that is to be seen at the functions and places that will be popular because they are part of the London Season, like cricket matches at Lords, and the Henley Regatta************.”
“And the Goodwood races!” adds Lettice with enthusiasm. “And Cowes week************!”
“That’s the spirit, my Angel!” Selwyn encourages her with equal enthusiasm. “Zinnia has charged me with chaperoning Pammy for her own end, but we will use the Season to thwart her with our own ends in mind.”
“Oh Selwyn, how clever you are! What a darling you are!”
Just at that time, the waiter who served them their vol-au-vents and player of cheese approaches the table. Noticing their half eaten meals and their cutlery sitting idle, he tentatively asks, “Shall I clear now, Your Grace?”
“If you would fetch us clean plates and cutlery for the cheese.” Selwyn replies. “Which I think we shall enjoy after a turn on the dancefloor. Don’t you agree, my Angel?” He stands up, pushing his chair back and offering Lettice his hand.
“I do indeed, Selwyn darling!” Lettice pulls her napkin from her lap and drops it on the tabletop.
The waiter pulls out Lettice’s chair, and taking Selwyn’s hand, Lettice allows him to lead her proudly across the dining room of the Savoy. Pairs of eyes note the handsome young couple and lips whisper behind glove clad hands and fans as remarks are made as to who they are and that they appear to be together as a couple, yet for the first time since the night of her mother’s Hunt ball, Lettice doesn’t care what people are thinking or saying. She feels light, as though floating on a cloud, and as she falls comfortably into Selwyn’s strong arms and they begin to sway to the music, she feels proud to be with Selwyn: the man she is falling in love with, and who intends to marry her.
*The Savoy Hotel is a luxury hotel located in the Strand in the City of Westminster in central London. Built by the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte with profits from his Gilbert and Sullivan opera productions, it opened on 6 August 1889. It was the first in the Savoy group of hotels and restaurants owned by Carte's family for over a century. The Savoy was the first hotel in Britain to introduce electric lights throughout the building, electric lifts, bathrooms in most of the lavishly furnished rooms, constant hot and cold running water and many other innovations. Carte hired César Ritz as manager and Auguste Escoffier as chef de cuisine; they established an unprecedented standard of quality in hotel service, entertainment and elegant dining, attracting royalty and other rich and powerful guests and diners. The hotel became Carte's most successful venture. Its bands, Savoy Orpheans and the Savoy Havana Band, became famous. Winston Churchill often took his cabinet to lunch at the hotel. The hotel is now managed by Fairmont Hotels and Resorts. It has been called "London's most famous hotel". It has two hundred and sixty seven guest rooms and panoramic views of the River Thames across Savoy Place and the Thames Embankment. The hotel is a Grade II listed building.
**May 20 1913 saw the first Royal Horticultural Society flower show at Chelsea. What we know today as the Chelsea Flower Show was originally known as the Great Spring Show. The first shows were three day events held within a single marquee. The King and Queen did not attend in 1913, but the King's Mother, Queen Alexandra, attended with two of her children. The only garden to win a gold medal before the war was also in 1913 and was awarded to a rock garden created by John Wood of Boston Spa. In 1919, the Government demanded that the Royal Horticultural Society pay an entertainment tax for the show – with resources already strained, it threatened the future of the Chelsea Flower Show. Thankfully, this was wavered once the Royal Horticultural Society convinced the Government that the show had educational benefit and in 1920 a special tent was erected to house scientific exhibits. Whilst the original shows were housed within one tent, the provision of tents increased after the Great War ended. A tent for roses appeared and between 1920 and 1934, there was a tent for pictures, scientific exhibits and displays of garden design. Society garden parties began to be held, and soon the Royal Horticultural Society’s Great Spring Show became a fixture of the London social calendar in May, attended by society ladies and their debutante daughters, the occasion used to parade the latter by the former. The Chelsea Flower Show, though not so exclusive today, is still a part of the London Season.
***Pied de Veau is a dish of calves feet served in a thick creamy chicken sauce, often served with carrots and onions.
****Cambridge Sausages are made from coarse ground lean and fatty pork with binder (rice in some receipts) and a heavy admixture of sweet spices such as mace, ginger and nutmeg, linked, in medium skins.
*****Salade Romaine is a salad made of Romaine lettuce, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, parmesan cheese, and a delicious olive garden dressing.
******Country Life is a British weekly perfect-bound glossy magazine that is a quintessential English magazine founded in 1897, providing readers with a weekly dose of architecture, gardens and interiors. It was based in London at 110 Southwark Street until March 2016, when it became based in Farnborough, Hampshire. The frontispiece of each issue usually features a portrait photograph of a young woman of society, or, on occasion, a man of society.
*******Vol-au-Vent de Volaille à la Royale is a dish of sliced chicken with mushroom and quenelles cooked in a cream sauce served in a puff pastry casing. The Savoy’s kitchens were famous for their deliciously light and tasty vol-au-vent selections, with 1920s menus often containing a selection of four to six varieties as plats du jour.
********The term “cutting a rug” emerged in the 1920s from American culture and became common parlance on both sides of the Atlantic by the 1930s. It came about because of African American couples doing the Lindy Hop (also known as the Jitterbug). This was vigorous, highly athletic dancing that when done continuously in one area made the carpet appear as though it was “cut” or “gashed”. Selwyn using this language would have been at the front of the latest fashion for exciting youthful language from America.
*********Clendon is the family seat of the Duke and Duchess of Walmsford in Buckinghamshire.
**********A Bolter is old British slang for a woman who ended her marriage by running away with another man.
***********The Henley Royal regatta is a leisurely “river carnival” on the Thames. It was at heart a rowing race, first staged in 1839 for amateur oarsmen, but soon became another fixture on the London social calendar. Boating clubs competed, and were not exclusively British, and the event was well known for its American element. Evenings were capped by boat parties and punts, the air filled with military brass bands and illuminated by Chinese lanterns. Dress codes were very strict: men in collars, ties and jackets (garishly bright ties and socks were de rigueur in the 1920s) and crisp summer frocks, matching hats and parasols for the ladies.
************Cowes Week is one of the longest-running regular regattas in the world, and a fixture of the London Season. With forty daily sailing races, up to one thousand boats, and eight thousand competitors ranging from Olympic and world-class professionals to weekend sailors, it is the largest sailing regatta of its kind in the world. Having started in 1826, the event is held in August each year on the Solent (the area of water between southern England and the Isle of Wight made tricky by strong double tides). It is focussed on the small town of Cowes on the Isle of Wight.
This splendid array of cheeses on the table would doubtless be enough to please anyone, but I suspect that even if you ate each cheese and biscuit on this silver tray, you would still come away hungry. This is because they, like everything in this scene, are in reality 1:12 size miniatures from my miniatures collection, including pieces from my childhood.
Fun things to look for in this tableau:
The silver tray of biscuits have been made in England by hand from clay by former chef turned miniature artisan, Frances Knight. Her work is incredibly detailed and realistic, and she says that she draws her inspiration from her years as a chef and her imagination. The cheeses and the vol-au-vents come from Beautifully handmade Miniatures in Kettering, as do the two slightly scalloped white gilt plates and the wonderful golden yellow roses in the vase on the table. The cutlery I acquired through Kathleen Knight’s Dolls House Shop in the United Kingdom. The silver champagne cooler on the table is made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The bottle of champagne itself is hand made from glass and is an artisan miniature made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The bottle is De Rochegré champagne, identified by the careful attention paid to recreating the label in 1:12 scale. The two glasses of sparkling champagne are made of real glass and were made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom.
The two red velvet upholstered high back chairs I have had since I was six years old. They were a birthday present given to me by my grandparents.
The painting in the background in its gilded frame is a 1:12 artisan piece made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States.
The red wallpaper is beautiful artisan paper given to me by a friend, who has encouraged me to use a selection of papers she has given me throughout the whole “Cavendish Mews – Lettice Chetwynd” series.
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Today however we are at Glynes, the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds in Wiltshire, and the home of Lettice’s parents, the presiding Viscount and Countess of Wrexham and the heir, their eldest son Leslie. Lettice is visiting her family home after receiving a strongly worded instruction from her father by telegram to visit without delay or procrastination. Lettice usually enjoys her trips to her childhood home, yet she has a sense of foreboding about this visit. Lettice has a strained relationship with her mother at the best of times as the two have differing views about the world and the role that women have to play in it, and whilst she is her father’s undeniable favourite, she fears that some of her more recent choices of clients might have put her out of favour with him. Thus, she heaved a sigh of relief upon her arrival at the house to find that her father and brother were elsewhere on the property on estate business and her mother was in the village attending to her charitable work. Left to her own devices until luncheon, Lettice spent the intervening time in her favourite room in the whole house, her father’s library, where she perused many of his volumes on architecture and design, drawing inspiration for her own interior designs.
Now we find ourselves in the grand and imposing formal dining room of Glynes, with its elegant Georgian furniture and its hand painted Eighteenth Century wallpaper featuring birds and flowers. Old masters and family portraits look down from gilded frames upon the diners. Viscount Wrexham sits at the head of the table, with his wife, Lady Sadie, to his left and Lettice to his right, all at one end of the Chippendale dining table. Despite the roaring fire in the hearth, Lettice shivers with a chill she feels in the room as Bramley the butler serves cream of cauliflower soup to the trio from a rose painted Rosenthal tureen.
“Is Leslie not joining us for luncheon, Pappa?” Lettice enquires after her eldest brother, noting the fact that the table is only set for three.
“Leslie still has unfinished business with the tenants down at Meadowdale Farm, Lettice.” her father replies sternly.
Lettice glances around the room, not engaging her mother’s intense gaze as she sits opposite her. She notices Lady Sadie’s hair is starting to gain streaks of silver amongst her blonde Edwardian set waves. Her mother toys brittlely with the two strands of pearls at her throat, a tell-tale sign that there is unpleasantness brewing.
“What lovely delphiniums, Mamma,” Lettice remarks as her gaze falls upon the tall purple blooms in the fluted Victorian cranberry glass vase on the table. “And in autumn. I don’t know how you manage to do it.”
“Yes.” She smiles thinly. “The hothouses are such a blessing as the weather turns colder and fresh flowers become scarce.”
“Thank you Bramley,” the Viscount says commandingly. “You may come and collect the plates in a quarter of an hour. I shall pour the wine myself.”
The butler looks startled by his master’s pronouncement as he readies himself to take his usual place by the sideboard where he has placed the tureen alongside two bottles of wine. However, he knows better than to contradict the Viscount. “Very good, My Lord.” He backs away, shooing Moira the maid who has taken to assisting wait table at luncheon on informal occasions since the war with his flapping fingers. The two disappear through the door that connects the dining room to the butler’s pantry.
“Why do I have the feeling of being ambushed?” Lettice clips.
“Lettice!” Lady Sadie gasps, glancing anxiously towards the door the servants have retreated behind.
The trio sit in awkward silence for a minute or so, allowing the servants to hopefully be out of earshot, listening to the quiet tick of the clock on the mantle and the crackle of the fire. None pick up their silver spoons to eat the steaming soup.
“Margot and Dickie’s wedding plans appear to be coming along well according to Lucie de Virre.” Lady Sadie remarks with false joviality as she picks up the jug of cold cream which she adds to her soup to temper it. “I am told that younger son of Sir Bruton has a remarkable job of making her wedding dress considering that he isn’t formally trained.”
As if his wife’s words have broken some spell, Viscount Wrexham picks up his spoon and starts to eat in silence.
“Well, as you know, Gerald’s mother is a very good needlewoman,” Lettice replies, picking up her own spoon and plunging it into the thick white soup. “I’m sure she taught him some tricks about embroidery.”
“Perhaps you could take a leaf from his book, Lettice.” suggests Lady Sadie.
“Ha!” Viscount Wrexham bursts, the sound echoing about the lofty dining room. Noticing the angry look his wife casts him, he clears his throat before apologising, “I beg your pardon.”
The conversation falters awkwardly after that and for a few moments the three people quietly eat their soup.
“Oh!” Viscount Wrexham exclaims suddenly. “The wine!” He pushes his chair back, the feet scraping noisily against the floor. Walking to the sideboard he picks up the bottle of red. “The Saint Germaine Bordeaux,” he muses, looking down at the label. “A good choice, Bramley.”
“So,” Lettice continues as her father comes back to the table and pours the wine. “Your letter said it was urgent. What did I need to come down here from London for in such a hurry that I had to cancel dinner plans at the Savoy this evening?”
As though not having heard her, the Viscount places the bottle in front of him, sits and continues eating his soup without speaking.
“Well tell her Cosmo!” Lady Sadie hisses, flapping her right hand at him, making the diamonds in her rings sparkle in the light.
Viscount Wrexham remains silent and takes another mouthful of soup.
“Very well then,” Lady Sadie mutters irritably. “If you won’t, then I will!”
Lady Sadie reaches into the left pocket of the light grey cardigan she has over her powder blue day dress and withdraws a letter. Unfolding it, she runs her long fingers across the lines until she reaches the part she wants. Clearing her throat she reads, annunciating each word in an especially clipped tone as she quotes, “It has come to our attention that your daughter, Lettice,” She looks up momentarily and glares at her youngest child. “Has recently taken up decorating the home of an American woman, a Miss Wanetta Ward. Discreet enquiries have revealed to me that she is a woman of questionable background who has recently come to London where she has commenced work as an actress.” The last word Lady Sadie spits out distastefully before folding the letter back into quarters and depositing it back into her pocket. “Do you deny it, Lettice?”
“Who’s been telling tales?” Lettice asks calmly, leaving her spoon in the bowl.
“An actress, Lettice! Really!” Lady Sadie admonishes.
“A moving picture actress, not a theatre actress, Mamma.” Lettice elaborates. “Now who’s been blabbing?”
“That doesn’t make it any better, Lettice!” her mother responds in a disgusted tone. “You might just as well say you’re decorating for a…”
“Sadie!” the Viscount breaks his silence, dropping his spoon with a clatter.
“Who?” Lettice repeats, glaring at her mother, who shrinks in her seat under her intense glare. "Who has been telling tales?"
Looking around awkwardly she finally replies, “Gwendolyn!”
“The Duchess?” Lettice gasps incredulously. “But the last time I saw her she as good as told me that she was never going to speak to you again.”
“Well,” Lady Sadie defends. “I managed to rebuild my bridges somewhat, no thanks to you after you and your father,” She glances at her husband with a chiding look. “Caused such a rift between her and I.”
“That venomous old trout!” Lettice utters, flabbergasted at the revelation.
“Lettice!” Viscount Wrexham barks angrily. “That’s no way to speak about your Mother’s cousin!”
“Lettice,” her mother continues. “Did your father not have a conversation with you a few months ago about decorating for your own class, if you must insist upon embarking upon this interior design nonsense?”
“He did, Mamma. However,” Lettice replies, but demurs. “I didn’t necessarily agree.”
“Oh Lettice!” Lady Sadie sighs exasperatedly. “Was it not bad enough that you decorated the home of that Hatchett woman, that you must now decorate this woman’s interiors? It is most inappropriate!”
“It’s true my girl,” her father adds a little more kindly, turning to her. “Just think how it makes the family look.”
“Oh, stop being so soft on her Cosmo!” Lady Sadie exclaims. “You’re always too indulgent with her.” She chuckles in an ironic fashion. “And just look where it has landed us. For shame Lettice!”
“Mr. Hatchett is a member of parliament now, you know Mamma.” Lettice answers back bravely.
“He’s not a lord though, is he?” Lady Sadie responds hotly.
“Well, you should be pleased with my next interior design commission. It’s for the Marquess of Taunton. I’ve been asked by Dickie and Margot to decorate some of the principal rooms of their house in Penance.”
Lettice settles back in her seat and resumes eating her soup docilely, refusing to engage her mother’s hostile stare across the table.
“Yes, Lucie de Virre told me.” Lady Sadie remains silent for a few tense moments before continuing, “However, it would please me even more, Lettice, if you simply stopped all this ridiculous interior design business folly of yours and settled down and got married!” She pulls a lace edged monogrammed handkerchief from her cardigan sleeve and blows her nose before dabbing her eyes.
“Now, don’t go upsetting yourself, Sadie,” Viscount Wrexham says softly, reaching out a consoling hand and placing it on her forearm.
Shying away from his touch as if being burned, his wife clings to the edge of the dining table, causing her knuckles to turn white. Thrusting her chair back forcefully, she abruptly stands up and pulls herself up to her full height in a haughty fashion. “Talk to her Cosmo!” she sniffs. “Goodness knows I can’t!” She looks over at Lettice who in turn looks away from her and concentrates on the purple delphiniums. “Make her see sense! She isn’t getting any younger! You’re twenty-one now, Lettice. Lally was married to Charles by the time she was your age and carrying his first child.”
“Oh that’s just what you’d like, wouldn’t you Mamma? You’d like to see me siring sons to some dull old peer in the country somewhere, rather than living the life that I want to lead!”
“Lettice!” Viscount Wrexham’s thunderous boom stuns both women into momentary silence. “That’s no way to speak to your Mother! Apologise! At once!”
Lettice drops her head before looking up again and saying earnestly, “I’m sorry Mamma.” Then she adds, “It’s just the world is changing now. It isn’t the same as it was before the war when Lally was married. And I don’t want a life like Lally has.”
“Oh, I can’t abide this conversation any longer! I’m going upstairs!” Lady Sadie storms. “Cosmo, would you have Cook send the remainder of luncheon up on a tray to my room, please.”
“Of course, Sadie.” he demurs.
Lady Sadie marches across the room, her footsteps pounding with pent up frustration against the parquetry floor of the dining room. Opening the door, even she with all her breeding cannot help but slam it behind her as she leaves the room.
The pair sit in silence again for a few minutes, neither finishing their cream of cauliflower soup, which has now gone cold in their bowls.
“Was this American actress the one you came down here to research oriental antiquities for?” Viscount Wrexham breaks the silence, looking at his daughter.
Lettice remains silent.
“Was it?” The brooding look clouding the older man’s face scares the young girl sitting adjunct to him.
Lettice shrugs. “Yes.”
“You lied to me, my dear girl!” the older man gives his daughter a hurt look. “How could you lie to me, of all people? Me, who has always tried to support and defend you.” He sinks back into his seat, deflated. “How could you lie to me?”
“I didn’t lie, Pappa! I told you that I had a potential new client who was an American who had been living in Shanghai. None of those things were a lie.”
“Then what did you do, if you neglected to tell me that she was an actress.”
“I was being selective with the facts I shared.”
“Don’t be impertinent, Lettice!” Viscount Wrexham snaps back. “You didn’t tell me the whole truth, and you hurt me!”
“I’m sorry, Pappa.”
“So am I, Lettice. Not only have you broken my trust, but now your Mother will be in a bad mood for the rest of the day, and that bodes an ill wind for all of us.”
Poking his head around the butler’s pantry door, Bramley asks tentatively, “Shall I clear the plates now, My Lord?”
“Thank you Bramley.” As the butler starts to collect the bowls of unfinished soup, the Viscount adds. “And Bramley, could you have Cook take the rest of her ladyship’s luncheon up to her room on a tray. She has one of her heads.”
“Certainly, My Lord.”
After the butler leaves, Viscount Wrexham turns to his wayward daughter and says in a conciliatory tone, “I do know that what you say is true, Lettice. I understand that the world has changed since the war. However, you could make things just a little easier for all of us.”
“By doing what, Pappa?” she asks with a defensive look. “By doing what you and Mamma want and throw my business away, settle down to a boring life with someone and have a brood of children like Lally. Aren’t three grandchildren enough for you?”
“Now that isn’t fair, my girl.” he chides her. “Your Mother and I just want what’s best for you.”
“Don’t you think I should be the one to decide that?”
“But you’re so young.”
“Mamma evidently doesn’t think so.”
“You don’t know how the world works.”
“I know more than you think!”
“Listen Lettice, I shan’t command you to stop designing interiors, partially because I know you enjoy doing it, and I can’t bear to see you unhappy.” He pauses, a pitying look in his eyes. “But moreover, because I know you’d keep doing it just to spite me if I did.”
Lettice chuckles quietly, a cheeky smile gracing her lips. She is not surprised at how well her father knows her.
“That isn’t funny, Lettice.” he admonishes. “It’s a commentary on your wilfulness.”
Lettice stops smiling immediately and casts her eyes down into her lap where she screws up the fine linen napkin between her fingers.
“However,” Viscount Wrexham continues with a wagging finger, admonishing her laughter. “I’d be grateful if you would please heed my advice if you’d be so good as to take it from your own Father, and design for a few more reputable people. Then it wouldn’t gall your mother quite so much, and she wouldn’t be so quarrelsome with you, or me. You don’t have to decorate for all great and good of the land, but a few minor members of the gentry on your books wouldn’t go astray.”
“Anything else?” Lettice asks contritely through sad eyes as she realises for the first time that perhaps her choices cause her father some level of difficulty in the relationship he has with her mother too.
“Yes,” he adds. “Can you please make more of an effort at the Hunt Ball after Christmas.”
“Whatever do you mean, Pappa? I always make an effort! I love the ball and put a lot of effort into my costume for it.”
“I don’t mean your damnable fancy dress costume, Lettice.” he sighs. “Please don’t be obtuse. You have intelligence. It doesn’t become you to play the dunce. Even though your Mother will never admit to it, she knows how many young men were killed in the war. She knows that so many names will no longer appear on her list of invitations. However, not everyone came back maimed and damaged. Your Mother is planning a really dazzling Hunt Ball this year, and I don’t want it spoilt for her.”
“Well?” Lettice asks.
“She… err,” he clears his throat awkwardly. “She has already made some discreet enquiries about inviting some eligible young bachelors for you.”
Lettice rolls her eyes. “Oh Pappa!”
“No, Lettice!” he cautions as he settles back in his chair. “It will do you some good to socialise with some charming, handsome and socially suitable eligible young men of marriageable age. Think of it as atonement for not being completely honest with me.”
“But Pappa…”
“No, Lettice! Atonement is what it is. A lesson in humility as you bow to your old fashioned parents’ wishes. Of course, your Mother and I would prefer for you to marry an older man, after all I am a few years senior to her and in spite of some minor differences, our marriage has been a happy and successful one. However, you yourself have said that times have changed, and we must adapt to those changes, so if the men we introduce you to are more your own age, so be it.”
“That’s not what I meant by changing times, Pappa.”
“I know Lettice, but nevertheless consider this a concession from us, and please make an effort to dance with and charm them. It will please your Mother and I very much.” He looks earnestly at her. “Please?”
“Alright Pappa,” she acquiesces. “But only to please you.”
“Thank you Lettice.” Viscount Wrexham’s shoulders relax and he releases a pent up breath in relief. “And who knows, perhaps you will enjoy yourself with one, enough to marry him.”
“Don’t press me too hard, Pappa.” Lettice warns.
Contrary to what your eyes might tell you, this upper-class country house domestic scene is actually made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures, some of which come from my own childhood.
Fun things to look for in this tableau include:
The Chippendale dining room table and matching chairs are very special pieces. They came from the Petite Elite Miniature Museum, later rededicated as the Carol and Barry Kaye Museum of Miniatures, which ran between 1992 and 2012 on Los Angeles’ bustling Wiltshire Boulevard. One of the chairs still has a sticker under its cushion identifying which room of which dollhouse it came. The Petite Elite Miniature Museum specialised in exquisite and high end 1:12 miniatures. The furnishings are taken from a real Chippendale design.
The table is set correctly for a three course Edwardian luncheon, using cutlery and glassware from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in the United Kingdom. Each glass is hand blown using real glass. The cutlery set is made of polished metal. The crockery is made by an unknown English company and each piece has been gilded by hand and features a rose pattern on it. There is a matching lidded soup tureen and bowls standing on the small demi-lune table in the background. This dinner set I have built up over time by buying individual or odd pieces through various online auctions. The linen napkins and napkin rings were made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom. The silver cruet set, which peeps from behind Lettice’s glasses, has been made with great attention to detail, and comes from Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The fluted cranberry glass vase on the right hand edge of the photo, was made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures. Made of polymer clay they are moulded on wires to allow them to be shaped at will and put into individually formed floral arrangements, the very realistic looking purple delphiniums are made by a 1:12 miniature specialist in Germany.
The Georgian style fireplace I have had since I was a teenager and is made from moulded plaster. On its mantlepiece stand two 1950s Limoges vases. Both are stamped with a small green Limoges mark to the bottom. These treasures I found in an overcrowded cabinet at the Mill Markets in Geelong. Also standing on the mantlepiece are two miniature diecast lead Meissen figurines: the Lady with the Canary and the Gentleman with the Butterfly, hand painted and gilded by me. There is also a dome anniversary clock in the middle of the mantlepiece which I bought the same day that I bought the fireplace.
To the left of the photo stands an artisan bonheur de jour (French lady's writing desk). A gift from my Mother when I was in my twenties, she had obtained this beautiful piece from an antique auction. Made in the 1950s of brass it is very heavy. It is set with hand-painted enamel panels featuring Rococo images. Originally part of a larger set featuring a table and chairs, or maybe a settee as well, individual pieces from these hand-painted sets are highly collectable and much sought after. I never knew this until the advent of E-Bay!
The Hepplewhite chair with the lemon satin upholstery in the background was made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq.
All the paintings around the Glynes dining room in their gilded frames are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States and the wallpaper is an authentic copy of hand-painted Georgian wallpaper from the 1770s.