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 south of the Thames in the middle-class London suburb of Putney in the front room of a red brick Edwardian villa in Hazelwood Road, where Lettice has come to see her childhood chum Gerald’s friend, Harriet Milford. The orphaned daughter of a solicitor with little formal education, Harriet has taken in theatrical lodgers to earn a living, but more importantly for Lettice, has taken up millinery semi-professionally to give her some pin money*. As Harriet made Lettice a fetching picture hat for her brother Leslie’s wedding in November, Lettice thought that Harriet might benefit as much from her patronage as Lettice herself will by commissioning a new millinery creation for the wedding of Lettice’s friend Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon** who is marrying the Duke of York*** in a few months.

 

As the taxi she has taken from Mayfair putters away down the street, Lettice pushes on the black painted wrought iron gate flanked by two capped red brick pillars. It protests shrilly with the squeal of hinges as she opens it. She sighs and walks up the garden path snaking across a well clipped lawn. Lettice can hear the notes of an oboe being played as she walks.

 

“Coo-ee, Lettice darling!” comes a bright, rather effeminate call from above as the oboe music abruptly stops. Shading her eyes from the sun as she looks up, and peers to the roofline where she can see Cyril, one of Harriet’s theatrical lodgers, leaning out of his open oriel bedroom window above, waving madly. “Hattie! Hattie, Lettice is here!” he calls down over his shoulder. As well as being Harriet’s tenant, it has also come to light in more recent times that he is Gerald’s younger lover, and Lettice worries about Cyril’s indiscretion at being a homosexual, in comparison to Gerald who is very appropriately circumspect about his inclinations.

 

Without replying, she smiles and waves weakly in an understated way, embarrassed at being called to from above like a butcher’s boy or some other domestic. She glances around to make sure no-one has seen the interaction, not that there would be anyone she would likely know or run into in her upper-class circles in middle-class Hazelwood Road, Putney.

 

She goes to depress the doorbell next to the front door, but as she does, it is flung open exuberantly by Harriet, her mousy brown hair framing her pretty face, her bright print frock covered by a white cotton pinny, looking rather like the maids Lettice is used to answering doors for her, rather than mistress of the house she is about to enter. “How do you do, Miss Chetwynd!” she says brightly.

 

“Miss Milford.” Lettice replies with a pinched smile and a curt not of her head.

 

“Lord love Cyril, eh?” Harriet beams, glancing up, wincing into the unusually sunny sky above. “Who needs a doorbell when you can have an oboist trumpet your arrival. Right, Miss Chetwynd?”

 

“Err, quite.” Lettice says awkwardly.

 

“Right this way Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet says with a genuine smile of pleasure at receiving Lettice. “Well, you know the way.” she adds, flinging open the first door on the left side of the hallway and indicating with an extended arm for Lettice to enter her parlour cum salon. “I’ve got the kettle on already, and you can be the first to sample my freshly made fruitcake.”

 

“The second, actually, Hattie.” a rather deep and drooping male voice annunciates clearly. From behind Harriet’s shoulder, a mature man with white hair and an impressive, expertly waxed handlebar moustache appears dressed in full evening attire with a top hat in his hand. “I just appropriated a slice from the kitchen table on my way out. Good of you to cut it for me in anticipation of my expedient departure.”

 

“Oh you cheeky boy!” Harriet slaps the older gentleman on the forearm playfully. “Without even so much as a by-your leave!”

 

Eyeing Lettice standing in the hallway dressed in her powder blue three quarter length coat and matching hat with a large arctic fox fur wrapped around her neck and draped down her front, the man asks, “And who have we here Hattie, my dear? An ingénue come to steal away the hearts of your bevvy of lead actors?”

 

“No lady will ever steal your heart away!” she scoffs.

 

“Never a truer word was spoken, my dear.” He puts a hand to his mouth. “But a great thespian can put on a convincing act.”

 

“Miss Chetwynd, may I present Mr. Charles Dunnage.” Harriet announces. “Charles, this is the Honourable Miss Lettice Chetwynd.”

 

“The honour,” Charles replies. “Is all mine, dear lady.” Taking up Lettice’s kid glove clad hand in his own white evening glove clad ones, he raises it dramatically to his lips and kisses it.

 

“Oh, get away with you, Charles!” Harriet laughs. “We don’t want Miss Chetwynd thinking she’s entered a home for retired theatrical lunatics.” She turns to Lettice. “Sorry, Miss Chetwynd. Charles is a Shakespearean actor at the Old Vic****. I…”

 

“How many times must I tell you, Hattie!” Charles huffs irritably, suddenly animating his shoulders, making them rise and fall with every syllable. “I’m a thespian,” He emphasises the word with reverence. “Not an actor.” He spits the last word out like an insult. “He’s an actor.” He points upwards with his cane to the plastered ceiling above, where the sound of Cyril’s oboe playing can be heard. “Only true thespians can perform the works of the Great Bard. Anyone can be an actor, and anyone is!” He arches his eyebrows, causing her brow to furrow in folds of pale white flesh.

 

The oboe playing stops. “I can hear you, you know, Charlie Boy!” Cyril calls down from above.

 

Charles shudders. “Like I was saying, my dears,” he pronounces loudly so that Cyril can hear. “Anyone can be an actor, however only some of us have the strength of character to be a thespian!” Looking at Lettice he continues conspiratorially in a more moderately toned voice. “My dear Miss Chetwynd, I suggest you flee this den of iniquity and retreat to the salubrious surrounds from whence you came, before you are swept into the maelstrom of actors that pass through this door.”

 

Stunned into silence by his dramatic and verbose statement, Lettice can only look the older man in the face with wide eyes and a closed mouth.

 

“Oh get on with you, Charles,” Harriet laughs good naturedly. “Or you’ll be late for rehearsals. You don’t want to miss your train. When shall I be expecting you?”

 

“I’ll be home around eleven, my dear, but don’t feel you have to wait up. I have my latch key.” He reached into his pocket and pulls out a key tied to a russet coloured ribbon which he dangles from his finger.

 

“Right you are then, Charles. See you later then.”

 

And with a bow, the older man dons his top hat and sweeps down the garden path, his black evening cape billowing behind him.

 

“You must really think I run a theatrical madhouse, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet says apologetically with a shake of her head as both women watch Charles slip out the gate. “Please do go in and make yourself comfortable. I’ll be back in a jiffy***** with tea and what cake is left that Charles hasn’t yet consumed.”

 

Stepping across the threshold of the room, Lettice’s critical eye again glances around the front parlour of the Putney villa, which doubles as Harriet’s sewing room and show room for her hats. She crinkles her nose in distaste. She finds the room’s middle-class chintzy décor an affront to her up-to-date interior design sensitivities, with its flouncy floral Edwardian sofa and roomy armchair by the fire, a pouffe hand embroidered by Harriet’s deceased mother and the busy Edwardian floral wallpaper covered with a mixture of cheap botanical prints and quaint English country scenes, all in gaudy gilded plaster frames. Yet what makes it even worse is that it seems that no attempt has been made to tidy the room in spite of Lettice and Gerald’s constant nagging of Harriet to present her hats in an orderly space. Harriet’s concertina sewing box on casters still stands cascaded open next to the armchair, threads, embroidery silks, buttons and ribbons pouring from its compartments like entrails. Hats in different stages of being made up and decorated lie about on furniture or on the floor in a haphazard way along with baskets of millinery provisions. The brightly patterned rug is littered with spools of cotton, scissors, ribbon, artificial flowers and dogeared copies of Weldon’s****** magazines. Lettice usually sits on the rather lumpy and sagging overstuffed sofa, but today that is an impossibility, with the seats covered in cardboard hat boxs spewing forth a froth of white tissue paper and hats stacked upon them. She sighs irritably and remains standing amidst the chaos of the room, unable to take a seat.

 

“I really am grateful that you’ve come back to see me again, Miss Chetwynd!” Harriet gushes as she steps across the threshold into the parlour carrying her wooden tray on which stand tea things for two and a silver platter with several slices of dark fruitcake on it. “You were true to your word, telling people at your brother’s wedding about who made your hat, and I’ve already had an order from a Mrs. Minchinbury and her sister, Miss Rentoul.”

 

Harriet unloads the teapot, milk jug and sugar bowl onto a small hexagonal Indian table, and whilst balancing the tray on the edge of her deceased father’s former chess table, she pushes aside cotton threads, ribbons, a tape measure and a pair of scissors in the shape of a stork with her elbow to make room for the teacups and the tray of fruitcake slices, which Lettice notices rest upon a pretty lace doily.

 

“Ahh yes, they are my second cousins on my mother’s side.” Lettice says.

 

“And a Miss Eglantine Chetwynd from Little Venice, who I believe is your aunt.”

 

“She is, Miss Milford.” Lettice smiles.

 

“Please do sit down, Miss Chetwynd,” Harriet says as she leans the tray against the flounced edge of the sofa. “There’s no need to stand on ceremony here.”

 

“I’d be happy to, if only I had a place to sit, Miss Milford.” Lettice remarks crisply.

 

“Oh!” Harriet’s eyes grow wide. “Sorry, Miss Chetwynd,” she mutters apologetically as she quickly whisks a tangle of ribbons off the salon chair she uses when at her sewing machine onto the floor and draws it up to the Indian and chess tables. “I know you and Gerry keep telling me, but, well as you can see, I still haven’t had an opportunity to tidy up in here yet. I just don’t seem to get the time.”

 

“It’s of no consequence, Miss Milford, so long as I can sit.” Lettice lies as she perches on the salon chair and hangs her crocodile skin handbag over its arm. “And I would imagine my Aunt Egg would have rather enjoyed the chaos of your theatrical household.”

 

“She did, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet admits with a shy smile and a nod.

 

“Shall I be mother******* then, Miss Milford?” Lettice asks poignantly staring at the teapot.

 

“Oh no, Miss Chetwynd,” Harriet springs from her own seat in the overstuffed armchair. “I’ll do it.”

 

Resuming her line of conversation whilst Harriet pours tea into the two pre-war Edwardian style cups, Lettice says, “Of course Aunt Egg would like this because she is an artist. However the likes of my cousins, or some of the finer people, even more exalted and refined, you may yet encounter doubtless wouldn’t approve,” She waves her hand around her. “Of all this.”

 

“Well, Gerry tells me that I should give this place up and move to your side of the river.”

 

“Gerald’s suggestion is quite a prudent one, Miss Milford.” Lettice replies, taking her teacup and saucer and placing them on the closed lid of the top layer of Harriet’s concertina sewing box.

 

“But I can’t afford that,” Harriet admits as she resumes her own seat. “At least not until I know my hat making can support me.”

 

“Then I strongly suggest that you take Gerald’s and my advice and make the time to tidy up in here.” Lettice takes a sip of tea. “Not to be unkind, Miss Milford, but it’s slovenly, and if you want to be taken seriously as a milliner, you need to present a professional front. Surely there is an equally light and spacious room upstairs you can use as a workroom.”

 

“You’re quite right, Miss Chetwynd. That wasn’t unkind at all. It’s the truth,” She looks guiltily at Lettice. “And I know it. I’ll do better. I promise.”

 

“I should hope so, Miss Milford, for I have a commission for you, and if you take it up, which I hope you will,” Lettice pauses for a moment for impact. “It could lead to many more commissions from much finer people than my second cousins.”

 

“I’ll be delighted to accept, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet says, moving forward slightly on her chair, her teacup and saucer perched on her knee, help in place by her hand. “What do you wish to commission?”

 

“Before I tell you, do I have your solemn promise of secrecy, at least for the time being?”

 

“Yes of course, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet’s brow furrows with concern. “What on earth is it you want?”

 

“My friend, Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, is going to marry the Duke of York in a few months.”

 

“But the papers say she is supposed to marry the Prince of Wales********.”

 

“It’s not been officially announced yet,” Lettice interrupts Harriet’s spurt of unfounded gossip. “But it will be very shortly, that she will marry the Duke of York.” Her eyes widen a she nods at Harriet, making her statement of fact clear. “And I need a hat for the occasion, Miss Milford, but not that one.” She points to a hat of straw decorated with garlands of lace ribbons and faux flowers around its wide brim sitting in a hat stand on Harriet’s appropriated work table. “Who on earth is that for? It looks like something the Miss Evanses would wear to one of my mother’s tombolas.”

 

“Well, I’m not sure who the Miss Evanses are, Miss Chetwynd, but this hat is meant for Mrs. Leonowens who lives down the street. Her granddaughter is getting married next Wednesday. She was very particular about what kind of hat she wanted, and its trimmings.” Looking critically at the hat she adds. “I suppose she is a little old fashioned in her taste,” She shrugs. “But that’s what she wanted.”

 

“Well, I’m very relieved to hear you say that your Mrs. Leonowens decided what was to go on that hat, and not you.” Lettice says with a sigh of relief. “After the beautiful creation you made for me for Leslie’s wedding, I consider you to have more than an ounce of good taste,” Looking again around her critically she adds. “In clothing and hats at any rate.”

 

“I’ll take that as a compliment, Miss Chetwynd,” Harriet says somewhat warily, yet with a smile. “I take it that Gerry is going to design your frock for the royal wedding?”

 

“He is, Miss Milford. Although even I am still a little unclear of the exact date, I believe the wedding will be in late April or early May at Westminster Abbey, so a spring wedding. Gerald thinks that as Lady Elizabeth is quite romantic, and loves pastel colours, that I should wear peach floral crêpe de chine, which I’ve agreed to. What do you propose, Miss Milford?”

 

“Well, Gerry and I can chat more about this when he visits Cyril later in the week,” Harriet pauses. “I take it I can talk to Gerry about this? I’m not sworn to secrecy from him, am I?”

 

“Oh no, Miss Milford! Gerald knows Lady Elizabeth too, so he knows her news and will doubtless be on the guest list too.”

 

“Oh, that’s a relief!”

 

“But not Cyril, even if he and Gerald are…”

 

“Friends, Miss Chetwynd?”

 

“Friends, Miss Milford, you mustn’t mention why you are making this hat for me, at last until after the official announcement of the engagement is made in the newspapers. I do not wish to be the source of more gossip. I know Lady Elizabeth is very irritated by the current rumours.”

 

“I doubt Cyril will care to ask why I’m making a hat for you, Miss Chetwynd, but if he asks, I shall make up an excuse. Now, if your friend Lady Elizabeth is romantic, and looking at her pictures in the papers, in keeping with your friend’s style and something that would suit you as well, I suggest a deeply crowned hat with a wide, poke style brim.” She gesticulates around her own head how wide the brim would be and how it would sit. “Stiffened of course.” she adds. She looks at Lettice’s expectant face. “Made of apricot felt, edged with the thinnest trim of white lace I think and ornamented with pink and orange taffeta roses. What do you think, Miss Chetwynd?”

 

“That sounds quite splendid, Miss Milford!” Lettice says, returning her cup to her saucer and sitting back in her chair. “Yes, do it!”

 

“Splendid, Miss Chetwynd! It will be subtle and yet striking as well.” Harriet remarks. “You might even outshine the bride.” She giggles girlishly.

 

“I do hope not, Miss Milford.” Lettice replies, albeit with a slight smile.

 

“But secretly, you wouldn’t mind it if you did.” Harriet responds with a knowing look. “A slice of cake, Miss Chetwynd?” She holds out the silver tray on which lay four slices of rich, dark fruitcake with a thin layer of white marzipan icing.

 

Lettice saves herself from having to reply by putting the piece of cake to her lips and taking a bite of it, allowing the moist sliver to fall apart in her mouth.

 

*Originating in Seventeenth Century England, the term pin money first meant “an allowance of money given by a husband to his wife for her personal expenditures. Married women, who typically lacked other sources of spending money, tended to view an allowance as something quite desirable. By the Twentieth Century, the term had come to mean a small sum of money, whether an allowance or earned, for spending on inessentials, separate and in addition to the housekeeping money a wife might have to spend.

 

**Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, as she was known at the beginning of 1923 when this story is set, went on to become Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions from 1936 to 1952 as the wife of King George VI. Whilst still Duke of York, Prince Albert initially proposed to Elizabeth in 1921, but she turned him down, being "afraid never, never again to be free to think, speak and act as I feel I really ought to". He proposed again in 1922 after Elizabeth was part of his sister, Mary the Princess Royal’s, wedding party, but she refused him again. On Saturday, January 13th, 1923, Prince Albert went for a walk with Elizabeth at the Bowes-Lyon home at St Paul’s, Walden Bury and proposed for a third and final time. This time she said yes. The wedding took place on April 26, 1923 at Westminster Abbey.

 

***Prince Albert, Duke of York, known by the diminutive “Bertie” to the family and close friends, was the second son of George V. Not only did Bertie propose to Elizabeth in 1921, but also in March 1922 after she was a bridesmaid at the wedding of Albert’s sister, Princess Mary to Viscount Lascelles. Elizabeth refused him a second time, yet undaunted Bertie pursued the girl who had stolen his heart. Finally, in January 1923 she agreed to marry him in spite of her misgivings about royal life.

 

****The Old Vic theatre in the London borough of Lambeth was formerly the home of a theatre company that became the nucleus of the National Theatre. The company’s theatre building opened in 1818 as the Royal Coburg and produced mostly popular melodramas. In 1833 it was redecorated and renamed the Royal Victoria and became popularly known as the Old Vic. Between 1880 and 1912, under the management of Emma Cons, a social reformer, the Old Vic was transformed into a temperance amusement hall known as the Royal Victoria Hall and Coffee Tavern, where musical concerts and scenes from Shakespeare and opera were performed. Lilian Baylis, Emma Cons’s niece, assumed management of the theatre in 1912 and two years later presented the initial regular Shakespeare season. By 1918 the Old Vic was established as the only permanent Shakespearean theatre in London, and by 1923 all of Shakespeare’s plays had been performed there. The Old Vic grew in stature during the 1920s and ’30s under directors such as Andrew Leigh, Harcourt Williams, and Tyrone Guthrie.

 

*****The expression in a jiffy was in use as early as 1780. It is a colloquial English expression for “in a short amount of time.” The origins of jiffy are unknown, though there are theories. One suggestion is that it comes from British thieves’ slang for “lightning,” hence very fast. An early instance appears in 1780 edition of Town and Country Magazine: “Most of the limbs of the law do every thing in a jiffy”.

 

******Created by British industrial chemist and journalist Walter Weldon Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was the first ‘home weeklies’ magazine which supplied dressmaking patterns. Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was first published in 1875 and continued until 1954 when it ceased publication.

 

*******The meaning of the very British term “shall I be mother” is “shall I pour the tea?”

 

********In early January 1923 a newspaper ran a gossip item that Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon was soon to be engaged to Prince Albert the Duke of York’s elder brother, the Prince of Wales – a story that reportedly annoyed her. Rumour has it that part of Elizabeth’s hesitance to marry Albert was due to her being in love with David – the loftier “catch” – however, these stories are highly unlikely and probably have more to do with trying to explain her later hatred for Wallis Simpson. More likely, she knew that the story meant more pressure for her to make up her mind about Albert and she knew the rumour would wound him.

 

This rather cluttered and chaotic scene of a drawing room cum workroom may look real to you, but believe it or not, it is made up entirely with pieces from my 1:12 miniatures collection, including pieces from my childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism such as these are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. The natural straw hat with white lace ribbon trim and faux flower garlands on the table was made by an unknown artisan in the United Kingdom and was sold through Doreen Jeffrey’s Small Wonders miniatures shop.

 

The concertina sewing box on casters which you can see spilling forth its contents is an artisan miniature made by an unknown artist in England. It comes from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the in the United Kingdom. All the box’s contents including spools of ribbons, threads scissors and buttons on cards came with the work box. The box can completely expand or contract, just like its life-sized equivalent.

 

The black japanned fire screen in the background, the black metal fire tools and the potted plants and their stands all come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop.

 

Harriet’s family photos seen cluttering the mantlepiece in the background are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are almost all from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and are made of metal with glass in each.

 

The porcelain clock on the mantlepiece is made by M.W. Reutter Porzellanfabrik in Germany, who specialise in making high quality porcelain miniatures. The pot of yellow and blue petunias and the ornamental swan figurine on the mantlepiece have been hand made and painted by 1:12 miniature ceramicist Ann Dalton.

 

The tilt chess table I bought from Mick and Marie’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom, whilst the Indian hexagonal table comes from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The Edwardian tea set and plate of fruit cake slices on its surface come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop, as do the spools of threads, the silver sewing scissors in the shape of a stork and the spool of ribbon. The skeins of pink and blue thread I have had since I was a teenager, when I acquired the from a high street doll house miniature specialist shop.

 

The sewing basket that you can see on the floor just behind the chess table I bought from a high street shop that specialised in dolls and doll house furnishings. It is an artisan miniature and contains pieces of embroidery and embroidery threads.

 

The floral chintz chair is made by J.B.M. miniatures who specialise in well made pieces of miniature furniture made to exacting standards.

 

The Chinese carpet beneath the furniture is hand made by Mackay and Gerrish in Sydney, Australia.

 

The Edwardian mantlepiece is made of moulded plaster and was acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Doll’s House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The paintings and prints on the walls all come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll’s House in the United Kingdom.

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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.

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 letter to visit without delay or procrastination. Over luncheon, Lettice was berated by her parents for her recent decision to decorate the home of the upcoming film actress, Wanetta Ward. 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 receiving complaints about her choice of clients, Lettice was also scolded by mother for making herself unsuitable for any young man who might present as an eligible prospect. Although Lettice is undeniably her father’s favourite child, even he has been less than receptive to her recent choices of clients, which has put her a little out of favour with him. After Lady Sadie stormed out of the dining room over one of Lettice’s remarks, Viscount Wrexham implored his headstrong youngest daughter to try and make an effort with her mother, which is something she has been mulling over during her overnight stay.

 

Now Lettice stands in the grand Robert Adam decorated marble and plaster entrance hall of her family home as she prepares to take her leave. Outside on the gravel driveway, Harris the chauffer has the Chetwynd’s 1912 Daimler ready to drive her to the Glynes village railway station for the one fifteen to London. She has bid farewell to her brother Leslie and her father. Now there is just one final member of the family whom she needs to say goodbye to.

 

“Thank you Marsden.” Lettice remarks to the liveried first footman as he carries the last of Lettice’s luggage out to the Daimler.

 

“I hope you have a safe journey back to London, My Lady.” Bramley, the Chetwynd’s butler remarks as he walks into the entrance hall to see Lettice off.

 

“Thank you, Bramley,” Lettice replies. “Oh, I’m glad you are here. Do you know where my Mother might be?”

 

Considering her question, the old butler looks to the upper levels and ceiling of the hall before replying knowingly. “Well, it is still mid-morning according to Her Ladyship, so I would imagine that she will be in the morning room. Shall I go and see, My Lady?”

 

“No thank you Bramley. You have more than enough to do I’m sure, managing this old pile of bricks, without doing that for me. I’m perfectly capable of seeking her out for myself.”

 

Turning on her heel, Lettice walks away from the butler, her louis heels echoing off the marble tiles around the entrance hall in her wake.

 

“Mamma?” Lettice trills with false cheer as she knocks with dread on the walnut door to the morning room.

 

When there is no reply to her call, she considers two possibilities: either her mother is still in a funk with her and not speaking to her after the scene in the dining room yesterday, or she isn’t in the morning room at all. Both are as likely as each other. Taking a deep breath, she turns the handle and opens the door, calling her mother again as she does so.

 

The Glynes morning room is very much Lady Sadie’s preserve, and the original classical Eighteenth Century design has been overlayed with the comfortable Edwardian clutter of continual and conspicuous acquisition that is the hallmark of a lady of her age and social standing. China cabinets of beautiful porcelain line the walls. Clusters of mismatched chairs unholstered in cream fabric, tables and a floral chaise lounge, all from different eras, fill the room: set up to allow for the convivial conversation of the great and good of the county after church on a Sunday. The hand painted Georgian wallpaper can barely be seen for paintings and photographs in ornate gilded frames. The marble mantelpiece is covered by Royal Doulton figurines and more photos in silver frames. Several vases of flowers stand on occasional tables, but even their fragrance cannot smother her mother’s Yardley Lily of the Valley scent. Lady Sadie is nowhere to be seen but cannot have been gone long judging by her floral wake.

 

Walking over to the Eighteenth Century bonheur de jour* that stands cosily in a corner of the room, Lettice snorts quietly with derision as she looks at the baby photograph of Leslie, her eldest brother, which stands in pride of place in a big silver frame on the desk’s serpentine top, along with a significantly smaller double frame featuring late Nineteenth Century younger incarnations of her parents. Lettice, her sister Lally and brother Lionel have been relegated to a lesser hanging space on the wall, as befits the children seen as less important by their mother. Everything has always been about Leslie as far as their mother is concerned, and always has been for as long as Lettice can remember.

 

Lettice runs her fingers idly over several books sitting open on the desk’s writing space. There is a costume catalogue from London and a book on Eighteenth Century hairstyles. “Making plans for the Hunt Ball.” Lettice muses with a smile. It is then that she notices a much thicker book below the costume catalogue which has a familiar looking worn brown leather cover with a gilt tooled inlay. Moving the catalogue Lettice finds a copy of Debrett’s**

 

“Oh Mamma!” she exhales with disappointment as she shakes her head.

 

As she picks it up, she dislodges a partially written letter in her mother’s elegant copperplate hand from beneath it. Lettice knows she shouldn’t read it but can’t help herself as she scans the thick white paper embossed with the Wrexham coat of arms. Its contents make her face go from its usual creamy pallor to red with frustration.

 

“Ahh! Lettice!” Lady Sadie’s crisp intonation slices the silence as she walks into the morning room and discovers her daughter standing over her desk. “Heading back to London, are we?” she continues cheerily as she observes her daughter dressed in her powder blue travelling coat, matching hat and arctic fox fur stole. She smiles as she indicates to the desk’s surface. “I’m making plans for my outfit for the Hunt Ball. I thought I might come as Britannia this year.”

 

Lettice doesn’t answer her mother immediately as she continues to stare down at the letter next to her mother’s silver pen and bottle of ink. Remembering her father’s request, she draws upon her inner strength to try and remain civil as she finally acknowledges, “How appropriate that you should come as the all-conquering female warrior.”

 

“Lettice?” Lady Sadie remarks quizzically.

 

“Perhaps you might like to reconsider your choice of costume and come as my faerie godmother, since I’m coming as Cinderella.”

 

“Oh, now that’s a splendid idea! Although I don’t…”

 

“Or better yet, come as cupid instead!” Lettice interrupts her mother hotly, anger seething through her clipped tones as she tries to keep her temper.

 

“Now you’re just being foolish, Lettice,” Lady Sadie replies as she walks towards her daughter, the cheerful look on her face fading quickly as she notices the uncovered copy of Debrett’s on her desk’s surface.

 

“Not at all, Mamma! I think it’s most apt considering what you are trying to do.”

 

“Trying to do? What on earth are you talking about Lettice?” the older woman chuckles awkwardly, her face reddening a little as she reaches her bejewelled right hand up to the elegant strand of collar length pearls at her throat.

 

Lettice picks up the letter, dangling it like an unspoken accusation between herself and her mother before looking down at it and reading aloud, “My dear Lillie, we haven’t seen you at Glynes for so long. Won’t you, Marmaduke and Jonty consider coming to the Hunt Ball this year? Do you remember how much Jonty and my youngest, Lettice, used to enjoy playing together here as children? I’m sure that now that they are both grown, they should be reacquainted with one another.” She lowers her hand and drops the letter on top of the edition of Debrett’s like a piece of rubbish before looking up at her mother, giving her a cool stare.

 

“It isn’t ladylike to read other people’s correspondence, Lettice!” Lady Sadie quips as she marches up to her desk and snatches the letter away from Lettice’s reach, lest her daughter should cast it into the fire cracking peaceably in the grate.

 

“Is it ladylike to arrange the lives of two strangers without discussing it?”

 

“It has long been the prerogative of mothers to arrange their children’s marriages.” The older woman defends herself. “And you and Jonty Hastings aren’t strangers, Lettice. You and he…”

 

“Haven’t seen each other since we were about six years old, when we played in the hedgerows together and had tea in the nursery with Nanny Webb after she had washed the mud off us!”

 

“Well, all the better for the two of you to become reacquainted then, as I’m suggesting to his mother.” She runs her fingers along the edges of the letter in her hands defiantly. “And I am going to send this letter, Lettice,” Her voice gathers a steely tone of determination. “Whether you like it, or lump it.”

 

“Yes, Pappa told me after you,” she pauses for a moment to consider her words carefully. “Left, us at luncheon yesterday, that you had been making some discreet enquiries about inviting some eligible young bachelors for me to the ball this year.”

 

“And so I have, Lettice.” Lady Sadie sniffs. “Since you seem incapable of finding yourself a suitable match even after your successful debut London Season, I have taken it upon myself to do some…”

 

“Matchmaking, Mamma?”

 

“Arranging, Lettice. Tarquin Howard, Sir John Nettleford-Hughes…”

 

“Sir John is as old as the hills!” Lettice splutters in disbelief. “You surely can’t imagine I’d consider him a likely prospect!”

 

“Sir John is an excellent match, Lettice. You can hardly fail to see how advantageous it would be to marry him.”

 

“Once I look past the twenty five, no more, years age difference. No, better he be chased by some social climbing American woman looking for an entrée into the society pages. Perhaps I should ask Miss Ward to the ball. I’m sure she would love to meet Sir John.”

 

Lady Sadie’s already pale face drains of any last colour at the thought of an American moving picture star walking into her well planned ball. “Well, if you won’t countenance Sir John, I’ve also invited Edward Lambley and Selwyn Spencely.”

 

“Selwyn Spencely?” Lettice laughs. “The guest list just gets more and more implausable.”

 

“What’s so implausible about Selwyn Spencely, Lettice? The Spencelys are a very good family. Selwyn has a generous income which will only increase when he eventually takes his father’s place as the next Viscount Markham. He inherited a house in Belgravia from his grandfather when he came of age, so you two can continue to live in London until you become chatelaine of Markham Park.”

 

“Can you hear yourself, Mamma?” Lettice cries as she raises her arms in exasperation, any good will she tried to muster for her Mother quickly dissipating. “Do you want to pick what wedding gown I am to wear too?” Lettice laughs again. “Selwyn and I haven’t laid eyes on each other for almost as long as Jonty and I.”

 

“Well, he’s grown into a very handsome young man, Lettice. I’ve seen his photograph in The Lady.” Her mother bustles across the end of the floral chaise where a pile of well fingered magazines sit. “Look, I can show you.”

 

“Oh, please don’t Mamma!” Lettice throws her hands up in protest. “Please don’t add insult to injury.”

 

Lady Sadie turns around, a hurt look on her face. “How can you say that to me, Lettice? I’m only trying to do right by you, by securing a suitable and advantageous marriage for you.”

 

“But what about love, Mamma?” Lettice sighs. “What if I don’t wish to marry at all? What if I am happy just running my interior design business.”

 

“Oh what nonsense, Lettice! The younger generation are so tiresome. All this talk of love! I blame those moving pictures your Ward woman stars in that you and your friends all flock to slavishly! Your Father and I had our marriage arranged. We weren’t in love.” She emphasises the last two words with a withering tone. “We’d only even met a handful of times before we were married. Love came naturally in time, and look how happy we are.” She smiles smugly with self satisfaction. “And as for your business, you aren’t Syrie Maugham***, Lettice. You’ve always been told, from an early age, that your duty as a daughter of a member of this great and noble family, even as the youngest daughter, is to marry and marry well.” She sinks onto the chaise. “This foolishness about interior design,” She flaps her glittering fingers distractedly at Lettice. “Will have to end when you get married. Whether it be Jonty, Nicolas or Selwyn, you’ll have to give it up. No respectable man of position and good breeding will have his wife working as a decorator! He’d be ashamed!”

 

At her mother’s harsh words, Lettice abandons any attempt to try and make an effort with her. She looks up to the ornate white painted plaster ceiling and crystal chandelier hanging in the middle of the room as she clenches her hands into fists. “Well,” she looks angrily at her mother. “We wouldn’t want my future husband to be ashamed of my success, now would we?”

 

“What success, Lettice?” her mother scoffs. “You were only able to decorate Gwendolyn’s small drawing room because I asked her to allow you to do it.”

 

“I’ve plenty of clients now, no thanks to you, Mamma!”

 

“Dickie and Margot don’t count, dear,” Lady Sadie replies dismissively as she fingers the edges of a copy of the Tattler distractedly. “They are your friends. Of course they were going to ask you to decorate their house.”

 

Lettice gasps as though her mother just punched all the air out of her chest. She stands, silent for a moment, her face flushing with embarrassment and anger. “You’ve always been so cruel to me Mamma, ever since I was little.”

 

“And you’ve always been so stubborn and obstinate, ever since you were a child! Goodness knows what I did to deserve a wilful daughter. Lally was so lovely and pliable, and certainly no trouble to marry off.” She folds her hands neatly in her lap over her immaculately pressed tweed skirt and looks up at her daughter. “I don’t mean to be harsh, Lettice, but someone has to make you see sense. Goodness knows your Father can’t, what with him wound around your little finger! You will have to marry eventually, Lettice, and preferably soon. It’s a foregone conclusion. It’s what is expected of you, and as I said yesterday, you aren’t getting any younger, and you certainly don’t want to be left stuck on the shelf. Just think of the shame it would bring you.”

 

“More think of the shame it would bring you, Mamma.” Lettice spits bitterly. “To have a daughter who is a spinster, an old maid, and in trade to boot!”

 

“Now there is no need to be overtly nasty, Lettice.” Lady Sadie mutters brittlely. “It’s unbecoming.”

 

A little gilt clock on an occasional table chimes one o’clock prettily.

 

“Mamma, however much I would love to sit here and share bitter quips and barbs with you all day over a pot of tea, I really do have to leave!” Lettice says with finality. “I have a train to catch. Gerald and I have a reservation at the Café Royal**** tonight.” She walks over to her mother, bends down and goes to kiss her cheek, but the older woman stiffens as she averts her daughter’s touch. Lettice sighs as she raises herself up again. “I’ll see you in a week for Dickie and Margot’s wedding and then after that for Bonfire Night*****.”

 

“Hopefully you’ll have come to your senses about marriage and this ridiculous designing business by then.”

 

Lettice raises her head proudly and takes a deep breath before turning away from her mother and walks with a purposeful stride across the room. “No I won’t, Mamma.” she says defiantly. As she opens the door to leave the morning room, she turns back to the figure of her mother sitting facing away from her towards the fire. “Pappa asked me to make an effort at the Hunt Ball, and I will. I will dance and flirt with whomever you throw in my general direction, be they old, blind or bandy-legged.” She sees her mother’s shoulders stiffen, indicating silently that she is listening, even if she doesn’t want to acknowledge that she is. “However, be under no pretence Mamma. I am doing it for him, and not you.”

 

“Lettice…” Lady Sadie’s voice cracks.

 

“And,” Lettice cuts her off sharply. “No matter who I dance with, or charm, I will not marry any of them. Goodbye Mamma.”

 

Lettice closes the door quietly behind her and walks back down the hallway to the entrance hall. She walks through the front doors with her head aloof, and steps into the back of the waiting Daimler. Marsden closes its door and Harris starts the engine. The chauffer can sense the tension seething through his passenger as she huffs and puffs in the spacious rear cabin, dabbing her nose daintily with a lace edged handkerchief, so he remains quiet as he steers the car down the sweeping driveway. As the car pulls away from Glynes basking in the early afternoon autumnal sun, Lettice can almost feel two sets of eyes on her back: one pair from her father looking sadly out from the library and the other her mother’s peering critically from behind the morning room curtains.

 

*A bonheur de jour is a type of lady's writing desk. It was introduced in Paris by one of the interior decorators and purveyors of fashionable novelties called marchands-merciers around 1760, and speedily became intensely fashionable. Decorated on all sides, it was designed to sit in the middle of a room so that it could be admired from any angle.

 

**The first edition of Debrett's Peerage of England, Scotland, and Ireland, containing an Account of all the Peers, 2 vols., was published in May 1802, with plates of arms, a second edition appeared in September 1802, a third in June 1803, a fourth in 1805, a fifth in 1806, a sixth in 1808, a seventh in 1809, an eighth in 1812, a ninth in 1814, a tenth in 1816, an eleventh in 1817, a twelfth in 1819, a thirteenth in 1820, a fourteenth in 1822, a fifteenth in 1823, which was the last edition edited by Debrett, and not published until after his death. The next edition came out in 1825. The first edition of The Baronetage of England, containing their Descent and Present State, by John Debrett, 2 vols., appeared in 1808. Today, Debrett's is a British professional coaching company, publisher and authority on etiquette and behaviour. It was founded in 1769 with the publication of the first edition of The New Peerage. The company takes its name from its founder, John Debrett.

 

***Syrie Maugham was a leading British interior decorator of the 1920s and 1930s and best known for popularizing rooms decorated entirely in shades of white. She was the wife of English playwright and novelist William Somerset Maugham.

 

****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.

 

****Guy Fawkes Day, also called Bonfire Night, British observance, celebrated on November the fifth, commemorating the failure of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Guy Fawkes and his group members acted in protest to the continued persecution of the English Catholics. Today Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated in the United Kingdom, and in a number of countries that were formerly part of the British Empire, with parades, fireworks, bonfires, and food. Straw effigies of Fawkes are tossed on the bonfire, as are—in more recent years in some places—those of contemporary political figures. Traditionally, children carried these effigies, called “Guys,” through the streets in the days leading up to Guy Fawkes Day and asked passersby for “a penny for the guy,” often reciting rhymes associated with the occasion, the best known of which dates from the Eighteenth Century.

 

Cluttered with paintings, photographs and furnishings, Lady Sadie’s morning room with its Georgian furnishings is different from what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The books on Lady Sadie’s desks are 1:12 size miniatures made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Most of the books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. Therefore, it is a pleasure to give you a glimpse inside two of the books he has made. One of the books is a French catalogue of fancy dress costumes from the late Nineteenth Century, and the other is a book of Georgian hairstyes. To give you an idea of the work that has gone into these volumes, each book contains twelve double sided pages of illustrations and they measure thirty-three millimetres in height and width and are only three millimetres thick. What might amaze you even more is that all Ken Blythe’s opening books are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. The 1908 Debrett’s Peerage book is also made by Ken Blythe, but does not open. He also made the envelopes sitting in the rack to the left of the desk and the stamps you can see next to the ink bottle. The stamps are 2 millimetres by two millimetres each! Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, as well as through his estate via his daughter and son-in-law. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter. I hope that you enjoy this peek at just two of hundreds of his books that I own, and that it makes you smile with its sheer whimsy!

 

On the desk is a 1:12 artisan miniature ink bottle and a silver pen, both made by the Little Green Workshop in England who specialise in high end, high quality miniatures. The ink bottles is made from a tiny faceted crystal bead and has a sterling silver bottom and lid.

 

The Chetwynd’s family photos seen on the desk and hanging on the walls are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are almost all from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and are made of metal with glass in each. The largest frame on the right-hand side of the desk is actually a sterling silver miniature frame. It was made in Birmingham in 1908 and is hallmarked on the back of the frame. It has a red leather backing.

 

The vase of primroses in the middle of the desk is a delicate 1:12 artisan porcelain miniature made and painted by hand by Ann Dalton.

 

The desk and its matching chair is a Salon Reine design, hand painted and copied from an Eighteenth Century design, made by Bespaq. All the drawers open and it has a lidded rack at either end. Bespaq is a high-end miniature furniture maker with high attention to detail and quality.

 

The wallpaper is a copy of an Eighteenth Century blossom pattern.

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 the little maid’s room off the Cavendish Mews kitchen, which serves as Edith, Lettice’s maid’s, bedroom. The room is very comfortable and more spacious than the attic she shared with her friend and fellow maid, Hilda, in her last position. The room is papered with floral sprigged wallpaper, and whilst there is no carpet, unlike Lettice’s bedroom, there are rugs laid over the stained floorboards. The room is big enough for Edith to have a comfortable armchair and tea table as well as her bed, a chest of drawers and a small wardrobe. Best of all, the room has central heating, so it is always warm and cosy on cold nights.

 

Friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) in Penzance as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot in her desire to turn ‘Chi an Treth’ from a dark Regency house to a more modern country house flooded with light, has commissioned Lettice to help redecorate some of the rooms in a lighter and more modern style, befitting a modern couple like the Channons. Lettice has decamped to Penzance for a week where she is overseeing the painting and papering of ‘Chi an Treth’s’ drawing room, dining room and main reception room, before fitting it out with a lorryload of new and repurposed furnishings, artwork and objets d’arte that she has had sent down weeks prior to her arrival. In her mistress’ absence, Edith has more free time on her hands, and so she is spending the morning pleasurably laying out some new fabric that she recently bought from a haberdasher’s in Whitechapel and cutting out the pieces for a new frock she has been wanting to make for a few weeks, but hasn’t had the time to do so before now owing to Lettice having her future sister-in-law as a houseguest.

 

Today is Tuesday and on Tuesdays, every third Thursday of the month and occasionally after a big party, Mrs. Boothby, Lettice’s charwoman*, comes from her home in Poplar to do all the hard jobs.

 

Edith is so emersed in running her hands joyfully over the soft cotton fabric featuring sprigs of pretty blue flowers that she doesn’t hear the familiar sounds of Mrs. Boothby as she climbs the service stairs of Cavendish Mews: her footfall in her low heeled shoes that she proudly tells Edith came ‘practically new from Petticoat Lane**’, nor the fruity cough that comes from deep within her wiry little body.

 

“Morning dearie!” Mrs. Boothby calls cheerily as she comes through the servants’ entrance door into the kitchen.

 

“Oh, morning Mrs. Boothby,” Edith calls in reply through her bedroom door. “I’m in here.”

 

The old Cockney woman’s head appears around the doorframe, her wiry grey hair hidden beneath a dark blue cloche hat, another purchase from Petticoat Lane, which frames her heavily wrinkled face. “Aye! Aye!” she says good naturedly with a cheery smile. “What ‘ave we ‘ere then? Whilst the cat’s away.”

 

Edith’s face flushes with embarrassment at Mrs. Boothby’s remark.

 

“Oh I’m only teasin’, dearie!” the old woman laughs, emitting another fruity cough from deep within her lungs as she does so. “What’s that what you’re doin’ then?”

 

“Well, with Miss Lettice being away,” Edith replies a little coyly. “I have a bit more free time, so I thought I’d make the most of it and cut out the pattern for a new frock I’m making. I was hoping to have it finished in time for summer, for when Frank and I went walking in Hyde Park, but I suppose Autumn is as good as summer for a new frock.”

 

“Course it is, dearie!” Mrs. Boothby concurs. She bends down with a groan and picks up a copy of Weldon’s*** Dressmaker magazine off the floor by the foot of Lettice’s armchair and looks at the four smart outfits on the front cover. “Any time’s the perfect time for a new frock if you ask me – ‘specially when someone is as pretty as you! What a picture you’ll look steppin’ out with Frank Ledbetter in that pretty pattern.” She scruitinises the fabric, admiring the blue flowers interwoven with stems and leaves in olive green on a cream background. “That come from Mrs. Minkin’s then?”

 

“It does, Mrs. Boothby,” beams Edith. “I can’t thank you enough for telling me about her. She’s a much better haberdasher than the old one I used to use in Holborn.”

 

“I should fink she would be,” Mrs. Boothby replies loftily with an appreciative nod. “We East Enders know better ‘n anyone ‘bout how to sew and patch a dress, and turn a silk purse from a sow’s ear, ‘cause that’s all we get.”

 

“Mrs. Minkin is so generous. Look. She gave me these buttons as a gift.” She withdraws a card of six faceted Art Deco glass buttons and wafts them in front of the old charwoman.

 

“Aye. She’s a gooden, that one. Not all Russian Yids**** is like that Golda Friedman what goes round my rookery***** wiv ‘er nose in the air like she was the Queen of Russia ‘erself. Mrs. Minkin’s taken a shine to you, that’s for certain. Tried to marry you off to one of her sons yet, ‘as she?”

 

Edith blushes again. “Well, she did, until I explained to her that I was stepping out with Frank.”

 

“Well, them Yids tend to marry uvver Yids anyways, so I s’pose it don’t matter that much. She’ll still treat you like ‘er surrogate daughter ‘til one of ‘em marries, and even then, she’ll probably still treat you special ‘cause youse so nice to ‘er, ‘cause you’re such a good girl.”

 

“Oh I don’t know about that, Mrs. Boothby,” Edith scoffs. “I just treat people as I’d like to be treated. Isn’t that what we all learned in Sunday School.”

 

“I’m not much of a church goer myself, but that’s one rule I do know and agree wiv, dearie. Nah, thinkin’ of treatin’ folk, I ain’t ‘alf parched after me trip up from Poplar this mornin!”

 

“Was the traffic bad again, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Bad? You should’ve seen the traffic at Tottenham Court Road, dearie! Quite bunged up it was! Nah, ‘ow about a nice reviving cup of Rosie-Lee*****, eh?”

 

“Oh, of course, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith says cheerily, pushing herself up off her knees and standing up.

 

A short while later, Edith and Mrs. Boothby are seated around Edith’s deal table which dominates the floorspace of the Cavendish Mews kitchen.

 

“Ta!” Mrs Boothby says. “Lovely.” She accepts the cup of tea proffered to her by Edith, and sticks a biscuit from the Hunley and Palmers******* tin on the table between her teeth and then starts fossicking through her capacious beaded bag before withdrawing her cigarette papers, Swan Vestas and tin of Player’s Navy Cut. Rolling herself a cigarette she reaches over to the deal dresser and grabs the black pottery ash tray Edith keeps for her. Lighting her cigarette with a satisfied sigh and one more of her fruity coughs, Mrs. Boothby settles back happily in the Windsor chair she sits in with her cigarette in one hand and the biscuit in the other.

 

Edith shudders almost imperceptibly. She hates the older woman’s habit of smoking indoors. When she lived with her parents, neither smoked in the house. Her mother didn’t smoke at all: it would have been unladylike to do so, and her father only smoked a pipe when he went down to the local pub. Nevertheless, she knows this is Mrs. Boothby’s morning ritual, and for all the hard work that the old woman does around the flat, Edith cannot deny her one of her few pleasures.

 

“I do like a nice ‘Untley and Palmer******* breakfast biscuit to go wiv me Rosie-Lee?” Mrs. Boothby sighs as she munches loudly on the biscuit, spilling a shower of golden brown crumbs into her lap as she speaks.

 

“I’m glad Mrs. Boothby,” Edith replies genuinely pleased as she pours herself a cup of tea.

 

“So dearie,” Mrs. Boothby queries. “Gonna whip your frock up on the sewin’ machine this afternoon are you?”

 

“This afternoon?” Edith looks questioning at Mrs. Boothby.

 

“Yes dearie, nah that you ‘ave the time on your ‘ands. Are you gonna stitch it up on your sewin’ machine?”

 

“Oh, I don’t have a sewing machine, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith adds sugar and milk to her tea and stirs her cup.

 

“Not got a sewin’ machine, dearie?” Mrs. Boothby draws deeply on her cigarette.

 

“No, Mrs. Boothby. There has never been one here, ever since I came to Cavendish Mews. No, I’ll take the cut pieces down to Mum’s when I visit her later in the week. She has a little Singer******** treadle that I can use.”

 

“Can you buy yourself one?”

 

“At forty pounds? I hardly think so!”

 

“You could get one through hire purchase********.”

 

“If I can’t afford one of Mrs. Minkin’s dressed hats, how can I possibly afford a sewing machine, even on hire purchase, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Well, can’t Miss Lettice buy you one then, dearie?” A plume of bluish grey smoke bursts forth in a tumbling cloud from the old woman’s mouth as she speaks.

 

Edith shakes her head as she selects a biscuit from the tin. “There’s no call for it, Mrs. Boothby. I seldom have to do any mending. Miss Lettice has Mr. Bruton mend any clothes for her. If she tears one of her stockings she simply goes and orders a new pair. The same can be said for any other article of clothing Mr. Bruton doesn’t make for her.”

 

“Lawd, to be that rich that I could toss a torn pair of stockings in the dustbin and buy a new pair wivvout thinkin’ twice!”

 

“I know. It seems like a wicked extravagance to me too, but I suppose Miss Lettice has always lived her life like that.”

 

“Yes,” Mrs. Boothby nods sagely as she slurps her tea loudly. “The ‘aves and ‘ave nots.”

 

“And any repairs required to the linen are done by the commercial laundry we use. No, I’ll take the pieces down to Mum’s and I can spend the afternoon there and sew it up then. She won’t mind.”

 

“Course she won’t mind, dearie. I just fink it’s a shame you don’t ‘ave your own sewin’ machine to make your own frocks on.”

 

“I get by well enough Mrs. Boothby, and Mum knows that if she ever wants to give up using it, I’ll have her Singer.”

 

The old charwoman nods and contemplates as she looks at Edith over the top of her own tea cup through the curtain of blueish grey cigarette smoke as she sips her tea.

 

An hour and a half later when Mrs. Boothby has finished scrubbing the bathroom, washing the kitchen linoleum and polishing the drawing room and dining room floors, she pops her head around Edith’s bedroom door again, where the young maid kneels laying out crisp white tissue paper patterns that she pins to the fabric before cutting them out with her shears. “Well, I’ll be off then, Edith dearie! I’ll see you Thursday.”

 

Edith looks up, her shears clasped in her right hand. “Yes, see you Thursday Mrs. Boothby. Even if I go down to Mum’s on Thursday, I’ll still be here in the morning to let you in.”

 

“Alright dearie. I’ll do Miss Lettice’s bedroom floor and the ‘allways on Thursday, and I’ll do the black leading. I’ll ‘elp you turn Miss Lettice’s mattress too, like we talked about.”

 

“Very good Mrs. Boothby.”

 

Mrs. Boothby looks down across Edith’s little chamber and takes in the Weldon’s and Lady’s World Fancy Workbook********** magazines scattered across the floor, Edith’s precious lacquered sewing box, a gift from her mother, from which spill knitting needles, spools of thread, pins and a tape measure, cards of buttons from Mrs, Minkin’s Haberdashery, her shears and the patterns for several fashionable frocks. The old Cockney sighs.

 

“Is anything wrong Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks, her own face filling with concern as she stares up into the thought filled face of the older woman.

 

“Well, I was just thinkin’ dearie.” She squeezes her pointy chin between her thumb and index finger thoughtfully.

 

“Yes, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“’Ow long is Miss Lettice away for?”

 

“At least until mid next week. She’s gone to redecorate Mr. and Mrs. Channon’s house down in Penzance and she is staying for an extra day or two afterwards to gauge their happiness with her designs and organise any changes. I think Mr. Bruton will be going down too at the end, as he is supposed to be bringing her back up to London in his motor.”

 

“So she’ll still be gone on Friday?”

 

“I certainly expect so. Why do you ask, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Well, I was just thinkin’ dearie, that I might ‘ave a solution for your sewin’ machine problem. Can you come dahn to my ‘ouse in Poplar on Friday afternoon when I finish work about midday?”

 

“I suppose so, Mrs. Boothby.” the young girl replies, rather perplexed. “But why?”

 

“Oh, never you mind nah, dearie. Give me a few days to see if I can’t sort somethin’ out. I’ll come pick you up about ‘alf twelve from ‘ere. Alright dearie?” She smiles broadly at Edith, showing her badly nicotine stained teeth, but the smile is a kindly one.

 

“Very well, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith replies with her own bemused smile. “I’ll be ready. What do I need to bring.”

 

“Oh just yourself, dearie. Nuffink more. Well, ta-ta then dearie. Till Friday.” And the old woman shuffles out, her familiar footfall announcing her departure.

 

*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.

 

**Petticoat Lane Market is a fashion and clothing market in Spitalfields, London. It consists of two adjacent street markets. Wentworth Street Market and Middlesex Street Market. Originally populated by Huguenots fleeing persecution in France, Spitalfields became a center for weaving, embroidery and dying. From 1882, a wave of Jewish immigrants fleeing persecution in eastern Europe settled in the area and Spitalfields then became the true heart of the clothing manufacturing district of London. 'The Lane' was always renowned for the 'patter' and showmanship of the market traders. It was also known for being a haven for the unsavoury characters of London’s underworld and was rife with prostitutes during the late Victorian era. Unpopular with the authorities, as it was largely unregulated and in some sense illegal, as recently as the 1930s, police cars and fire engines were driven down ‘The Lane’, with alarm bells ringing, to disrupt the market.

 

***Created by British industrial chemist and journalist Walter Weldon Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was the first ‘home weeklies’ magazine which supplied dressmaking patterns. Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was first published in 1875 and continued until 1954 when it ceased publication.

 

****The word Yid is a Jewish ethnonym of Yiddish origin. It is used as an autonym within the Ashkenazi Jewish community, and also used as slang. When pronounced in such a way that it rhymes with did by non-Jews, it is commonly intended as a pejorative term. It is used as a derogatory epithet, and as an alternative to, the English word 'Jew'. It is uncertain when the word began to be used in a pejorative sense by non-Jews, but some believe it started in the late Nineteenth or early Twentieth Century when there was a large population of Jews and Yiddish speakers concentrated in East London, gaining popularity in the 1930s when Oswald Mosley developed a strong following in the East End of London.

 

*****A rookery is a dense collection of housing, especially in a slum area. The rookeries created in Victorian times in London’s East End were notorious for their cheapness, filth and for being overcrowded.

 

******Rosie-Lee is Cockney slang for tea, and it is one of the most well-known of all Cockney rhyming slang.

 

*******Huntley and Palmers is a British firm of biscuit makers originally based in Reading, Berkshire. The company created one of the world’s first global brands and ran what was once the world’s largest biscuit factory. Over the years, the company was also known as J. Huntley and Son and Huntley and Palmer. Huntley and Palmer were renown for their ‘superior reading biscuits’ which they promoted in different varieties for different occasions, including at breakfast time.

 

********The Singer Corporation is an American manufacturer of consumer sewing machines, first established as I. M. Singer & Co. in 1851 by Isaac M. Singer with New York lawyer Edward C. Clark. Best known for its sewing machines, it was renamed Singer Manufacturing Company in 1865, then the Singer Company in 1963. In 1867, the Singer Company decided that the demand for their sewing machines in the United Kingdom was sufficiently high to open a local factory in Glasgow on John Street. The Vice President of Singer, George Ross McKenzie selected Glasgow because of its iron making industries, cheap labour, and shipping capabilities. Demand for sewing machines outstripped production at the new plant and by 1873, a new larger factory was completed on James Street, Bridgeton. By that point, Singer employed over two thousand people in Scotland, but they still could not produce enough machines. In 1882 the company purchased forty-six acres of farmland in Clydebank and built an even bigger factory. With nearly a million square feet of space and almost seven thousand employees, it was possible to produce on average 13,000 machines a week, making it the largest sewing machine factory in the world. The Clydebank factory was so productive that in 1905, the U.S. Singer Company set up and registered the Singer Manufacturing Company Ltd. in the United Kingdom.

 

*********The hire purchase agreement was developed in Britain in the Nineteenth Century to allow customers with a cash shortage to make an expensive purchase they otherwise would have to delay or forgo. These contracts are most commonly used for items such as automobiles and high-value electrical goods where the purchasers are unable to pay for the goods directly. However in the 1920s and 1930s, they were also available for furnishings such as lounge suites and bedroom suites.

 

**********Published by Horace Marshall and Son of London since the 1850s, the Lady’s World Fancy Work Book, like Weldon’s, was a magazine which supplied dressmaking knitting, crochet and embroidery patterns. It was published quarterly on the first of the month in January, April, July and October.

 

This cheerful and busy domestic scene is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The copies of Weldon’s Dressmaker and the Lady’s World Fancy Work Book are 1:12 size miniatures made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Most of the books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. In this case, the magazines are non-opening, however what might amaze you is that all Ken Blythe’s books and magazines are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, as well as through his estate via his daughter and son-in-law. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter.

 

The Superior Quality buttons on cards are in truth tiny beads. They, along with the spool of cotton in the foreground, the sewing box, the spools of cottons pincushion, tape measure, silver embroidery scissors and the knitting needles in it all come from various online shops who sell dollhouse miniatures.

 

The patterns for three afternoon dresses are genuine 1922 modes and come from Chic Parisien Beaux-Arts de Modes and are modes 386, 387 and 388.

 

The shears with black handles on the fabric open and close. Made of metal, they came from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniature Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The fabric is real, and is a small corner of a few metres I acquired to have made into a shirt. Unfortunately, I cannot remember the name of the pattern.

 

The corner of Edith’s armchair that can be seen in the top of the photo is upholstered in blue chintz, and is made to the highest quality standards by J.B.M. Miniatures. The back and seat cushions come off the body of the armchair, just like a real piece of furniture.

 

The floorboards are a print of a photo taken of some floorboards that I scaled to 1:12 size to try and maintain a realistic look.

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 northwest of Lettice’s flat, in the working-class London suburb of Harlesden where Edith, Lettice’s maid, grew up. She is visiting her parents as she often does on her Wednesdays off, and today she is helping her mother, Ada, shop for groceries and the pair have been traversing the Harlesden high street. They have visited the local grocers where Ada has filled her basket with some of her household staples: lettuce and apples, some Bisto gravy powder, Oxo stock cubes, Ty-Phoo tea and some bars of Hudson’s Soap, the latter of which she will grate in her laundry to make soap flakes to wash the laundry she takes in to help supplement the family’s income. Now the pair are at Mr. Chapman’s, the local butcher. As the two ladies walk through the door, the shop bell rings out cheerfully to announce their arrival.

 

“Hullo Mrs. Watsford.” Mr. Chapman calls cheerily from his bench against the far wall behind the counter, where dressed in his familiar uniform of a navy blue vest and a blue and white striped apron he glances over his shoulder. He pauses slicing up some ham turns and smiles cheerily at the two women. “How are we today?”

 

“Oh quite well, Mr. Chapman. Thank you.” Ada replies as with a small groan she places her worn, roughly made shopping basket, the only one Edith has only ever known her mother to have, on the shop counter.

 

“And Mr. Watsford?” the middle aged and balding butcher asks, his smile bright and genuine beneath his salt and pepper moustache.

 

“Quite well too, Mr. Chapman. Thank you for asking. He’s at the factory at the moment.”

 

“As he should be, Mrs. Watsford. But I imagine he’ll be home for his tea, soon.”

 

“That he will Mr. Chapman.” Ada confirms.

 

It is then that Mr. Chapman’s eyes fall upon the pretty form of Edith standing next to her mother. He admires her willowy figure dressed in her three-quarter length black coat with her green leather handbag hanging in the crook of her arm and her purple rose and black feather decorated straw hat sitting smartly atop her flaxen hair which is tied in a neat chignon at the back of her neck. “I say,” he remarks with widening blue eyes. “This fine young lady can’t be your Edith, can it Mrs. Watsford?”

 

“Hullo Mr. Chapman.” Edith greets the butcher she has known all her life shyly as she deposits her handbag on the counter next to her mother’s basket and brown leather handbag.

 

“I say!” he laughs. “Wait until Nellie sets her eyes on you.” He leans back across the sawdust covered floor* behind the counter and calls though a small doorway leading from the shop, “Nellie! Nellie, you’ll never guess who’s out here.”

 

“Who is it then?” calls back an equally chipper female voice before moments later, Mrs. Chapman, in a pink and white striped frock covered with a pink floral pinny, bustles into the shop. She stops in her tracks when she spies Edith, and her slightly sagging face breaks into a broad smile of delight. “Why if it isn’t little Edith Watsford!”

 

Mrs. Chapman hurries out from behind the counter and envelops Edith in an all embracing hug, pressing the young girl to her heavy breast. When Edith first went into service for the pompous and mean spirited local widow, Mrs. Hounslow, who also happens to be the landlady of the Watsfords, Mrs. Chapman was a bright and cheerful influence in the life of the then homesick and unsure young girl. Mrs. Chapman felt for the poor young teenager with sallow cheeks and took Edith under her wing, slipping her a little bit of extra meat if she could spare it during the more lean years of the war, and stopping by when she knew Mrs. Hounslow was out to teach Edith a few easy recipes she wasn’t taught by her mother to cook for the old widow, who in spite of being quite wealthy, was always very mean when it came to providing a budget for food, yet still expected to eat like a queen.

 

“I haven’t seen you in, what, four years, my pet?” the butcher’s wife continues.

 

“Around about that, Mrs. Chapman.” Edith replies shyly.

 

“Yet, I’d know that face anywhere!” Mrs. Chapman chuckles, holding Edith at arm’s length and drinking in her smart appearance. “Where are you working now, Edith pet?”

 

“I’m up in Mayfair.” she replies proudly.

 

“Mayfair!” Mrs. Chapman exclaims. “Well isn’t that a turn up for the books, Ada!” She turns to Edith’s mother, her sparkling dark eyes crinkling up in delight. “Who would have thought? Little Edith, that wee slip of thing, all grown up and working for a household in Mayfair!”

 

“I work for the daughter of a viscount now, Mrs. Chapman.” Edith continues proudly. “It’s much easier than working for old Widow Hounslow, as she’s in one of those newfangled flats** where everything is on one floor, and everything is brand new. Plus, Miss Lettice is far nicer to work for than mean old Widow Hounslow.”

 

“Edith, love!” Ada exclaims. “Shame on you!” she chides. “You should be more grateful. Mrs. Hounslow took you on as her maid when you had no experience or references.”

 

“Because you were cheap.” adds Mrs. Chapman, her smiling mouth screwing up with distaste as she nods knowingly.

 

“Now I won’t have a bad word said about her, you two.” Ada wags her finger admonishingly at her daughter and then looks disappointingly at Mrs. Chapman. “You’re as bad as each other. Really you are! I know she isn’t the easiest woman to rub along with Nellie, but besides giving Edith her first position, she helped pay for many a meal in my house with her sixpences and shillings putting your husband’s meat on my table over the years. We should all be grateful to her. She does a lot for the locals.”

 

Both Edith and Mrs. Chapman roll their eyes, then look at one another knowingly before smiling mischievously at one another and chuckling.

 

“And thinking of meat, what can I get for you today, Mrs. Watsford? What does that hard working husband of yours fancy for his tea?”

 

“I’ve come to get two rashers of bacon and I think, a shilling’s worth of mutton for a pie.” Ada replies after a moment’s consideration.

 

“Coming right up, Mrs. Watsford.” Mr. Chapman replies as he turns around, whilst Ada fetches out her small leather reticule*** from the confines of her handbag.

 

“It looks like life has been good to you, now you aren’t working for that mean old Mrs. Hounslow anymore, my pet.” Mrs. Chapman says, addressing Edith as she grasps both her hands with the friendly familiarity of two long time friends. “Just look at that smart outfit of yours.”

 

“Oh,” Edith dismisses her Mrs. Chapman’s comment with a flap of her hand. “My coat came from a Petticoat Lane**** second-hand clothes stall. I picked it up dead cheap and remodelled it myself.”

 

“Taking after your old Mum then?” Mrs. Chapman remarks with a hint of pride. “Is that right Ada?”

 

“Mum taught me everything I know about sewing, Mrs. Chapman. She taught me how to make something beautiful from nothing special at all, and I’ll always be grateful for that.”

 

Ada smiles proudly at her daughter.

 

“And that colour in your cheeks, Edith pet!” Mrs. Chapman exclaims. “It must be all that good upper-class Mayfair air.”

 

“Now that, “ Ada remarks to Mrs. Chapman. “You can put down to Edith’s new beau.”

 

“A beau?” Mrs. Chapman gasps. “Edith pet, you didn’t say anything!”

 

“Well, you haven’t really given me the chance to tell you yet.” Edith giggles.

 

“Well tell me now!” the butcher’s wife trembles with anticipation. “Who is he? What’s his name?”

 

“His name is Frank Leadbetter. He lives in Holborn but works for my local grocers in Mayfair. He’s the delivery boy.”

 

“A good, fine and stable job, Ada.” Mrs. Chapman remarks to Edith’s mother with a nod of approval. “I like the sound of him.”

 

“Mum thinks he’s a Communist.” Edith whispers.

 

“I heard that, Edith love!” Ada pipes up. “And I’ll have you know, that I don’t think that. I just don’t hold with some of his fancy ideas about whose who and what’s what, is all.”

 

When Mrs. Chapman gives Edith a quizzical look, the young girl explains, “Frank is more political than Mum or Dad are, and he believes in bettering himself.”

 

“It’s not that I mind him bettering himself, Edith love.” Ada defends herself. “It’s his ideas about the system. I don’t think we need to tear down things that work just fine, only to re-build them again. You’ll agree with me, won’t you Mr. Chapman.”

 

“Of course I will, Mrs. Watsford.” The butcher replies as he returns with two rashers of bacon partially wrapped in paper and a tray of diced mutton. “In my shop, the customer is always right.”

 

Edith and Mrs. Chapman chuckle good naturedly as Ada’s face falls in disappointment at the half hearted statement from her would be ally.

 

“Mum’s softened a bit towards Frank since he showed up with tickets for her and Dad to the White Horse final*****.”

 

“Goodness! I would too, Mrs. Watsford!” Mr. Chapman enthuses as he takes out some of the diced mutton from the battered metal tray. “Tickets to the White Horse final! You and Mr. Watsford were the lucky ones. I’d hang onto this chap if I were you, Edith. Sounds to me like he’ll make a grand son-in-law for your parents.”

 

“We’re not getting married just yet, Mr. Chapman!” Edith blushes. “Just stepping out together.”

 

“Aye! Aye!” Mr. Chapman replies with a wink.

 

“Well, it seems like everything is better, now you aren’t working for old Widow Hounslow.” Mrs. Chapman says, squeezing Edith’s hands. “Congratulations pet. I’m so happy for you.”

 

Just then the light coming through the glass paned butcher’s front door is partially obscured and the bell above the door tickles prettily as it opens.

 

“Thinking of which,” remarks Mr. Chapman with an arched eyebrow as he quickly turns around back to his butchering bench.

 

An older woman dressed from head to foot in black sweeps haughtily into the shop, the black jet beads of her shawl sparkling in the light like precious jewels as she releases the door and allows it to slowly close behind her, yet not quite engage with the lock.

 

“Good morning, Mrs. Hounslow.” Mrs. Chapman says a little begrudgingly as she leaves Edith’s side and moves swiftly behind the old widow and closes the door to keep the cool air of the spring morning outside the already cool butcher’s shop.

 

“You know I don’t approve of women working in the front of the shop where they can be seen, Mrs. Chapman.” the old woman pronounces dourly through her bitter pucker of a mouth as she looks down her nose in judgement at the butcher’s wife. “It’s most unseemly.”

 

“Well, things have changed since the war, Mrs. Hounslow.” Mrs. Chapman replies defiantly with a forced brightness in her voice that rings untruly. “We all have to do our bit these days.”

 

“Your husband came back from the front, thank the good Lord,” the old widow replies crisply, before pausing and looking wistfully out of the shop window, through the rabbit and goose carcases hung outside the shop in as much of a lavish display as to bring out the flavour in the meats on display. “Unlike some.” She artfully withdraws a white handkerchief embroidered with a heavy black trim, which Edith imagines her mother spent hours sewing for her for only a measly few pence.

 

“As a matter of fact, Mrs. Hounslow,” Mrs. Chapman elucidates. “I’d only come out to the front of the shop from the cash office so that I could say hullo to Edith Watsford. You remember your former housemaid, don’t you Mrs. Hounslow?”

 

The old woman with her hair still styled in the fashion of her mid Nineteenth Century youth, coiled at the back and topped with a lace trimmed cap, as was common of many elderly women her age, peers with a squint across the shop floor of the butchers, only then appearing to notice that both Edith and Ada are present.

 

“Good morning, Mrs. Hounslow.” Ada says with deference, bobbing a small, servile curtsey to the widow.

 

“Mum!” Edith chides her mother, knowing that she should be the last person to curtsey to their mean landlady.

 

“Goodness!” remarks the old widow unflappably with an arch of her thick salt and pepper eyebrow over her right eye. “Is that my old chit of housemaid?”

 

“It is, Mrs. Hounslow.” Edith manages to say through barred teeth in a forced smile, refusing to curtsey to her former mistress.

 

“And doesn’t she look well, Mrs. Hounslow.” Mrs. Chapman enthuses. “All grown up and so elegant.”

 

Mrs. Hounslow peers at Edith with her coal black button eyes that match her outfit, contemplating the young girl from within the confines of her jowly and doughy face. “That, Mrs. Chapman is a matter of opinion.” she remarks dismissive of the butcher’s wife’s remark. “You look peaky, girl.” she snaps. “Are you sickening for something?”

 

“No, Mrs. Hounslow.” Edith remarks in surprise. “Not at all.”

 

“No doubt your new mistress, poor creature, doesn’t feed you as well as I did.”

 

Edith bristles with the insult implied by the old widow in her pronouncement like a sharp slap in the face. Mrs. Hounslow was always quick to find fault in anything Edith did, even when she had done it correctly. She remembers the many nights she went to bed in the dark and draughty attic up under the eaves of Mrs. Hounslow’s high pitched roof, her stomach growling after her meagre supper of watery broth with few limp pieces of cabbage and some slices of carrot in it. That was all she could muster for her supper after the old widow had dined on a fine repast and then forbade Edith from eating any of the leftovers, which Edith would then be obliged to serve the following day to the old widow who would greedily devour them for luncheon in the dining room. She wants to scream at the old woman, and tell her how much happier she is now, and how much better treated, but catching a glimpse of her mother’s pale face as she almost imperceptibly shakes her head, she holds her tongue. Old Widow Hounslow may not be her mistress any longer, but she is still her parents’ landlady, so she keeps her own counsel silently.

 

“Chapman!” Mrs. Hounslow barks at the butcher. “I want one of your raised game pies.”

 

“I…err…” stammers Mr. Chapman somewhat meekly. “I was just serving Mrs. Watsford, if you’d…”

 

“Mrs. Watsford, you don’t mind waiting whilst Mr. Chapman serves me, do you dear?” She eyes Ada with a hard stare which indicates that whilst posed as a question, it is clearly a statement. “You know what a busy woman I am.”

 

“Not at all, Mrs. Hounslow.” Ada says deferentially, picking up her basket and handbag and backing away meekly from the counter, allowing the imperious figure of the black clad widow to shuffle up to the counter, onto which she drops her beaded handbag with a rattle of glass beads.

 

“Now, Chapman,” Mrs. Hounslow continues sharply. “A raised game pie, no, a game pie and a giblet pie, delivered this afternoon, if you please. Trixy will be there to take it from you at the scullery door.”

 

“Very good, Mrs. Hounslow.” Mr. Chapman demurs.

 

“I’ll settle the account in due course, Mrs. Chapman.” the widow says, implying that the cash office is where the butcher’s wife belongs. She releases a sigh of satisfaction. “Well, I cannot stand around prattling idle gossip like some,” She looks meaningfully between Ada, Edith and Mrs. Chapman. “Gossip is the Devil’s work, and I on the other hand, have God’s deeds to perform. So many good deeds.” She smiles smugly to herself. “So if you’ll excuse me, Mr. Chapman, Mrs. Chapman, Mrs. Watsford.” Then she looks at Edith and mutters something unintelligible in a grunt and waves her hand at the young girl before picking up her handbag and sweeping out of the shop again.

 

There is a collective sigh from Mr. and Mrs. Chapman, Ada and Edith as Mrs. Hounslow leaves.

 

“If she didn’t spend as much as she does in here, I’d refuse to serve her.” Mr. Chapman says.

 

“It’s alright, Mr. Chapman.” Ada says, returning her heavy basket and handbag to the counter. “Really it is.”

 

“No, it’s not, Mum!” pipes up Edith hotly. “She’s a rude old…”

 

“Edith!” Ada warns, wagging her finger at her daughter warningly. “I won’t say it again. I won’t have anything said against Mrs. Hounslow. She’s our landlady and we should be grateful to have a roof over our heads. Anyway, Mrs. Hounslow’s a widow.”

 

“I know, Mum. I’ve grown up hearing about how Mrs. Hounslow’s husband died a hero in the siege of Mafeking in the Boer War. But that doesn’t give her the right to lord it over the rest of us. She’s a mean old so-and-so, Mum, and you know it. She treats everyone else like rubbish, and one day… well one day she won’t be allowed to.”

 

“My goodness!” Mrs. Chapman claps her hands with pride. “The old Edith I knew a few years ago wouldn’t have said that.”

 

“No, it’s the influence of young Frank Leadbetter, Nellie.” Ada says with a frown. “I told you, he’s all about pulling the old system down.”

 

“Well, I think that’s a jolly good influence, Ada.” Mrs. Chapman says. “Even if you don’t think so, especially if the system doesn’t work.” She smiles at Edith before turning back to Ada. “Your daughter has a very valid point, and well you know it, even if you won’t voice your opinion because she is your landlady. Old Widow Hounslow is mean and there’s an end to it.” She nods emphatically. “Do you remember Trixy, Edith?”

 

“Oh yes, of course I do.” Edith says. “She was the girl I trained up for Mrs. Hounslow before I left for my next position.”

 

“Well, the poor thing is even more timid and mouselike now than she was when she arrived at old Widow Hounslow’s, and that’s all on account of the mean old biddy!” Mrs. Chapman nods emphatically.

 

“Well, mean or not, I’m not going to let the likes of old Widow Hounslow spoil my day off.” Edith says pluckily. “Come on Mum. Let’s pay for your parcels and go home and see Dad. He’ll be home from the factory soon, wanting his tea.”

 

“Well, it’s been lovely to see you again, Edith.” Mr. Chapman says as he hands Ada her packages of meat.

 

“Yes it has, Edith pet.” agrees Mrs. Chapman with a smile. “I’m so pleased to see you looking so hale and hearty and doing so well for yourself. I’m so proud of you, and I know you do your mum and dad proud too.”

 

With her basket in the crook of her left arm, Ada hooks her right arm through her daughter’s and the two open the shop door and walk out onto the Harlesden high street with smiles on their faces.

 

*Regardless of where the butchers shop was, whether a suburban or up-market shop or a small concern in a village, the standard practice was to dust the wooden floorboards of the shop behind the counter where the butchering was done with sawdust. The idea was that the sawdust would sop up any spilled blood or dropped offcuts of meat that was easy to sweep away and helped prevent slips.

 

**With the “servant problem” far more prevalent following the Great War when servicemen and factory girls not wishing to return to their low paid and hard working lives of pre-war drudgery in service, the building of flats that were easier to maintain, rather than the large houses built prior to the war that required a retinue of servants to manage them, became the new fashion for the upper classes, but were still something of a novelty in 1923. By the end of the decade, wealthier people living in flats would not only be more common, but would be a statement of fashionable modern living.

 

***A reticule is the predecessor to a modern day purse and is a woman's small bag or purse, usually in the form of a pouch with a drawstring and made of net, beading, brocade or leather. They date back to the Eighteenth Century. Where did the word reticule come from? The term “reticule” comes from French and Latin terms meaning “net.” At the time, the word “purse” referred to small leather pouches used for carrying money.

 

****Petticoat Lane Market is a fashion and clothing market in Spitalfields, London. It consists of two adjacent street markets. Wentworth Street Market and Middlesex Street Market. Originally populated by Huguenots fleeing persecution in France, Spitalfields became a center for weaving, embroidery and dying. From 1882, a wave of Jewish immigrants fleeing persecution in eastern Europe settled in the area and Spitalfields then became the true heart of the clothing manufacturing district of London. 'The Lane' was always renowned for the 'patter' and showmanship of the market traders. It was also known for being a haven for the unsavoury characters of London’s underworld and was rife with prostitutes during the late Victorian era. Unpopular with the authorities, as it was largely unregulated and in some sense illegal, as recently as the 1930s, police cars and fire engines were driven down ‘The Lane’, with alarm bells ringing, to disrupt the market.

 

*****The first football match to be played at the newly opened Wembley Stadium in April 1923 was between the Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United. This match became known as the White Horse final, and was played just a few days after the completion of the stadium.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful Edwardian butchers is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The rashers of bacon and tray of diced meat on the counter come from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls House Shop in the United Kingdom. The joints of meat in the background both on the bench and hanging from hooks above it also come from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls House Shop.

 

The eggs and the Cornish Ware bowl they are in come from Beautifully handmade Miniatures in Kettering, as does the shiny cash register and Ada’s rather battered wooden basket.

 

Inside the basket there are various foods and cleaning agents which would have been household names in the 1920s, and some of which are still known today including Oxo Stock Cubes, Ty-Phoo Tea, Bisto Gravy Powder and Hudson’s Soap. All these items are 1:12 size artisan miniatures made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire, with great attention to detail paid to their labels and the shapes of their jars and cans. Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures also made the tin of corned beef to the left of the photo, as can be derived from the “Little Things Food Co.” label.

 

In 1863, William Sumner published A Popular Treatise on Tea as a by-product of the first trade missions to China from London. In 1870, William and his son John Sumner founded a pharmacy/grocery business in Birmingham. William's grandson, John Sumner Jr. (born in 1856), took over the running of the business in the 1900s. Following comments from his sister on the calming effects of tea fannings, in 1903, John Jr. decided to create a new tea that he could sell in his shop. He set his own criteria for the new brand. The name had to be distinctive and unlike others, it had to be a name that would trip off the tongue and it had to be one that would be protected by registration. The name Typhoo comes from the Mandarin Chinese word for “doctor”. Typhoo began making tea bags in 1967. In 1978, production was moved from Birmingham to Moreton on the Wirral Peninsula, in Merseyside. The Moreton site is also the location of Burton's Foods and Manor Bakeries factories. Typhoo has been owned since July 2021 by British private-equity firm Zetland Capital. It was previously owned by Apeejay Surrendra Group of India.

 

The first Bisto product, in 1908, was a meat-flavoured gravy powder, which rapidly became a bestseller in Britain. It was added to gravies to give a richer taste and aroma. Invented by Messrs Roberts and Patterson, it was named "Bisto" because it "Browns, Seasons and Thickens in One". Bisto Gravy is still a household name in Britain and Ireland today, and the brand is currently owned by Premier Foods.

 

Oxo is a brand of food products, including stock cubes, herbs and spices, dried gravy, and yeast extract. The original product was the beef stock cube, and the company now also markets chicken and other flavour cubes, including versions with Chinese and Indian spices. The cubes are broken up and used as flavouring in meals or gravy or dissolved into boiling water to produce a bouillon. Oxo produced their first cubes in 1910 and further increased Oxo's popularity.

 

In 1837 Robert Spear Hudson opened a shop in High Street, West Bromwich. He started making soap powder in the back of this shop by grinding the coarse bar soap of the day with a mortar and pestle. Before that people had had to make soap flakes themselves. This product became the first satisfactory and commercially successful soap powder. Despite his title of "Manufacturer of Dry Soap" Robert never actually manufactured soap but bought the raw soap from William Gossage of Widnes. The product was popular with his customers and the business expanded rapidly. In the 1850s he employed ten female workers in his West Bromwich factory. In time the factory was too small and too far from the source of his soap so in 1875 he moved his main works to Bank Hall, Liverpool, and his head office to Bootle, while continuing production at West Bromwich. Eventually the business in Merseyside employed just over one thousand people and Robert was able to further develop his flourishing export trade to Australia and New Zealand. The business flourished both because of the rapidly increasing demand for domestic soap products and because of Hudson's unprecedented levels of advertising. He arranged for striking posters to be produced by professional artists (this was before other firms such as Pears Soap and Lever Brothers used similar techniques). The slogan "A little of Hudson's goes a long way" appeared on the coach that ran between Liverpool and York. Horse, steam and electric tramcars bore an advertisement saying "For Washing Clothes. Hudson's soap. For Washing Up". Robert was joined in the business by his son Robert William who succeeded to the business on his father's death. In 1908 he sold the business to Lever Brothers who ran it as a subsidiary enterprise during which time the soap was manufactured at Crosfield's of Warrington. During this time trade names such as Rinso and Omo were introduced. The Hudson name was retained until 1935 when, during a period of rationalisation, the West Bromwich and Bank Hall works were closed.

 

Also in Ada’s basket are some very lifelike looking fruit and vegetables. The apples are made of polymer clay are made by a 1:12 miniature specialist in Germany. The leaves of lettuce are artisan made of very thin sheets of clay and are beautifully detailed. I acquired them from an auction house some twenty years ago as part of a lot made up of miniature artisan food.

 

Edith’s handbag handmade from soft leather is part of a larger collection of hats and bags that I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel, including Ada’s tan soft leather handbag seen resting against her basket at the right of the picture.

 

The black umbrella came from an online stockist of 1:12 miniatures on E-Bay.

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 have left the hustle and bustle of London, travelling southwest to a stretch of windswept coastline just a short drive the pretty Cornish town of Penzance. Here, friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot, encouraged by her father Lord de Virre who will foot the bill, has commissioned Lettice to redecorate a few of the principal rooms of ‘Chi an Treth’. In the lead up to the wedding, Lord de Virre has spent a great deal of money making the Regency house habitable after many years of sitting empty and bringing it up to the Twentieth Century standards his daughter expects, paying for electrification, replumbing, and a connection to the Penzance telephone exchange. Now, with their honeymoon over, Dickie and Margot have finally taken possession of their country house gift and have invited Lettice to come and spend a Friday to Monday with them so that she might view the rooms Margot wants redecorating for herself and perhaps start formulating some ideas as to how modernise their old fashioned décor. As Lettice is unable to drive and therefore does not own a car, Margot and Dickie have extended the weekend invitation to one of their other Embassy Club coterie, Lettice’s old childhood chum, Gerald, also a member of the aristocracy who has tried to gain some independence from his family by designing gowns from a shop in Grosvenor Street. Gerald owns a Morris*, so he can motor both Lettice and himself down from London on Friday and back again on Monday. After the retirement of the housekeeper, Mrs. Trevethan, from the main house to the gatekeeper’s cottage the previous evening, the quartet of Bright Young Things** played a spirited game of sardines*** and in doing so, potentially solved the romantic mystery of ‘Chi an Treth’ after discovering a boxed up painting, long forgotten, of a great beauty.

 

Now we find ourselves in ‘Chi an Treth’s’ Regency breakfast room with views through the French doors, overlooking the wild coast on a remarkably sunny day for this time of year. Dickie, Margot and Gerald are all seated around the table in their pyjamas and robes enjoying breakfast, some with more gusto than others, as Lettice stumbles into the room and joins them at the table.

 

“All hail the discoverer of lost treasures and the solver of mysteries!” cries Dickie dramatically as he doffs an invisible hat towards his friend.

 

“Oh!” gasps Gerald, raising his right hand gingerly to his temple. “Must you be so loud Dickie? Is he always like this in the mornings, Margot darling?”

 

“He is, Gerald,” Margot sighs from her seat opposite him at the breakfast table as she takes a slice of thinly sliced toast and spreads marmalade across it with as little noise as possible.

 

“Morning Dickie!” Lettice returns Dickie’s welcome, walking up to him and placing a kiss firmly on the top of his head amidst his sleep tousled sandy hair. “Good morning, Margot. Good morning, Gerald.” Stumbling down the room and reaching her seat at the table opposite Dickie she picks up her glass tumbler and then turns to Gerald to adds. “It could be worse.”

 

“What could be?” Gerald asks, taking the pot from Margot’s outstretched hand and proceeding to plop a generous spoonful of marmalade on his own toast slices.

 

“Dickie’s frightfully jolly morning personality trait.” she replies, walking back the way she came to the sideboard, where she helps herself to orange juice. “His cousin, the Earl McCrea, plays the bagpipes every morning to wake the guests when he’s on his Scottish estate.”

 

“How frightful,” Gerald winces at the thought before continuing in a withering voice. “After a night of champagne like we had last night, that’s the last thing I should want.”

 

“Apparently the Prince of Wales quite likes it though**** when he visits.” Margot adds. “Coffee, Lettice darling?”

  

“Tea,” Lettice replies laconically before turning her attention to the lidded chaffing dishes on the sideboard. Lifting one, she quickly drops it when she sees and smells what lies beneath it with a loud clatter that elicits a groan from Gerald, Margot and herself.

 

“Mrs. Trevethan’s kedgeree,” Margot remarks without looking up as she pours tea from a silver teapot into Lettice’s teacup.

 

“Ugh,” mutters Lettice.

 

“It takes some getting used to.” adds Margot.

 

“Is an acquired taste, I’d say.” observes Gerald wryly, looking about the plates at the table. “Since no-one appears to be having any.”

 

“I think my stomach will settle for a boiled egg and an apple.” Lettice places her glass of orange juice gingerly on the tabletop and reaches across to grab an apple from the glass comport in the centre of the table. She then sits before reaching for an egg from the cruet proffered by Margot.

 

“Freshly boiled by Mrs. Trevethan.” Margot says with a smile.

 

“What’s taking that woman so long to bring me a bloody aspirin?” quips Gerald.

 

“God how much did we drink last night?” Lettice asks.

 

“Before, or after you found the Winterhalter*****?” Dickie asks.

 

“That explains why my head is fit for cracking, just like an egg, this morning then.” Lettice rubs her own temples and winces. “I think I could do with a couple of aspirin too.”

 

“Surely they have heard of aspirin down here.” Gerald grumbles, his train of thought about his own sore head undisturbed by the conversation around him.

 

“It is only Cornwall, Gerald darling,” Margot gives him an aghast look. “Not the middle of the Sahara Desert or the Antarctic, you know.”

 

“I might have more luck getting some aspirin in the Sahara.”

 

“Now Gerald, there’s no need to be cantankerous, just because your hangover is purportedly worse than ours.” Margot quips.

 

“Was Mrs. Trevethan cross with the mess, we,” Lettice pauses, blushes and corrects herself. “I… made last night in the storeroom?”

 

“Not at all, dear girl!” Dickie pipes up cheerily, deliberately hitting his own egg with gusto to break the shell, eliciting a scowl from Gerald which he returns with a teasing smile. “Margot and Gerald did a capital job of tidying most of the mess up, and I think the old dear is rather pleased to have people to look after again.”

 

“She can’t care that much about us if it takes this long to fetch me an aspirin.”

 

“Oh do shut up, Gerald old boy,” Dickie barks, surprising even himself at the sudden change to his usual affable self. Taking a few deep breaths, he looks across the coffee pot, teacups and marmalade pot to his friend and continues in laboured syllables. “Look, we all need the bloody aspirins this morning, and they will get here when Mrs. Trevethan gets them to us. Alright, old boy?”

 

Gerald shrinks back in his seat, whilst both Margot and Lettice smirk at one another.

 

“I do like your bed jacket, Lettice darling.” Margot remarks. “It suits you. Did Gerald make it for you?”

 

“This?” Lettice pulls on the burnt orange brocade of her jacket, making the marabou feather trim quiver prettily about her pale face. “No. I actually bought this at Marshall and Snelgrove’s****** because I saw it and I liked the colour.”

 

“And what shall we do today?” Dickie asks the table, casting Gerald a warning look that makes Gerald think twice about saying that his head feels too poorly to do anything.

 

“Well,” Lettice remarks, turning around in her seat to peer through the French doors across the lawn and the windswept tree line. “It’s a fine day today. It might be nice to take advantage of the good weather and go exploring down along the cove.” She turns back. “That’s if no-one else has any other more appealing ideas of course.”

 

Margot smiles and starts nodding. “That sounds splendid, Lettice darling! You could bring your paints with you. There’s a rather nice vista featuring an old lighthouse that I know you would enjoy painting.”

 

“Capital idea, old girl!” Dickie agrees. “The bracing sea breeze will be a perfect way to dust off the fuzzy heads from last night.”

 

Gerald quietly sinks further back in his seat but says nothing.

 

At that moment, the door to the breakfast room creaks open and Mrs. Trevethan shuffles in, wearing the same rather tatty apron over another old fashioned Edwardian print dress of a rather muddy brown colour, carrying a silver tray on which she has several tumblers and a small jar of aspirin. When her eyes fall upon Lettice, she smiles broadly. “Metten daa******* Miss Chetwynd.” she says, dropping a bob curtsey.

 

“Good morning Mrs Trevethan.” Lettice replies.

 

The old woman shuffles across the room and around the oval breakfast table where she removes a glass and the jar of tablets and deposits them in front of Gerald. “Your aspirins, sir.”

 

Dickie gives him a knowing smile, and Gerald mutters a thank you in reply.

 

“I am sorry about the mess we made last night, Mrs, Trevethan.” Lettice apologises to the old Cornish woman as she places a glass tumbler on the table before her, feeling the heat of a fresh blush rising up her throat and into her cheeks as she speaks. “It really was an accident.”

 

“Oh!” scoffs the woman with a dismissive wave of her hand as if shooing a sand fly away. “That’s quite alright. It’s nice to have young people, any people, about the house again after so long. You did make a fine mess, but you cleaned it up pretty well.”

 

“Oh, that was Margot and Gerald’s doing, not mine.” she looks sheepishly to her two friends at either side of her at the table as she sips her orange juice. “I was quite shaken by the whole incident.”

 

“Well, that was quite a pile of things you brought down,” Mrs. Trevethan laughs as she looks down upon the slight girl before her. “Especially for one your size! But look at what hidden treasure you uncovered with it!”

 

“That’s true, Lettice old girl!” Dickie remarks. “If it weren’t for you, that Winterhalter might have sat there another century, evading would-be treasure hunters.”

 

“If it’s a Winterhalter, Dickie,” tempers Lettice. “It may not be. It may not be her.”

 

“Who?” Gerald asks, perplexed, passing Lettice the aspirin bottle after taking out two tablets for himself. “Winterhalter was a man.”

 

“The captain’s lost love of course, Gerald!” scoffs Lettice. “Don’t be dim.”

 

“Sorry, it’s the hangover.”

 

“Oh that’s Miss Rosevear in the painting,” Mrs. Trevethan remarks. “There is no doubt of that.”

 

Lettice eyes the old Cornish woman up and down. Even with her weather-beaten face and white hair indicating that she is of an advanced age, a quick calculation in her still slightly muffled head suggests that she cannot be so old as to have known the lady when the portrait was painted.

 

Mrs. Trevethan starts laughing again as she observes the changes on Lettice’s face, betraying her thoughts. “No dear, I’m not that old, but I still knew Miss Rosevear when I was young, and she was older, and even then, she was still a beauty. It’s her face make no mistake.”

 

“Really Mrs. Trevethan?” Margot gasps, sitting forward in her chair, her half finished cup of coffee held aloft as she sits in the older woman’s thrall. “How?”

 

“What was she like?” Lettice adds excitedly.

 

“Is there truth to the legend?” Dickie asks.

 

“Well, Mrs. Channon, I was a maid for the Rosevears when I was a girl and first went into service.” The old woman’s eyes develop a far away sheen as she reminisces. “Mr. Rosevear had a beautiful old manor about half-way between here and Truro. Burnt down now of course, but you can still see the ruins from the train, if you know where to look. There’s even an old halt******** where the house used to be: Rosevear Halt. My first ride on a train was taken from Rosevear Halt up to London when I was taken with a few of the other maids to clean Mr. Rosevear’s rented London house for the Season.”

 

“And Miss Rosevear?” Lettice asks with trepidation, hoping to glean information about the mysterious beauty in the painting and from the legend.

 

“Oh, Miss Elowen was the youngest of the three Rosevear daughters. They were all beautiful, but she was the loveliest, in my opinion anyway. She could dance and play the spinet, and she had a voice that could have charmed the angels from the heavens.” A wistful look crosses her face. “And she was blithe, or had been before my time at the house, I was told by some of the other maids. Her elder sisters were far more serious than she: set upon always wearing the most fashionable clothing and focussing upon good marriages, whereas the youngest Miss Rosevear, she just took life as it came to her without complaint. Although, she always had an air of sadness about her when I knew her.”

 

“Without complaint? What happened to her, Mrs. Trevethan?” Dickie asks, swept up in the tale as much as his wife and Lettice. “Why didn’t she marry my ancestor of sorts, the captain?”

 

“I don’t rightly know, sir, why she didn’t marry him. As I said, this all happened before my time with the Rosevears, but there were others amongst the older household staff who were witness to what happened, so I have some inkling. I think Mr. Rosevear took against the captain because,” Mrs. Trevethan pauses, lowering her eyes as she speaks. “And you’ll pardon me for speaking out of turn, sir.”

 

“Yes,” replies Dickie. “Go on.”

 

“Well, I think he took against the captain because he wasn’t a legitimate son of the Marquis of Taunton. The Rosevears were an old family you see, and well respected in the district. It might not have looked proper for someone of her family’s standing to marry the illegitimate son of the Marquis, even if he was a naval hero and well set up by his father. However,” She pauses again. “I don’t think things would have gone so badly for him, if it wasn’t for the other two Miss Rosevears.”

 

“What do you mean, Mrs, Trevethan?” asks Margot.

 

“Well, I said that Miss Elowen was the prettiest of all three, and I stand by that. Even when she was in her forties when I first met her, she had a look that could stop idle chatter in a room. Her two sisters weren’t so fortunate, and their looks had begun to fade by the time she met the captain, may God rest his soul. Miss Doryty, the eldest was ten years her little sister’s senior, and for all her plotting and planning for a good marriage, a good marriage never found her, nor her sister, Miss Bersaba. Miss Doryty was her father’s favourite as to look at one, you would like to see the other in appearance and temperament. I think she took against the captain because her little sister was likely to marry before her two siblings and Miss Doryty wasn’t going to have that any more than Miss Bersaba was. Miss Doryty was the eldest and felt it her right to marry first, and Miss Bersaba wanted Miss Doryty married off so that then she could get wed herself. Even when I worked for the Rosevears, both ladies still talked about her would-be suitors up in London, yet not a one ever materialised, and I never knew of them ever going to London. Miss Doryty always was bitter, and a bully. I think she swayed her father’s opinion on the captain. I also know, because I heard her say it often enough within my earshot, that she was of the opinion that it was Miss Elowen’s responsibility as the youngest daughter to care for her father and unmarried sisters into their dotage, since their mother had been in the churchyard many a year already.”

 

“And did she?” Lettice asks sadly, her hand rising to her mouth in upset.

 

“Like I said, Miss Chetwynd, Miss Elowen took whatever life dealt her with forbearance. She never complained, even though her sisters obviously treated her in a lesser way than they should their own kin.”

 

“And, she never married?” asks Margot.

 

“None of the Miss Rosevears did, Mrs. Channon. They lived alone in the Big House. I was still in service there after Mr. Rosevear died. The ladies continued to do good deeds in the district, and they used the house for tombolas and fetes to raise money for the poor. Then I met and married Mr. Trevethan and I had to leave the Rosevears’ service. I heard from friends who stayed on after I’d gone, that the house slowly fell into disrepair, but I was in Penzance with my own family, so I never went back to see for myself.”

 

“And you say there was a fire at the house?” Dickie asks.

 

“There was, sir.”

 

“How did it start, do you know?” continues Dickie.

 

“I couldn’t say for certain sir, but I’d imagine it started from a fallen log. The Rosevears had ever so many fireplaces without fireguards. It's why I won’t have Mr. Trevethan light a fire in any of the fireplaces here that don’t have fireguards. All you need is for a smouldering log to fall on a carpet, and before you know it… whoosh!” The old woman gesticulates dramatically interpreting the way of wild flames.

 

“And did Miss Rosevear die in the fire?” Margot asks. “How thrilling if she did.”

 

“And you say I love dramatics,” Gerald grumbles, looking at Dickie.

 

“What a terrible thing to say, my love.” Dickie looks at his wife with horrified eyes.

 

“Oh yes, but wouldn’t it be terrifically romantic?” gushes Margot in reply.

 

“None of the Rosevears died it the fire, Mrs. Channon. In fact, no one died in it, thank God! But the family lost a great deal of standing with the loss of the Big House and all its contents, and the sisters moved to Truro and lived in much reduced circumstances, I’m told. And that’s where they died. I don’t know who died first, Miss Bersaba or Miss Doryty, but my friend who used to help char for them after they moved to Truro said that the two elder sisters health declined dramatically, and Miss Elowen fulfilled the destiny predicted by her eldest sister, and she spent her life looking after her sisters.”

 

“Do you know if, after her sisters died, whether Elowen ever saw the captain again, Mrs. Trevethan?” Lettice asks tentatively.

 

“I can’t say for certain, Miss Chetwynd,” the old woman replies. “But almost certainly no, to my knowledge. Taking care of her sisters, Miss Rosevear became something of a recluse in Truro, and after Miss Doryty and Miss Bersaba had joined their parents in the churchyard, it was too late for Miss Elowen. She was set in her ways and lived as she had for many a year prior, alone and hidden from the world. The captain too. Mr. Trevethan and I only served him for about five years before he died, and he never left the property once during that time. He barely left the house. And I’d lived in Penzance my whole married life and we all knew about the sea captain in the house on the hill by the cove, and I never once heard of him coming to town. So, miss, I’d say he was much the same, a recluse. And so ends my tale.”

 

“Well, “ Dickie announces, releasing a pent up breath he didn’t realise he had been holding on to. “Thank you so much for sharing it with us, Mrs. Trevethan. I shall know who to come to the next time I want to know anything about local history.”

 

“I should be getting back now, sir. I have to reorganise that storeroom, and then there’s lunch to prepare.”

 

“Oh, we’ve decided to go down to the cove today so Miss Chetwynd can paint the landscape.” Margot announces with a smile. “Could you pack us a picnic luncheon to take with us, rather than having us eat it here, Mrs. Trevethan?”

 

“Oh, pur dha********* Mrs. Channon.” replies Mrs. Trevethan before dropping a quick bob curtsey and shuffling out through the breakfast room door again.

 

“Well, what a tragic tale!” enthuses Margot, taking up a slice of marmalade covered toast and taking a bite.

 

“Not so much tragic as just sad, my love.” Dickie replies.

 

“I say again,” Gerald grumbles. “You say I’m the one who loves drama.”

 

“Well you do, Gerald,” Lettice chimes in, stirring extra sugar into her almost forgotten cup of tea. “And we love you for it.” She assures him. “But I happen to agree with Margot. It is a tragic tale, more so than just sad. Sad is too… too…”

 

“Insipid?” Gerald offers.

 

“Thank you, Gerald. Yes, too insipid a word for it. The loss of youth and true love makes this a tragic tale.”

 

Dickie chuckles and shakes his head. “Well, I wouldn’t doubt that there was a little bit of wax lyrical about Mrs. Trevethan’s version of the story, as it would be with any local legend. However, what I think is important about the story is that it tells us exactly who the lady is in the Winterhalter painting. It gives us provenance, which makes it all the more valuable.”

 

“If it’s a Winterhalter, Dickie!” Lettice reminds him again. “It may not be.”

 

“Well, whether it is or it isn’t,” Margot adds in. “All this talk won’t get us out into this unseasonable sunshine and down to the cove so Lettice can paint the lighthouse. Let’s finish up breakfast and get ready to go out.”

 

*Morris Motors Limited was a privately owned British motor vehicle manufacturing company established in 1919. With a reputation for producing high-quality cars and a policy of cutting prices, Morris's business continued to grow and increase its share of the British market. By 1926 its production represented forty-two per cent of British car manufacturing. Amongst their more popular range was the Morris Cowley which included a four-seat tourer which was first released in 1920.

 

**The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

 

***Sardines is an active game that is played like hide and go seek — only in reverse! One person hides, and everyone else searches for the hidden person. Whenever a person finds the hidden person, they quietly join them in their hiding spot. There is no winner of the game. The last person to join the sardines will be the hider in the next round. Sardines was a very popular game in the 1920s and 1930s played by houseguests in rambling old country houses where there were unusual, unknown and creative places to hide.

 

****As a youth the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII and then Duke of Windsor) became a proficient player of the highland bagpipe, being taught by William Ross and Henry Forsyth. He frequently, until his later years, played a tune round the table after dinner, sometimes wearing a white kilt. He was also known to wake the guests at his house on the Windsor Great Park, Fort Belvedere, with a rousing rendition of a tune on the bagpipes.

 

*****Franz Xaver Winterhalter (1805 – 1873) was a German painter and lithographer, known for his flattering portraits of royalty and upper-class society in the mid-19th century. His name has become associated with fashionable court portraiture. Among his best known works are Empress Eugénie Surrounded by her Ladies in Waiting (1855) and the portraits he made of Empress Elisabeth of Austria (1865).

 

******Marshall & Snelgrove was an up-market department store on the north side of Oxford Street, London, on the corner with Vere Street founded by James Marshall. The company became part of the Debenhams group.

 

*******“Metten daa” is Cornish for “good morning”.

 

********A halt, in railway parlance in the Commonwealth of Nations and Ireland, is a small station, usually unstaffed or with very few staff, and with few or no facilities. A halt station is a type of stop where any train carrying a passenger is scheduled to stop for a given period of time. In Edwardian times it was not unusual for wealthy families with large houses close to the railway line to have their own halt stop for visiting guests or mail and other deliveries.

 

*********”Pur dha” is Cornish for “very good”.

 

Contrary to what your eyes might tell you, even though the food looks quite edible, this upper-class Regency 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 Royal Doulton style tea set featuring roses on the breakfast table came from a miniature dollhouse specialist on E-Bay, whilst the silver teapot on the left hand size of the picture comes from Smallskale Miniatures in the United Kingdom, as does the jam pot to the right of the toast rack. The toast rack, egg cruet set, cruet set and coffee pot were made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The eggs and the toast slices come from miniature dollhouse specialists on E-Bay. The apples in comport on the centre of the table are very realistic looking. Made of polymer clay are made by a 1:12 miniature specialist in Germany. The comport in which they stand is spun of real glass and was made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in England as is the glass of orange juice on the table, the jug of orange juice and the bunch of roses on the sideboard at the back of the photograph. The remaining empty glass tumblers are all hand made of spun glass and came from a high street dolls’ specialist when I was a teenager.

 

The Queen Anne dining table, chairs and Regency sideboard were all given to me as birthday and Christmas presents when I was a child.

 

The fireplace in the background of the photo comes from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom. The two candelabra on it were made by Warwick Miniatures, and the Georgian Revival clock on the mantlepiece is a 1:12 artisan miniature made by Hall’s Miniature Clocks, supplied through Doreen Jeffries Small Wonders Miniatures in England. The vases came from a miniatures specialist on E-Bay.

 

All the paintings around the drawing room in their gilded or black frames are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States and Marie Makes Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

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.

 

Concerned about her beau, Selwyn Spencely’s, true affections for her, and worried about the threat his cousin and 1923 debutante, Pamela Fox-Chavers, posed to her own potential romantic plans with Selwyn, Lettice concocted a ruse to spy on Pamela and Selwyn at the Royal Horticultural Society’s 1923 Great Spring Show*. As luck would have it, Lettice ran into Pamela and Selwyn, quite literally in the latter’s case, and they ended up having tea together. Whilst not the appropriate place to talk about Selwyn’s mother, Lady Zinnia, whom Lettice suspects of arranging a match between Selwyn and Pamela, who are cousins, Selwyn has agreed to organise a dinner with Lettice where they can talk openly about the future of their relationship and the interference of Lady Zinnia. However, whilst Lettice waits for the dinner to be arranged, she has a wonderful distraction to take her mind off things.

 

That is why today we are far from London, returning to Wiltshire, where Lettice grew up at Glynes, the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds, and the home of Lettice’s parents, the presiding Viscount and Countess of Wrexham and the heir, their eldest son Leslie and his new wife Arabella. However, we are not at Glynes, but rather in Glynes Village at the local village hall where a much loved annual tradition is taking place. Every year the village have a summer fête, run by the local women and overseen by Lettice’s mother, Lady Sadie, to help raise money for a worthy cause in the village. The summer fête is one of the highlights of the village and country calendar as it always includes a flower show, a cake stand, stalls run by local famers’ wives selling homemade produce, games of hoopla, a coconut shy, a tombola and a jumble sale, a white elephant stall and a fortune teller – who is always local haberdasher Mrs. Maginot who has a theatrical bent and manages the Glynes theatrical players as well as her shop in the village high street. All the stalls and entertainments are held either in the village hall or the grounds surrounding it. Not only do the citizens of the village involve themselves in the fête, but also the gentry, and there is always much excitement when matriarch of the Brutons, Lady Gwyneth – Gerald’s mother, and Lady Isobel Tyrwhitt – Arabella’s mother, attend. Neither lady have been well over the last few years with Lady Gwyneth suffering a spate of bronchial infections and Lady Isobel receiving treatment for cancer, so it is a rare treat to have both in attendance. This year’s summer fête is a special one for Arabella in particular, for as the newly minted Mrs. Leslie Chetwynd, she now joins the effort to help run the Glynes summer fête for the first time and has been given the second-hand clothing stall to run as part of the jumble sale.

 

The Glynes village hall is a hive of activity, and the cavernous space resounds with running footsteps, voluble chatter from the mostly female gathering, hammering and children’s laughter and tears as they run riot around the adults as they set up their stalls. Mr. Lovegrove, who runs the village shop, climbs a ladder which is held by the elderly church verger Mr. Lewis and affixes the brightly coloured Union Jacks and bunting that have been used every year since the King’s Coronation in 1911 around the walls. Lady Sadie casts a critical eye over the white elephant stall, rearranging items to put what she considers the best quality items on more prominent display, whilst removing a select few pieces which she thinks unsuitable for sale, which she passes to Newman, her ladies maid, to dispose of. Bramley, the Chetwynd’s butler arranges and categorises books for the second-hand book stall, perhaps spending a little too much time perusing some of the titles. Mrs. Elliott who runs the Women’s Institute manages the influx of local women bringing in cakes with regimental efficiency. And amongst all the noise, activity and excitement, Arabella busies herself unpacking boxes of old clothes and tries her best to make her trestle an attractive addition to the summer fête. Lettice perches on an old bentwood chair, offering suggestions to her sister-in-law whilst pulling faces as she lifts up various donations before depositing them in disgust where they had been beforehand.

 

“Here we are then,” Gerald announces as he walks across the busy floor of the hall bearing a wooden tray containing several teacups and a plate of cupcakes from the refreshments stand, narrowly avoiding Mrs. Lovegrove’s two youngest children as they chase one another around his legs. The sound of his jolly call and his footsteps joining all the other cacophony of setting up going on around him. “Refreshments for the hard workers,” he looks at Arabella. “And the not-so-hard-workers.” he looks at Lettice.

 

“Don’t be cheeky!” Lettice says to him with a hard stare, letting a limp stocking fall from her hand and collapse into a wrinkled pool on the trestle table’s surface.

 

Gerald puts the three tea cups down where he can find a surface on Arabella’s trestle table, followed by a long blue and gilt edged platter on which sit three very festive cupcakes featuring Union Jacks made of marzipan sticking out of white clouds of icing.

 

“Mrs. Casterton’s special cupcakes.” he announces proudly with a beaming smile.

 

“How on earth did you get those, Gerald?” gasps Lettice in surprise, eyeing the dainty cakes greedily. “Mrs. Casterton hasn’t let me take food from her kitchen since I started dining at the table with the rest of the family, never mind pinch anything from her stall for the fundraiser!”

 

“It helps when you aren’t her employer’s indulged youngest child.” Gerald says, tapping his nose knowingly.

 

“I was not an indulged child!” Lettice defends, raising her hand to the boat neckline of her frock and grasping her single strand of creamy white pearls hanging about her neck. “You were more indulged by Aunt Gwen than I ever was by Mater or Pater.”

 

“Oh, just ignore him, Tice!” laughs Arabella from her place behind the trestle. “You know Gerald has always had the ability to charm anything from anyone when he wants to.”

 

“That’s true,” Lettice replies, eyeing Gerald with a cocked eyebrow and a bemused smile as she picks up her magenta and gilt rimmed cup and sips her tea. “I had forgotten that.”

 

“What can I say?” laughs Gerald proudly with a shrug of his shoulders.

 

“It’s not so much what you can say as what you can do, Gerald.” mutters Arabella with a frustrated sigh.

 

“I am at your service, my lady?” Gerald replies, making a sweeping bow before Arabella and Lettice, who both laugh at his jester like action.

 

“Be careful what you promise, Gerald.” giggles Lettice.

 

“Bella would never expect too much from me, Lettice.” Gerald retorts with a smile. “She’s known me all her life and she knows what my limitations are.”

 

“Well, I was hoping you could help me by working some magic on my second hand clothing stall.” Arabella remarks with another frustrated sigh as she tugs at the old fashioned shirtwaister** blouse with yellowing lace about the collar. “I’ve tried and tried all morning, but nothing I seem to do helps make anything look more modern and more attractive to buy.”

 

Lettice and Gerald look around at Arabella’s stall. The shirtwaister outfit with its pretty, albeit slightly marked, lace, tweed skirt and leather belt with a smart, yet old fashioned Art Nouveau buckle really is the most attractive piece that she has on display. Around it on the surface of her trestle are a jumble of yellowing linen napkins complete with tarnished napkin rings, a selection of embroidered, tatted*** and crocheted doilies, mismatched pairs of leather and lace gloves and several rather worn looking hats that are really only suitable for gardening now, rather than being worn to church services on Sunday.

 

“I warned you Gerald.” Lettice says with a knowing wink.

 

“Don’t you remember how much we all felt sorry for whomever ran the second-hand clothing stall at the fête each year as children, Bella?” Gerald asks.

 

“It was always the short straw.” Lettice adds.

 

“Yes, being stuck under the piercing stare of His Majesty.” Gerald indicates to the portrait of King George V, dating back to the pre-war years when the King still had colour in his hair.

 

“The worst stall to have because none of the villagers ever seem to have anything nice or remotely fashionable to donate, even for a good cause like new books for the village school.” Lettice picks up a pretty primrose yellow napkin. “These are nice at least.”

 

“Except there are only three of them.” points out Arabella with a disappointed air. “I can’t seem to find a fourth.” She picks up a red dyed straw hat in the vain hope that it will be there, even though she has searched beneath it three times already. “And I’ve looked everywhere.”

 

“Tea for two, perhaps?” Gerald suggests hopefully as he picks up his own teacup and takes a sip of tea.

 

“Oh, you two are no help!” scoffs Arabella. “I’ve a right mind to stick you both with these!” She grasps a pair of knitting needles complete with some rather dreadfully made rows of incomplete knitting and a ball of wool and thrusts them through the air between she, Lettice, and Gerald. “They’ll get you working.”

 

“Even if they do, Bella, we aren’t miracle workers.” remarks Gerald.

 

All three of them laugh good heartedly.

 

“Oh I must make the best of it,” Arabella sighs resignedly as she tugs at the left leg-of-mutton sleeve**** of the shirtwaister. “After all, this is my first year as Leslie’s wife, and the first jumble sale I am actively helping to run to help raise funds for the village. I must make this stall a success no matter what.” The steely determination in her voice surprises her as she speaks. “I’m a Chetwynd now, and I can’t disappoint the villagers with a poor show.”

 

“Nor Mater.” adds Lettice, taking another sip of tea.

 

“No indeed!” agrees Gerald. “Lady Sadie will be judging you from afar, Bella, rest assured. If your stall isn’t a great success, you’ll hear about it.”

 

“In a dozen little quips.” Lettice adds.

 

“More like a hundred.” corrects Gerald.

 

“Tearing delicately phrased strips off you.” agrees Lettice.

 

“Inflicting as much pain for as long as possible.” adds Gerald with seriousness.

 

“Oh stop, Gerald!” laughs Arabella. “She isn’t anywhere near as much of a dragon as you and Tice paint her to be.”

 

“You’ve only been married to the family for a little while now,” Lettice counters, looking at her sister-in-law over the magenta and gilt painted rim of her cup. “And you and Leslie have your own lives and are left pretty much to your own devices down in the Glynes Dower House from what I can gather. We’ll give you a little while longer to find out the truth about your wicked mother-in-law.” She smiles cheekily.

 

“I have grown up alongside you, going in and out of your house, Tice,” Arabella replies with a dismissive wave of her hand. “So it’s not like Sadie is an unknown quantity to me.”

 

“But you’ve never been a recipient of her acerbic tongue either, I’ll wager.” adds Gerald dourly. “You’re far too sweet and compliant a young daughter-in-law for that, but both Lettice and I have.”

 

“I still don’t know,” Lettice queries, turning her attention to Gerald. “What was it you said to Mater that night of Hunt Ball that set her so against you, Gerald? I’ve never known her to take against anyone so vehemently, except perhaps poor Aunt Egg who can never do any right in her eyes.”

 

Gerald blushes, remembering the altercation he had with Lettice’s mother, Lady Sadie, at the ball. In a slightly inebriated state he told her that neither she nor Lettice had any sway over Selwyn Spencely’s choice of a wife, any more than Selwyn did himself, explaining that it was his mother, the Duchess of Mumford, Lady Zinnia, who would choose a wife for him. “I keep telling you, darling girl. I really don’t remember,” he replies awkwardly, covering his tracks as best as he can. “If you remember, I was rather tight***** that night on your father’s champagne.”

 

“Well,” Arabella says with a sigh. “I’m determined not to incur her wrath, even though I’m sure it’s nowhere near as awful as you two suggest.”

 

“Oh-oh!” Gerald mutters under his breath to Lettice. “In coming.”

 

“Oh no.” moans Lettice quietly in return behind the painted smile she places on her face as she, Gerald and Arabella are suddenly set upon by the Miss Evanses, the two spinster sisters who live in Holland House, a Seventeenth Century manor house in the village.

 

The trio smile benignly as the two sisters twitter to one another in crackling voices that sound like crisp autumn leaves underfoot as they approach them.

 

“Well, twice in as many weeks, Miss Chetwynd!” exclaims the younger of the Miss Evanses in delight, a joyous smile spreading across her dry, unpainted lips. “Last week at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Great Spring Show, and now here! How very blessed we are to see you again.”

 

“How do you do, Miss Evans, Miss Evans,” Lettice acknowledges them both with a curt nod from her seat. She glances at the two old women, who must be in their seventies at least, both dressed in a similar style to when she saw them last week at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Great Spring Show, in floral gowns of pre-war Edwardian era length, their equally old fashioned whale bone S-bend corsets****** forcing their breasts into giant monobosoms down which sautoirs******* of glittering Edwardian style beads on gold chains cascade. Wearing toques with feather aigrettes jutting out of them atop their waved white hair they look like older versions of Queen Mary.

 

“I’m afraid you are a little early for the jumble sale, Miss Evans and Miss Evans,” Arabella remarks sweetly. “We are still setting up.”

 

“Oh, thank you! We know, Mrs. Chetwynd.” twitters the elder of the Miss Evanses, surprising Arabella a little as she still gets used to being referred to by her new married name. “I was just remarking to Henrietta this very morning over breakfast that we do so much look forward to the village fête every year.”

 

“Yes, it’s a nice way for us to be able to support the local community in our own small way, isn’t that right Geraldine?” enthuses her sister, raising her white lace glove clad hand to her wrinkled and dry mouth as she giggles in a rather unseemly girlish way.

 

“Indeed yes, Henrietta. It is to aid the school this year, is it not?”

 

“It is Miss Evans.” Arabella confirms. “To help buy new books for the children.”

 

“A very fine cause, I must say,” the younger of the Miss Evanses remarks indulgently. “Helping the young ones to read and develop their fertile minds. Rather like gardening, wouldn’t you say?”

 

“It is not even remotely like gardening!” quips her sister. “Stop talking such nonsense Henrietta.”

 

“We shall of course be glad of your patronage when the jumble sale opens in an hour.” Arabella quickly says in an effort to diffuse any unpleasantness between the two spinster sisters, at the same time emphasising the time the sale begins.

 

“Well,” adds the elder of the Miss Evanses seriously. “We shall of course come and spend a few shillings and pence when it opens officially, but…”

 

“Oh!” interrupts the younger of the Miss Evanses. “Is your frock designed by Master Bruton, Miss Chetwynd?” She addresses Gerald in the old fashioned deference of the village and county folk when addressing the children of the bigger aristocratic houses.

 

“Yes, Miss Evans. Mr. Bruton,” Lettice applies gravatas to the correct reference to Gerald’s name now that he is of age. “Did design my frock.”

 

“Oh it’s ever so smart!” the younger of the sisters enthuses.

 

“Thank you, Miss Evans.” Gerald acknowledges her.

 

“And your hat?” Miss Evans points to the yellow straw hat. “Didn’t I see you wearing that at Master Leslie’s wedding to Miss Arabella?”

 

“Mrs. Chetwynd, I think you mean, Henrietta.” corrects her sister with a sharpness to her remark.

 

“Oh yes!” bristles the younger Miss Evans at her sister’s harsh correction, raising her hand to her mouth again. “Yes of course! Mrs. Chetwynd, I do apologise.”

 

“It’s quite alright, Miss Evans.” Arabella assures her. “I am still getting used to being Mrs. Chetwynd myself.”

 

“How very observant of you, Miss Evans.” Lettice addresses the younger of the siblings. “I did indeed have my hat made for Leslie and Bella’s wedding. It was made by a friend of Mr. Bruton’s, Miss Harriet Milford.”

 

“Yes, well thinking of hats, I…” begins the elder Miss Evans.

 

“Oh it’s most becoming, Miss Chetwynd.” the younger Miss Evans interrupts her sister again as she compliments Lettice in an obsequious manner, followed by another twittering giggle.

 

“I can send someone down to Holland House this afternoon after the fête with her details if you like.” Lettice replies. “The next time you’re in London, you might pay her a call.”

 

The two sisters give one another a sour look at the idea, their lips thinning and their eyes lowering as they nod to one another in unison before turning back to Lettice and Gerald.

 

“Aside from the Great Spring Show, we don’t have much call to go up to London these days, do we Henrietta?”

 

“Indeed no, Geraldine.” agrees the younger Miss Evans between pursed lips, a tinge of regret in her statement.

 

“Besides we find the services of Mrs. Maginot’s in the high street to be quite adequate.”

 

“Good lord!” gasps Gerald, causing the two spinster sisters to blush at his strong language. “Is old Mrs. Maginot still going?” He chuckles. “Fancy that!”

 

The elder Miss Evans clears her dry and raspy throat awkwardly before continuing. “For our more bucolic, and doubtlessly simple tastes, Master Bruton, we find Mrs. Maginot to be quite satisfactory.” Both sisters raise their lace gloved hands to their toques in unison, patting the runched floral cotton lovingly. “We aren’t quite as fashionable as you smart and select London folk down here in sleepy little Glynes, Master Bruton, Miss Chetwynd, but we manage to keep up appearances.”

 

“On indeed yes, Miss Evans.” Lettice replies with an amused smile. “No-one could fault you on maintaining your standards.”

 

“I imagine you will soon be designing Miss Chetwnd’s own wedding frock, Master Bruton.” the younger of the Miss Evanses announces rather vulgarly.

 

“That’s only if I let her get married, Miss Evans,” Gerald teases her indulgently. “I might like to whisk her away and lock her in a tower so that I can keep her all to myself.”

 

“After what we all saw with our own eyes at the Hunt Ball, I’m sorry Master Bruton, but I don’t think you are in the running for Miss Chetwynd’s affections!” the younger Miss Evans twittering giggle escapes her throat yet again as her eyes sparkle with delight at the very faintest whiff of any gossip.

 

“How is Mr. Spencely, Miss Chetwynd?” the elder Miss Evans asks pointedly, her scrutinising gaze studying Lettice’s face.

 

Lettice blushes at the directness of both Miss Evans’ question and her steely gaze. “Oh, he’s quite well, as far as I know, Miss Evans.” she replies awkwardly.

 

“As far as you know?” the older woman’s outraged tone betrays her surprise as she looks quizzically into Lettice’s flushed face.

 

“Well, I haven’t seen Selw… err, Mr. Spencely just as of late.”

 

“Oh?” the elder Miss Evans queries. “I thought we saw you leave the tent we were in at the Great Spring Show, on the arm of Mr. Spencely.”

 

“Yes, I’m sure it was him, Miss Chetwynd.” adds the younger Miss Evans as she raises a lace clad finger in thought. “He’s very striking and hard to mistake for someone else.”

 

Silently Lettice curses the beady eyed observation the two spinster sisters are known for. Of course, they of all people at the bustling and crowded Chelsea flower show, noticed her inadvertent stumble into Selwyn and then her departure with him. Although perfectly innocent, and accompanied by her married friend Margot Channon, and Selwyn’s cousin, Pamela Fox-Chavers, she can see how easily the Miss Evanses can construe the situation to their own advantage of spreading salacious London gossip about Lettice, as daughter of the local squire, around the citizenry of Glynes village.

 

“I believe you were here for a purpose, Miss Evans.” Gerald pipes up, quickly defending his best friend from any more uncomfortable cross examination.

 

“Oh,” the elder Miss Evans replies, the disappointment at the curtailing of her attempt to gather gossip clear in both her tone of voice and the fall of her thin and pale face. “Yes.” She turns to Arabella. “I have actually come early today to see you on business, Mrs. Chetwynd.”

 

“Me, Miss Evans?” Arabella raises her hand to the scalloped collar of her blouse and toys with the arrow and heart gold and diamond broach there – a wedding gift from her husband.

 

“Yes.” replies the elder of the two sisters. “You see, when I heard that you were running the second-hand stall this year, I did feel sorry for you.”

 

“Sorry for me, Miss Evans?”

 

“Yes,” she replies, screwing up her eyes. “For as you know, there is always a poor offering of donated goods by the other villagers, and it makes for a rather sad and depressing sight amidst all this gaiety.” She gesticulates over Arabella’s trestle with a lace glove clad hand, sending forth the whiff of lavender, cloves and camphor in the process.

 

“Unless you are donating one of your lovely frocks to the sale, Master Bruton?” the younger of the Miss Evanses adds with a hopeful lilt in her voice. “I should buy it, even if it didn’t fit me.”

 

Gerald splutters and chokes on the gulp of tea he has just taken as the question is posed of him. Coughing, he deposits his cup quickly and withdraws a large white handkerchief which he uses to cover his mouth and muffle his coughs.

 

“Oh, poor Master Bruton!” exclaims the younger of the Miss Evanses as she reaches out and gently, but pointlessly, taps Gerald on the shoulder in an effort to help him. “Did you tea go down the wrong way?”

 

“I arrest my case.” her elder sister snaps giving Gerald a steely, knowing look.

 

“Now be fair, Miss Evans,” Lettice defends her friend, filled with a sudden burst of anger towards the hypocritical old woman, who despite having plenty of money of her own, only spends a few shillings at the fundraiser every year. “Gerald is still establishing himself in London! He cannot afford to give one of his frocks away when he has to pour what little profit he currently makes back into supporting and promoting his atelier.”

 

“As you like, Miss Chetwynd.” Miss Evans replies dismissively. “It is a pity though that neither Master Bruton, nor yourself could cast something Mrs. Chetwynd’s way, to help make her stall more,” She pauses momentarily as she considers the correct word. “Appealing.”

 

Lettice feels the harshness of the old woman’s rebuke, but she says nothing as she feels a flush of shame rise up her neck and fill her face.

 

“Geraldine!” her younger sister scolds her. “That’s most uncharitable of you.”

 

“Charity, my dear Henrietta, begins at home.” She looks critically at the knotted half completed knitting, the yellow and age stained linen and the mismatched gloves. “And Mrs, Chetwynd, I see that try as you might, you cannot disguise the usually dispirited efforts of the village used clothing drive this year.”

 

“Oh, well I haven’t really finished setting up yet, Miss Evans.” Arabella defends herself. “There are still some things to unpack from the boxes behind me.” She indicates to several large wooden crates stacked up behind her against the wall under the watchful gaze of the King.

 

“Which are items that doubtlessly didn’t sell last year, or the year before that have been shuffled away, only to make their annual reappearance.”

 

“Perhaps you have something appealing,” Lettice emphasises her re-use of the elder Miss Evans’ word as she tries to regain some moral standing against the older woman. “To offer at this year’s second-hand clothing stall, Miss Evans.”

 

“As a matter of fact,” the elder Miss Evans replies with a self-satisfied smile and sigh. “That is exactly why I am here.”

 

With a groaning heave, she foists the wicker basket, the handle of which she has been grasping in her bony right hand, up onto the trestle table’s surface. She opens one of the floral painted flaps and withdraws a large caramel felt Edwardian style picture hat of voluminous pre-war proportions from within the basket’s interior. The brim of the hat is trimmed with coffee and gold braid, woven into an ornate pattern whilst the crown is smothered in a magnificent display of feathers in curlicues and the brim decorated with sprigs or ornate autumnal shaded foliage and fruit.

 

“As I said, charity begins at home, so I thought I would add some style and panache to your stall, Mrs. Chetwynd, with the addition of this beautiful hat.”

 

“Oh, thank you, Miss Evans.” Arabella says with a sweet, yet slightly forced smile as the older woman tears off a smaller blue stiffed lace hat from a wooden hatstand and replaces it with her enormous millinery confection.

 

“I know it is only a hat from Mrs. Maginot, and not a London milliner,” she looks pointedly at Lettice. “But I dare say it will be more than suitable for our modest little country jumble sale.”

 

“Oh I’m sure it will be,” Arabella lies politely as she looks in dismay at the old fashioned headwear.

 

“Geraldine!” gasps her sister in disbelief. “You love that hat! I remember you had Mrs. Maginot make it for the King’s Coronation celebrations at great expense!”

 

“That’s true, Henrietta, but it just sits in a box at home these days and never gets worn anymore. It seems a shame to hide it away when it could look fetching on another’s head in church on Sunday. No-one will have anything to rival it. Not even you, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

“I agree with that,” whispers Lettice discreetly into Gerald’s ear, unnoticed by either of the spinster sisters. “I’d rather die than be caught in that ghastly thing. It looks every minute of it’s age.”

 

“Just a touch Miss Havisham, don’t you think?” Gerald whispers back, causing both he and Lettice to quietly snort and stifle their giggles.

 

“Well, that really is most kind of you, Miss Evans.” Arabella says loudly and brightly with a polite nod of acknowledgement, anxious to cover up the mischievous titters from her friend and sister-in-law.

 

“It’s my pleasure.” she replies with a beatific smile. “Well, we shan’t hold you up any longer from doing your setting up of the clothes, Mrs. Chetwynd. Come along Henrietta. Let’s go and make sure Mr. Beatty has my floral arrangement in a suitably advantageous place. I’m not having it shunted to the back like last year.”

 

“Oh, yes Geraldine.” her sister replies obsequiously.

 

Lettice, Gerald and Arabella watch as the two old ladies slowly retreat and heave a shared sigh of relief.

 

Gerald deposits his cup on the trestle’s surface and walks up to the grand Edwardian hat and snatches it off the wooden stand before placing it atop his own head with a sweeping gesture. “Do you think it suits me?” he laughs.

 

Lettice and Arabella laugh so much they cannot answer.

 

“Well,” Gerald sighs, returning the hat to the stand. “Even if Hattie could make hats a hundred times more fashionable than this, maybe some local lady who is a bit behind the times will want to take this beauty home.” He arranges it carefully on the rounded block so that it shows off the autumnal themed fruit garland pinned to the wide felt brim.

 

“That’s the spirit I need, Gerald.” Arabella manages to say as she recovers from laughing at her friend’s theatrical modelling of the hat, and quietly she hopes that someone will buy the hat and everything else she has in her remit to sell, to help raise money for schoolbooks for the local village and country children that attend the Glynes Village School.

 

*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.

 

**A shirtwaister is a woman's dress with a seam at the waist, its bodice incorporating a collar and button fastening in the style of a shirt which gained popularity with women entering the workforce to do clerical work in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries.

 

***Tatting is a technique for handcrafting a particularly durable lace from a series of knots and loops. Tatting can be used to make lace edging as well as doilies, collars, accessories such as earrings and necklaces, and other decorative pieces.

 

****A leg of mutton sleeve is a sleeve that has a lot of fullness around the shoulder-bicep area but is fitted around the forearm and wrist. Also known as a gigot sleeve, they were popular throughout different periods of history, but in particular the first few years of the Twentieth Century.

 

*****’Tight’ is an old fashioned upper-class euphemism for drunk.

 

******Created by a specific style of corset popular between the turn of the Twentieth Century and the outbreak of the Great War, the S-bend is characterized by a rounded, forward leaning torso with hips pushed back. This shape earned the silhouette its name; in profile, it looks similar to a tilted letter S.

 

*******A Sautoir is a long necklace consisting of a fine gold chain and typically set with jewels, a style typically fashionable in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries.

  

Whilst this charming village fête scene may appear real to you, it is in fact part of my 1:12 miniatures collection, including items from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Perhaps the main focus of our image, the elder Miss Evans’ camel coloured wide brimmed Edwardian picture hat is made of brown felt and is trimmed with miniature coffee coloured braid. The brim is decorated with hand curled feathers, dyed to match the shade of the hat, as well as a spray of golden “grapes” and dyed flowers. Acquired from an American miniatures collector who was divesting herself of some of her collection, I am unsure who the maker was, other than it was made by an American miniature artisan. 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism such as these are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable.

 

The shirtwaister dummy, complete with lace blouse, tweed skirt and Art Nouveau belt attached to a lacquered wooden base, is an artisan miniature as well, once again by an unknown person. It came from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The divine little patriotic cupcakes, each with a Union Jack on the top, has 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 cupcake is only five millimetres in diameter and eight millimetres in height! The plate on which they stand and the teacups on the table are made by the Dolls House Emporium and are part of a larger sets including plates, tureens and gravy boats.

 

Miss Evans’ wicker picnic basket that can be seen peeping out near the right-hand side of the picture was made by an unknown miniature artisan in America. The floral patterns on the top have been hand painted. The hinged lids lift, just like a real hamper, so things can be put inside. When I bought it, it arrived containing the little yellow napkins folded into triangles and the hand embroidered placemats that you see on the table in the foreground.

 

The knitting needles and tiny 1:12 miniature knitting, the red woven straw hat, the doilies, the stockings and the napkins in their round metal rings all came from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom. The elbow length grey ttravelling gloves on the table are artisan pieces made of kid leather. I acquired these from a high street dolls house specialist when I was a teenager. Amazingly, they have never been lost in any of the moves that they have made over the years are still pristinely clean.

 

The wooden boxes in the background with their Edwardian advertising labels have been purposely aged and came from The Dolls’ House Supplier in the United Kingdom.

 

The Portrait of King George V in the gilt frame in the background was created by me using a portrait of him done just before the Great War of 1914 – 1918. I also created the Union Jack bunting that is draped across the wall in the background.

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 just a short distance from Cavendish Mews, at Mr. Willison’s grocers’ shop. Willison’s Grocers in Mayfair is where Lettice has an account, and it is from here that Edith, Lettice's maid, orders her groceries for the Cavendish Mews flat, except on special occasions like the soirée that Lettice threw for Dickie and Margot Channon’s engagement, when professional London caterers are used. Mr. Willison prides himself in having a genteel, upper-class clientele including the households of many titled aristocrats who have houses and flats in the neighbourhood, and he makes sure that his shop is always tidy, his shelves well stocked with anything the cook of a duke or duchess may want, and staff who are polite and mannerly to all his important customers. The latter is not too difficult, for aside from himself, Mrs. Willison does his books, his daughter Henrietta helps on Saturdays and sometimes after she has finished school, which means Mr. Willison technically only employs one member of staff: Frank Leadbetter his delivery boy who carries orders about Mayfair on the bicycle provided for him by Mr. Willison. He also collects payments for accounts which are not settled in his Binney Street shop whilst on his rounds.

 

Lettice’s maid, Edith, is stepping out with Frank, and to date since he rather awkwardly suggested the idea to her in the kitchen of the Cavendish Mews flat, the pair has spent every Sunday afternoon together, going to see the latest moving pictures at the Premier in East Ham*, dancing at the Hammersmith Palais or walking in one of London’s many parks. They even spent Easter Monday at the fair held on Hampstead Heath***. Whilst Lettice is away in Cornwall selecting furniture from Dickie and Margot’s Penzance country house, ‘Chi an Treth’, to be re-purposed, Edith is taking advantage of a little more free time and has come to Willison’s Grocers under the pre-text of running an errand in the hope of seeing Frank. The bell rings cheerily as she opens the plate glass door with Mr. Willison’s name painted in neat gilt lettering upon it. Stepping across the threshold she immediately smells the mixture of comforting smells of fresh fruits, vegetables and flour, permeated by the delicious scent of the brightly coloured boiled sweets coming from the large cork stoppered jars on the shop counter. The sounds of the busy street outside die away, muffled by shelves lined with any number of tinned goods and signs advertising everything from Lyon’s Tea**** to Bovril*****.

 

“Miss Watsford!” exclaims Mr. Willison’s wife as she peers up from her spot behind the end of the return counter near the door where she sits doing her husband’s accounts. “We don’t often have the pleasure.”

 

Edith looks up, unnerved, at the proprietor’s wife and bookkeeper, her upswept hairstyle as old fashioned as her high necked starched shirtwaister****** blouse down the front of which runs a long string of faceted bluish black beads. “Yes,” Edith smiles awkwardly. “I… I have, err… that is to say I forgot to give Fr… err, Mr. Leadbeater my grocery list when he visited the other day.”

 

“Oh?” Mrs. Willison queries. “I could have sworn that we had it.” She starts fussing through a pile of papers distractedly. “That isn’t like you Miss Watsford. You’re usually so well organised.”

 

“Well,” Edith thinks quickly. “It… it isn’t really the list. It’s just that I left a few things off. Miss Chetwynd… well, you see she fancies…”

 

“Oh, well give me the additions, Miss Watsford,” Mrs. Willison thrusts out her hand efficiently, the frothy white lace of her sleeve dancing around her wrist. “And I’ll see to it that they are added to your next delivery. We don’t want the Honourable Miss Chetwynd to go without, now do we?”

 

With a shaky hand Edith reluctantly hands over her list of a few extra provisions that aren’t really required, especially with her mistress being away for a few days. As she does, she glances around the cluttered and dim shop hopefully.

 

“Will there be anything else, Miss Watsford?” Mrs. Willison asks curtly.

 

“Err… yes.” Edith stammers, but falls silent as she continues to look in desperation around the shop.

 

Mrs. Willison suspiciously eyes the slender and pretty domestic through her pince-nez*******. She scrutinises Edith’s fashionable plum coloured frock with the pretty lace collar. The hem of the skirt is following the current style and sits higher than any of Mrs. Willison’s own dresses and it reveals Edith’s shapely stockinged calves. She wears her black straw cloche decorated with purple silk roses and black feathers over her neatly pinned chignon. “Is that a few frock, Miss Watsford?” the grocer’s wife continues.

 

“Ahh, yes it is, Mrs. Willison. I made it myself from scratch with a dress pattern from Fashion for All********,” Edith replies proudly, giving a little twirl that sends her calf length skirt flaring out prettily, and Mrs. Willison’s eyebrows arching with disapproval as the young girl reveals even more of her legs as she does. “Do you like it?”

 

“You seem a little dressed up to run an errand here, Miss Watsford.” Mrs. Willison says with bristling disapprobation.

 

“Well, I… I err… I do have some letters to post too, Mrs. Willison,” Edith withdraws two letters from her wicker basket and holds them up in her lilac glove clad hand.

 

“Well, we mustn’t keep you from your errand, now must we, Miss Watsford? Now what else did you require before you leave?” the older woman emphasises the last word in her sentence to make clear her opinion about young girls cluttering up her husband’s shop.

 

“An apple.” Edith says, suddenly struck with inspiration. “I’d like an apple for the journey, Mrs. Willison.”

 

“Very good, Miss Watsford.” the older woman starts to move off her stool. “I’ll fetch…”

 

“No need, Mrs. Willison!” Frank’s cheerful voice pipes up as he appears from behind a display of tinned goods. “I’ll take care of Miss Watsford. That’s what I’m here for. You just stay right there Mrs. Willison. Right this way, Miss Watsford.” He ushers her with a sweeping gesture towards the boxes of fresh fruit displayed near the cash register.

 

“Oh Fran…” Edith catches herself uttering Frank’s given name, quickly correcting herself. “Err… thank you, Mr. Leadbetter.”

 

Mrs. Willison lowers herself back into her seat, all the while eyeing the pair of young people critically as they move across the shop floor together, their heads boughed conspiratorially close, a sense of overfamiliarity about their body language. She frowns, the folds and furrows of her brow eventuated. Then she sighs and returns to the numbers in her ledger.

 

“What are you doing here, Edith?” Frank whispers to his sweetheart quietly, yet with evident delight in his voice.

 

“Miss Lettice is away down in Cornwall on business, so I thought I’d stop in on my way through in the hope of seeing you, Frank.” She glances momentarily over her shoulder. “Then Mrs. Willison greeted me. I thought I was going to get stuck with the disapproving old trout and not see you.”

 

“The weather looks good for Sunday, Edith. It’s supposed to be sunny. Shall we go to Regent’s Park and feed the ducks if it is?”

 

“Oh, yes!” Edith clasps her hands in delight, her gloves muffling the sound. “Maybe there will be a band playing in the rotunda.”

 

“If there is, I’ll hire us a couple of deck chairs and we can listen to them play all afternoon in the sunshine.”

 

“That sounds wonderful, Frank.”

 

“Well,” pronounces Frank loudly as the stand over the wooden tray of red and golden yellow apples. “This looks like a nice juicy one, Miss Watsford.”

 

“Yes,” Edith replies in equally clear tones. “I think I’ll have that one, Mr. Leadbeater.”

 

“Very good, Miss Watsford. I’ll pop it into a paper bag for you.”

 

“Oh, don’t bother Fr… Mr. Leadbeater. I’ll put it in my basket.”

 

Frank takes the apple and walks back around the counter to the gleaming brass cash register surrounded by jars of boiled sweets. “That will be tuppence please, Miss Watsford.” He enters the tally into the noisy register, causing the cash draw to spring open with a clunk and the rattle of coins rubbing against one another with the movement.

 

Edith hooks her umbrella over the edge of the counter, pulls off her gloves and fishes around in her green handbag before withdrawing her small leather coin purse from which she takes out tuppence which she hands over to Frank.

 

“Here,” Frank says after he deposits her money and pushes the drawer of the register closed. He slides a small purple and gold box discreetly across the counter.

 

Edith gasps as she looks at the beautifully decorated box featuring a lady with cascading auburn hair highlighted with gold ribbons, a creamy face and décollétage sporting a frothy white gown and gold necklace. She traces the embossed gold lettering on the box’s lid. “Gainsborough Dubarry Milk Chocolates!”

 

“Can’t have my girl come all this way to see me and not come away with a gift.” Frank whispers with a beaming smile dancing across his face.

 

“Seeing you is gift enough, Frank.” Edith blushes.

 

“Ahem!” Mrs. Willison clears her throat from the other end of the shop. “Will they be going on the Honourable Miss Chetwynd’s account, Frank?” she asks with a severe look directly at her husband’s employee.

 

“Um… no Mrs. Willison. Don’t worry. I’ll be paying for them.” Frank announces loudly. Bending his head closer to Edith, he whispers, “I can see why Mr. Willison has her in here when he isn’t. You can’t get away with anything without her knowing: ghastly old trout.”

 

Edith giggles as she puts the small box of chocolates and the apple into her basket. “I’ll save them for Sunday.” she says with a smile. “We can share them whilst we listen to the band from our deckchairs.”

 

Frank smile broadens even more. “Righty-ho, Edith.”

 

“Righty-ho, Frank.”

 

“Well, as I was saying, Miss Watsford,” Mrs. Willison pronounces from her stool. “We mustn’t keep you from your errands. I’m sure you have a lot to do, and it is almost midday already.”

 

“Yes indeed, Mrs. Willison.” Edith agrees, unable to keep the reluctance out of her voice. “I really should be getting along. Well, goodbye Mr. Leadbeater. Thank you for your assistance.” She then lowers her voice as she says, “See you Sunday.”

 

Both Frank and Mrs. Willison watch as the young lady leaves the shop the way she came, by the front door, a spring in her step and a satisfied smile on her face, her basket, umbrella and handbag slung over her arm.

 

“Frank!”

 

Frank cringes as Mrs. Willison calls his name. Turning around he sees her striding with purpose behind the counter towards him, wending her way through the obstacle course of stacks of tins and jars of produce, hessian sacks of fresh vegetables and fruits and boxes of bottles.

 

“Yes, Mrs Willison?”

 

“Frank,” she says disappointingly. “I can’t stop you from stepping out with a girl in your own time,” She comes to a halt before him, domineering over him with her topknot, her arms akimbo. “And I’d say the Honourable Miss Chetwynd is foolishly modern enough to let you take her maid out on Sundays.” She looks at him with disapproving eyes. “However, I’d be much obliged if you kept your dalliances to your own time, and kindly keep them out of my husband’s establishment during business hours!”

 

“Yes Mrs. Willison!” Frank replies, sighing gratefully, now knowing that he isn’t going to be given notice for chatting with Edith during work hours.

 

“And I’ll make an adjustment to your wages this week for the chocolates.” she adds crisply.

 

“Yes Mrs. Willison.” Frank nods before hurrying away back to the stock room.

 

*The Premier Super Cinema in East Ham was opened on the 12th of March, 1921, replacing the 800 seat capacity 1912 Premier Electric Theatre. The new cinema could seat 2,408 patrons. The Premier Super Cinema was taken over by Provincial Cinematograph Theatres who were taken over by Gaumont British in February 1929. It was renamed the Gaumont from 21st April 1952. The Gaumont was closed by the Rank Organisation on 6th April 1963. After that it became a bingo hall and remained so until 2005. Despite attempts to have it listed as a historic building due to its relatively intact 1921 interior, the Gaumont was demolished in 2009.

 

**The Hammersmith Palais de Danse, in its last years simply named Hammersmith Palais, was a dance hall and entertainment venue in Hammersmith, London, England that operated from 1919 until 2007. It was the first palais de danse to be built in Britain.

 

***Hampstead Heath (locally known simply as the Heath) is a large, ancient London heath, covering 320 hectares (790 acres). This grassy public space sits astride a sandy ridge, one of the highest points in London, running from Hampstead to Highgate, which rests on a band of London Clay. The heath is rambling and hilly, embracing ponds, recent and ancient woodlands, a lido, playgrounds, and a training track, and it adjoins the former stately home of Kenwood House and its estate. The south-east part of the heath is Parliament Hill, from which the view over London is protected by law.

 

****Lyons Tea was first produced by J. Lyons and Co., a catering empire created and built by the Salmons and Glucksteins, a German-Jewish immigrant family based in London. Starting in 1904, J. Lyons began selling packaged tea through its network of teashops. Soon after, they began selling their own brand Lyons Tea through retailers in Britain, Ireland and around the world. In 1918, Lyons purchased Hornimans and in 1921 they moved their tea factory to J. Lyons and Co., Greenford at that time, the largest tea factory in Europe. In 1962, J. Lyons and Company (Ireland) became Lyons Irish Holdings. After a merger with Allied Breweries in 1978, Lyons Irish Holdings became part of Allied Lyons (later Allied Domecq) who then sold the company to Unilever in 1996. Today, Lyons Tea is produced in England.

 

*****Bovril is owned and distributed by Unilever UK. Its appearance is similar to Marmite and Vegemite. Bovril can be made into a drink ("beef tea") by diluting with hot water or, less commonly, with milk. It can be used as a flavouring for soups, broth, stews or porridge, or as a spread, especially on toast in a similar fashion to Marmite and Vegemite.

 

******A shirtwaister is a woman's dress with a seam at the waist, its bodice incorporating a collar and button fastening in the style of a shirt which gained popularity with women entering the workforce to do clerical work in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries.

  

*******Pince-nez is a style of glasses, popular in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries, that are supported without earpieces, by pinching the bridge of the nose. The name comes from French pincer, "to pinch", and nez, "nose".

 

********”Fashion for All” was one of the many women’s magazines that were published in the exuberant inter-war years which were aimed at young girls who were looking to better their chances of finding a husband through beauty and fashion. As most working-class girls could only imagine buying fashionable frocks from high street shops, there was a great appetite for dressmaking patterns so they could dress fashionably at a fraction of the cost, by making their own dresses using skills they learned at home.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful Edwardian shop is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection. Some pieces come from my own childhood. Other items I acquired as an adult through specialist online dealers and artists who specialise in 1:12 miniatures.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Central to the conclusion of our story is the dainty box of Gainsborough Dubarry Milk Chocolates. This beautifully printed confectionary box comes from Shepherd’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Starting in the Edwardian era, confectioners began to design attractive looking boxes for their chocolate selections so that they could sell confectionary at a premium, as the boxes were often beautifully designed and well made so that they might be kept as a keepsake. A war erupted in Britain between the major confectioners to try and dominate what was already a competitive market. You might recognise the shade of purple of the box as being Cadbury purple, and if you did, you would be correct, although this range was not marketed as Cadbury’s, but rather Gainsborough’s, paying tribute to the market town of Gainsborough in Lincolnshire, where Rose Bothers manufactured and supplied machines that wrapped chocolates. The Rose Brothers are the people for whom Cadbury’s Roses chocolates are named.

 

Also on the shop counter is an apple which is very realistic looking. Made of polymer clay it is made by a 1:12 miniature specialist in Germany. The brightly shining cash register, probably polished by Frank, was supplied by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in the United Kingdom. The cylindrical jars, made of real spun glass with proper removable cork stoppers which contain “sweets” I acquired as a teenager from an auction as part of a larger lot of miniature items. Edith’s lilac coloured gloves are made of real kid leather and along with the envelopes are artisan pieces that I acquired from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Edith’s green leather handbag I acquired as part of a larger collection of 1:12 artistan miniature hats, bags and accessories I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel. The umbrella comes from Melody Jane’s Doll House Suppliers in the United Kingdom. Edith’s basket I acquired as part of a larger lot of 1:12 miniatures from an E-Bay seller in America.

 

The packed shelves you can see in the background is in fact a Welsh dresser that I have had since I was a child, which I have repurposed for this shot. You can see the dresser more clearly in other images used in this series when Edith visits her parent’s home in Harlesden. The shelves themselves are full of 1:12 artisan miniatures with amazing attention to detail as regards the labels of different foods. Some are still household names today. So many of these packets and tins of various foods would have been household staples in the 1920s when canning and preservation revolutinised domestic cookery. They come from various different suppliers including Shepherds Miniatures in the United Kingdom, Kathleen Knight’s Doll House in the United Kingdom, Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering and Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. Items on the shelves include: Tate and Lyall Golden Syrup, Lyall’s Golden Treacle, Peter Leech and Sons Golden Syrup, P.C. Flett and Company jams, Golden Shred and Silver Shred Marmalades, Chiver’s Jelly Crystals, Rowtree’s Table Jelly, Bird’s Custard Powder, Bird’s Blancmange Powder, Coleman’s Mustard, Queen’s Gravy Salts, Bisto Gravy Powder, Huntly and Palmers biscuits, Lyon’s Tea and Typhoo Tea.

 

In 1859 Henry Tate went into partnership with John Wright, a sugar refiner based at Manesty Lane, Liverpool. Their partnership ended in 1869 and John’s two sons, Alfred and Edwin joined the business forming Henry Tate and Sons. A new refinery in Love Lane, Liverpool was opened in 1872. In 1921 Henry Tate and Sons and Abram Lyle and Sons merged, between them refining around fifty percent of the UK’s sugar. A tactical merger, this new company would then become a coherent force on the sugar market in anticipation of competition from foreign sugar returning to its pre-war strength. Tate and Lyle are perhaps best known for producing Lyle’s Golden Syrup and Lyle’s Golden Treacle.

 

Peter Leech and Sons was a grocers that operated out of Lowther Street in Whitehaven from the 1880s. They had a large range of tinned goods that they sold including coffee, tea, tinned salmon and golden syrup. They were admired for their particularly attractive labelling. I do not know exactly when they ceased production, but I believe it may have happened just before the Second World War.

 

P.C. Flett and Company was established in Kirkwall in the Orkney Islands by Peter Copeland Flett. He had inherited a small family owned ironmongers in Albert Street Kirkwall, which he inherited from his maternal family. He had a shed in the back of the shop where he made ginger ale, lemonade, jams and preserves from local produce. By the 1920s they had an office in Liverpool, and travelling representatives selling jams and preserves around Great Britain. I am not sure when the business ceased trading.

 

Golden Shred orange marmalade and Silver Shred lime marmalade still exist today and are common household brands both in Britain and Australia. They are produced by Robertson’s. Robertson’s Golden Shred recipe perfected since 1874 is a clear and tangy orange marmalade, which according to their modern day jars is “perfect for Paddington’s marmalade sandwiches”. Robertson’s Silver Shred is a clear, tangy, lemon flavoured shredded marmalade. Robertson’s marmalade dates back to 1874 when Mrs. Robertson started making marmalade in the family grocery shop in Paisley, Scotland.

 

Chivers is an Irish brand of jams and preserves. For a large part of the Twentieth Century Chivers and Sons was Britain's leading preserves manufacturer. Originally market gardeners in Cambridgeshire in 1873 after an exceptional harvest, Stephen Chivers entrepreneurial sons convinced their father to let them make their first batch of jam in a barn off Milton Road, Impington. By 1875 the Victoria Works had been opened next to Histon railway station to improve the manufacture of jam and they produced stone jars containing two, four or six pounds of jam, with glass jars first used in 1885. In around 1885 they had 150 employees. Over the next decade they added marmalade to their offering which allowed them to employ year-round staff, rather than seasonal workers at harvest time. This was followed by their clear dessert jelly (1889), and then lemonade, mincemeat, custard powder, and Christmas puddings. By 1896 the family owned 500 acres of orchards. They began selling their products in cans in 1895, and the rapid growth in demand was overseen by Charles Lack, their chief engineer, who developed the most efficient canning machinery in Europe and by the end of the century Chivers had become one of the largest manufacturers of preserves in the world. He later added a variety of machines for sorting, can making, vacuum-caps and sterilisation that helped retain Chivers' advantage over its rivals well into the Twentieth Century. By the turn of the century the factory was entirely self-sufficient, growing all its own fruit, and supplying its own water and electricity. The factory made its own cans, but also contained a sawmill, blacksmiths, coopers, carpenters, paint shop, builders and basket makers. On the 14th of March 1901 the company was registered as S. Chivers and Sons. By 1939 there were over 3,000 full-time employees, with offices in East Anglia as well as additional factories in Montrose, Newry and Huntingdon, and the company owned almost 8,000 acres of farms. The company's farms were each run independently, and grew cereal and raised pedigree livestock as well as the fruit for which they were known.

 

Founded by Henry Isaac Rowntree in Castlegate in York in 1862, Rowntree's developed strong associations with Quaker philanthropy. Throughout much of the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries, it was one of the big three confectionery manufacturers in the United Kingdom, alongside Cadbury and Fry, both also founded by Quakers. In 1981, Rowntree's received the Queen's Award for Enterprise for outstanding contribution to international trade. In 1988, when the company was acquired by Nestlé, it was the fourth-largest confectionery manufacturer in the world. The Rowntree brand continues to be used to market Nestlé's jelly sweet brands, such as Fruit Pastilles and Fruit Gums, and is still based in York.

 

Bird’s were best known for making custard and Bird’s Custard is still a common household name, although they produced other desserts beyond custard, including the blancmange. They also made Bird’s Golden Raising Powder – their brand of baking powder. Bird’s Custard was first formulated and first cooked by Alfred Bird in 1837 at his chemist shop in Birmingham. He developed the recipe because his wife was allergic to eggs, the key ingredient used to thicken traditional custard. The Birds continued to serve real custard to dinner guests, until one evening when the egg-free custard was served instead, either by accident or design. The dessert was so well received by the other diners that Alfred Bird put the recipe into wider production. John Monkhouse (1862–1938) was a prosperous Methodist businessman who co-founded Monk and Glass, which made custard powder and jelly. Monk and Glass custard was made in Clerkenwell and sold in the home market, and exported to the Empire and to America. They acquired by its rival Bird’s Custard in the early Twentieth Century.

 

Queen’s Gravy Salt is a British brand and this box is an Edwardian design. Gravy Salt is a simple product it is solid gravy browning and is used to add colour and flavour to soups stews and gravy - and has been used by generations of cooks and caterers.

 

The first Bisto product, in 1908, was a meat-flavoured gravy powder, which rapidly became a bestseller in Britain. It was added to gravies to give a richer taste and aroma. Invented by Messrs Roberts and Patterson, it was named "Bisto" because it "Browns, Seasons and Thickens in One". Bisto Gravy is still a household name in Britain and Ireland today, and the brand is currently owned by Premier Foods.

 

Huntley and Palmers is a British firm of biscuit makers originally based in Reading, Berkshire. The company created one of the world’s first global brands and ran what was once the world’s largest biscuit factory. Over the years, the company was also known as J. Huntley and Son and Huntley and Palmer. Huntley and Palmer were renown for their ‘superior reading biscuits’ which they promoted in different varieties for different occasions, including at breakfast time.

 

In 1863, William Sumner published A Popular Treatise on Tea as a by-product of the first trade missions to China from London. In 1870, William and his son John Sumner founded a pharmacy/grocery business in Birmingham. William's grandson, John Sumner Jr. (born in 1856), took over the running of the business in the 1900s. Following comments from his sister on the calming effects of tea fannings, in 1903, John Jr. decided to create a new tea that he could sell in his shop. He set his own criteria for the new brand. The name had to be distinctive and unlike others, it had to be a name that would trip off the tongue and it had to be one that would be protected by registration. The name Typhoo comes from the Mandarin Chinese word for “doctor”. Typhoo began making tea bags in 1967. In 1978, production was moved from Birmingham to Moreton on the Wirral Peninsula, in Merseyside. The Moreton site is also the location of Burton's Foods and Manor Bakeries factories. Typhoo has been owned since July 2021 by British private-equity firm Zetland Capital. It was previously owned by Apeejay Surrendra Group of India.

 

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.

 

Lettice is sitting at her Hepplewhite desk next to the fire in her drawing room. Across it she has open a book of modern interpretations of folk art, a title that she has only recently picked up from her father’s favourite bookshop, Mahew’s* in Charing Cross Road. She has recently accepted a commission to redecorate the St. John’s Wood dining room of friends of hers, Charles and Minnie Palmerston, after Minnie papered the room in fashionable, but totally unsuitable, wallpaper. Charles and Minnie want a modern look to go with their modern art, so Lettice is hoping to gain some inspiration about wall treatments from the book. The colours and patterns she sees are beautiful, but nothing catches her eye as she flips though the pages. Suddenly her thoughts are interrupted by a noisy jangling.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

The telephone in the drawing room starts ringing.

 

Edith, Lettice’s maid looks through from the adjoining dining room where she is dusting. “That infernal contraption!” she mutters to herself.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“Oh Edith, be a brick and get that, would you.” Lettice calls sweetly to her maid, spying her through the open double doors.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“I think it would be better if you answered it, Miss.” Edith says doubtfully.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“Nonsense, it might be someone I might not want to be at home to. You answer it.” She waves her hand dismissively at the telephone and turns back to her book, before she continues to flip through it in a desultory fashion.

 

Edith walks in and up to the black japanned occasional table upon which the silver and Bakelite telephone continues to trill loudly.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“I know you don’t like it, Edith, but any household you work in will have one now, so you may as well get used to it.” Lettice says in a matter-of-fact way. “Just pick it up and answer it, Edith. “

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“I should pull your chord out next time I’m Hoovering.” Edith mutters. “Let’s hear you ring then!”

 

Edith hates answering the telephone. It’s one of the few jobs in her position as Lettice’s maid that she wishes she didn’t have to do. Whenever she has to answer it, which is quite often considering how frequently her mistress is out and about, there is usually some uppity caller at the other end of the phone, whose toffee-nosed accent only seems to sharpen when they realise they are speaking to ‘the hired help’ as they abruptly demand Lettice’s whereabouts.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Smoothing her suddenly clammy hands down the apron covering her print morning dress she answers with a slight quiver to her voice, “Mayfair 432, the Honourable Miss Lettice Chetwynd’s residence.” Her whole body clenches and she closes her eyes as she waits for the barrage of anger from some duchess or other titled lady, affronted at having to address the maid. A distant male voice speaks down the line. “Oh Mr. Spencely, how do you do. Yes, this is Edith, Miss Chetwynd’s maid.”

 

“Selwyn!” Lettice squeaks excitedly. She waves anxiously to catch Edith’s attention. “Bring it over here!” she hisses, gesticulating enthusiastically to her maid to drag the phone across the drawing room.

 

“Oh, I’m not sure, Mr. Spencley,” Edith says with a cheeky smile playfully curling up the corners of her mouth. “I’ll just check and see whether she is in.”

 

Edith walks over to Lettice’s desk slowly, swaying her hips as she goes, dragging the white and black houndstooth flex behind her.

 

“Oh you!” Lettice mouths as she takes the receiver from her maid’s hand as Edith puts the base of the telephone on the desk next to Lettice’s silver roller.

 

With her amusement over, Edith retreats quickly through the green baize door, back to the kitchen, to give her mistress the privacy she deserves.

 

“Selwyn darling!” Lettice exclaims down the receiver. “What a lovely surprise! How are you?”

 

“I’m fit as a fiddle my Angel,” Selwyn’s voice calls down the phone over the constant pop of crackling. “How are you?”

 

“Never better.”

 

“I say, I do hope I haven’t caught you at an inopportune moment.”

 

“No, no,” she assures him. “Not at all! As a matter of fact you’re a lovely distraction. I’ve just taken on a new commission to decorate my friend Minnie’s dining room, and nothing is inspiring me. Perhaps you’ll help inspire me.”

 

“Well that’s good, my Angel.” he replies, his voice crackling with static.

 

“I say, where are you, Selwyn darling? You sound rather faint. You’re not at your club, are you? This line is quite dreadful.”

 

The line falls silent for a few moments as Lettice holds her breath.

 

“I’m at Clendon**,” he finally answers laconically.

 

“Clendon?” She pauses. “You haven’t forgotten that Priscilla and Georgie’s wedding is on Wednesday***, have you? Are you going to drive down from Buckinghamshire to London?” When there is no reply to her questions, just the constant crackle of the line, Lettice asks again, “Are you sure you’re alright, Selwyn darling.”

 

“Listen my Angel, I have to tell you something.”

 

Lettice swallows awkwardly as her joyful mood at talking to Selwyn suddenly dissipates and a roiling starts twisting her stomach.

 

“I’m so sorry, Lettice darling, but I can’t attend the wedding with you like we’d planned.”

 

“What?” Lettice asks as she feels the colour drain from her face. “Not come?”

 

“No. You see, I’m afraid that Zinnia has made some alternate arrangements that I didn’t know about. My Uncle Bertrand and Aunt Rosalind, the Fox-Chavers, are visiting Clendon for a week, and they’ve brought their daughter, my cousin Pamela. She is going to debut next year, and, well, I’ve been charged by Zinnia to help chaperone Pamela in the 1923 Season. I haven’t seen her since we were children together, rather like you and I. Zinna has organised this week for us to get to know one another again, so that I can do my duty and be a good chaperone. I’m so sorry.”

 

Lettice feels the stinging in the backs of her eyes, as tears threaten to spill from her lids.

 

“Couldn’t you… couldn’t you just….”

 

“Look it’s no good, my Angel.” Selwyn cuts her off. “Zinnia has packed the week with all sorts of outings and excursions, luncheons and the like. You know there is nothing I would rather do than spend a wonderful afternoon with you, but you must understand, this is my duty. What kind of Duke will I be if I don’t fulfil my duties?”

 

As the dam breaks and the tears spill from her eyes and silently cascade down her cheeks, Lettice longs to ask Selwyn about his duty to her, but good breeding and an upbringing of etiquette doesn’t allow her to speak her unvoiced question.

 

“Of course.” she manages to utter in a strangled voice. “You must… you must do your duty to your cousin. You’re such a… such a gentleman,” The word feels hollow as she speaks it from her suddenly dry mouth. “So gallant. That’s one of the many reasons why I like you… Selwyn darling.” She tries to take a deep breath, but can only manage shallow ones, feeling as though she is wearing one of her pre-war whalebone corsets. “No wonder… Zinnia wants you to chaperone her. Who else in London society cold she trust when it comes to… to gentlemen?”

 

There is silence broken only intermittently by the crackling in the lines for a short while before Selwyn speaks again.

 

“Look, I know you’re disappointed….”

 

“It’s quite alright, Selwyn darling.” she cuts him off, glad that he is not before her now, where her face will give away the lie in her words and tone. “Don’t worry, I’ll get Gerald to escort me.”

 

The fact is that Gerald is a friend of Priscilla’s as well, and been invited to the wedding himself.

 

“Good old Bruton.” Selwyn replies with a sigh of relief. “Always so reliable.”

 

“Yes, he’s a good companion, and he… he always enjoys a good meal and some champagne at… at someone else’s expense.”

 

The words sound hollow as she speaks them down the line, even though the tone is a falsely cheerful one. Once again there is momentary silence.

 

“I promise I’ll make it up to you, my angel.” Selwyn says. “I really would rather be with you than Pamela, whom I barely know.” He sounds genuinely sad, although in her state of sudden disappointment, Lettice half wonders if she is imagining it, or willing it to be so. “As soon as this wretched week of entertaining is over, I’ll be back in London and we’ll have dinner. Simpson’s maybe?”

 

“Yes… yes that would be lovely, Selwyn darling.” She struggles to swallow. “You, you just let me know. I’m not going down to Glynes any time soon, and what with this new commission, I’ll be quite tied up here in London for ages.”

 

“That’s the spirit, my Angel!”

 

There is a whining call in the background at Selwyn’s end.

 

“Oh! That’s Zinnia!” There is a sudden urgency in his voice, almost as if he is frightened of getting caught out doing something wrong. “Look, I snuck into father’s study to make this call, and I’ve been missed. I really must go! I’ll speak to you next week, my Angel. Pip-pip****!”

 

“Pip-pip, then…” Lettice begins, yet already she is saying goodbye to nothing but dead air.

 

Deflated, Lettice hangs up the receiver in the cradle of the telephone where it makes a clunking, muffled ding. It is only then that she finally allows herself to vice her cries as she allows them to spill forth from within her, like the tears that dampen her cheeks as they run in rivulets down ger face.

 

*A. H. Mayhew was once one of many bookshops located in London’s Charring Cross Road, an area still famous today for its bookshops, perhaps most famously written about by American authoress Helene Hanff who wrote ’84, Charing Cross Road’, which later became a play and then a 1987 film starring Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins. Number 56. Charing Cross Road was the home of Mayhew’s second-hand and rare bookshop. Closed after the war, their premises is now the home of Any Amount of Books bookshop.

 

**Clendon is the family seat of the Duke and Duchess of Walmsford in Buckinghamshire.

 

***Wednesdays were the most popular days for couples to get married in the 1920s. This is due to an old English wedding superstition very popular at the time. An auspicious rhyme from English folklore rules: “Monday for health, Tuesday for wealth, Wednesday best of all, Thursday for losses, Friday for crosses, Saturday for no luck at all”.

 

****Pip-pip, that particularly cheery of old-fashioned British farewells, is said to have been formed in imitation of the sound made by a car horn and first came into vogue in the early 1920s after the Great War.

 

For anyone who follows my photostream, you will know that I collect and photograph 1:12 size miniatures, so although it may not necessarily look like it, but this cluttered desk is actually covered in 1:12 size artisan miniatures and the desk itself is too. All are from my collection of miniatures.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Lettice’s Hepplewhite drop-drawer bureau and chair are beautifully and artfully made by J.B.M. miniatures. Both the bureau and chair are made of black japanned wood which have been hand painted with chinoiserie designs, even down the arms of the chair and inside the bureau. The chair set has a rattan seat, which has also been hand woven.

 

The book of folk art open on Lettice’s desk is a 1:12 size miniature made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. It is a German edition called “Moderner Volkunst Zierat” (“Modern Folk Art Ornament”) by P. Siegel, consisting of ornament designs from the 1920s printed by the pochoir stencilling technique. You can see images of the illustrations faithfully reproduced in 1:12 size by Ken Blythe here: bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2012/11/moderner-volkskunst-zie.... Most of the books I own that Ken Blythe has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. Therefore, it is a pleasure to give you a glimpse inside one of the books he has made. To give you an idea of the work that has gone into this volume, it contains twelve double sided pages of illustrations and it measures twenty-three millimetres in height thirty three millimetres in width and is only two millimetres thick. What might amaze you even more is that all Ken Blythe’s opening books are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, as well as through his estate via his daughter and son-in-law. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter. I hope that you enjoy this peek at just one of hundreds of his books that I own, and that it makes you smile with its sheer whimsy!

 

On the top of the Hepplewhite bureau stand three real miniature photos in frames including an Edwardian silver frame, a Victorian brass frame and an Art Deco blue Bakelite and glass frame. The latter comes from Doreen Jenkins’ Small Wonders Miniatures in England, whilst the other two come from Melody Jane Dolls’ House, also in England. The photos themselves are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

The black Bakelite and silver telephone is a 1:12 miniature of a model introduced around 1919. It is two centimetres wide and two centimetres high. The receiver can be removed from the cradle, and the curling chord does stretch out.

 

Also on the desk, are some 1:12 artisan miniature ink bottles, a roller, a blotter and a letter opener, all made by the Little Green Workshop in England who specialise in high end, high quality miniatures. The ink bottles are made from tiny faceted crystal beads and have sterling silver bottoms and lids. The ink blotter is sterling silver too and has a blotter made of real black felt, cut meticulously to size to fit snugly inside the frame.

 

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.

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 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 as her parents host their first Hunt Ball since 1914. Lady Sadie has been completely consumed over the last month by the planning and preparation of the occasion, determined that not only will it be the event of the 1922 county season, but also that it will be a successful entrée for her youngest daughter, still single at twenty-one years of age, to meet a number of eligible and marriageable men. Letters and invitations have flown from Lady Sadie’s bonheur de jour* to the families of eligible bachelors, some perhaps a little too old to be considered before the war, achieving more than modest success. Whilst Lettice enjoys dancing, parties and balls, she is less enthusiastic about the idea of the ball being used as a marriage market than her parents are.

 

We find ourselves in the lofty Adam design hall of Glynes with its parquetry floors and ornate plasterwork, outside the entrance to the ballroom antechamber, through which guests must pass to enter the grand ballroom where tonight’s Hunt Ball is being held. From the ballroom, the sound of the band hired for the evening to play can be heard above the hubbub of happy voices as like an exclusive club, aristocracy and local county guests intermingle. At the entrance to the ballroom antechamber stand the Viscount and Countess Wrexham, Leslie and Lettice, all forming a reception line where they have been standing for the last half hour, since the clocks around them struck eight and the first guests began to arrive. Now a steady stream of partygoers appear across the threshold of the house, through the door held open by Mardsen, the Chetwynd’s tall first footman. He acknowledges each person with a bow from the neck which is seldom acknowledged in return as ladies and gentlemen in thick fur coats and travel capes, fur tippets and top hats alight from the motorcars and in a few cases, horse drawn carriages that pull up to the front door. Bustling with idle chatter they each sweep through the door with a comfortable sense of privilege and self assurance, gasping with pleasure as they feel the heat of the blazing fire in the hearth of the foyer: a delightful change to the chill of the evening air their journeys were taken in. Bramley, the Chetwtynd’s butler takes the gentleman’s topcoats, capes, hats, gloves and canes, whilst Mrs. Renfrew, the Chetwynd’s housekeeper, helps the ladies divest themselves of their capes, furs and muffs, the pair revealing spectacular fancy dress costumes of oriental brocade, pale silks and satins, colourfully striped cottons and hand printed muslins.

 

Standing next to her mother who is dressed as Britannia, Lettice, costumed as Cinderella in an Eighteenth century style wig and gown, smiles politely, yet vacantly, as she greets guest after guest, watching the passing parade of Pierrots, and Columbines, Sinbads and faeries, princesses and Maharajas, pirates and mandarins.

 

“Oh good evening Miss Evans, and Miss Evans,” Lady Sadie exclaims, placing her glove clad fingers onto the forearms of the two spinster sisters who live in Holland House, a Seventeenth Century manor house in the village. “How delightful to see you both. Do come in out of the cold and make yourselves comfortable. It was good of you to come up from the village for tonight’s festivities when I know you were both poorly before Christmas.” She smiles benignly as they twitter answers back at her in crackling voices that sound like crisp autumn leaves underfoot. “You remember my youngest daughter, Lettice don’t you ladies?”

 

“How do you do, Miss Evans, Miss Evans,” Lettice replies with a nod, accepting the two ladies from her mother like a parcel on a conveyor belt, smiling the same polite painted smile she, her parents and brother have been wearing since the first guest arrived. She glances at the two old women, who must be in their seventies at least, one dressed as Little Bo-Peep complete with shepherdess’ crook and the other as Miss Muffet with a hand crocheted spider dangling from her wrist, both looking more like tragic pantomime dames than anything else. Both women have worn the same costumes to every Hunt Ball Lettice can remember, and she is surer now that they are at close quarters, that the costumes are made from genuine Eighteenth Century relics from their ancestors. “What delightful costumes. Miss Bo-Peep I believe?”

 

“Indeed, Miss Chetwynd!” Giggles the elder of the Miss Evanses. “My how you’ve grown into a smart young woman since the last Hunt Ball your parents threw before the war.”

 

“We read about you often in the London illustrated papers, don’t we Geraldine?” pipes up her sister.

 

“Oh quite! Quite Henrietta! What a marvellous time you must have up there in London. It’s good of you to come and join us for these little parochial occasions, which must be so dull after all the cosmopolitan pleasures you enjoy.”

 

“Not at all, Miss Evans. Now, please do go in. You must be freezing after your drive up from the village. There’s a good fire going in the antechamber. Please go and warm yourselves.”

 

“You are too kind, Miss Chetwynd! Too kind!” acknowledges Henrietta.

 

The two rather macabre nursery rhyme characters giggle and twitter and walk into the ballroom antechamber.

 

“Ahh, Lady Sadie,” a well intonated, yet oily voice annunciates, causing Lettice to shudder. “What a pleasure it is to be asked to the event of the country season.”

 

Lettice turns to see Sir John Nettleford-Hughes, tall and elegant, yet at the same time repugnant to her, dressed in full eveningwear, yet also wearing a very ornamental turban in deference to the Hunt ball’s fancy dress theme. Lettice shudders again as Sir John takes up her mother’s right hand in his and draws it to his lips and kisses it.

 

“Oh, Sir John!” Lady Sadie giggles in a girlish way Lettice seldom hears from her dour and matronly Edwardian mother.

 

“Well, I must kiss the hand of the brave and bold defender of the Empire.” He smiles up at her with wily eyes glittering with mischief. “You are Britannia, are you not?”

 

“Indeed I am, Sir John.” Lady Sadie chortles proudly. “Well done. Now, you remember my youngest daughter, Lettice, don’t you?” She turns Sir John’s and her own attention to her daughter beside her.

 

“Good heavens!” Sir John exclaims, his piercing blue eyes catching Lettice’s gaze and holding it tightly as he eyes her up and down. “Could this elegant Marie Antoinette be the lanky teenager I remember from 1914?”

 

Lettice feels very exposed by the intensity of his stare, and she feels as he looks her over, that in his mind he is removing her gown and wig to see what lies beneath them. She feels the flush of a blush work its way up her neck, the heat of it at odds with the coolness of the Glynes necklace of diamonds and rubies, lent to her for the evening by her mother, at her throat.

 

“I’m actually Cind…” Lettice begins, before stopping short and gasping as she feels the sharp toe of her mother’s dance pump kick firmly into her ankle beneath her skirts. “So pleased to see you again, Sir John.” she concludes rather awkwardly.

 

“Do you know, Sir John,” Lady Sadie gushes. “I do believe we have a painting of Marie Antoinette in our very own Glynes gallery.”

 

“Is that so, Lady Sadie?” he replies, without disengaging his eyes from Lettice.

 

“Yes, one of Cosmo’s ancestors brought it back from France after the Revolution, when all those lovely things from the French aristocracy were being sold for a song.”

 

“Then I should very much like to see it, Lady Sadie, and make my own comparison between the woman that was,” He takes up Lettice’s right hand and plants a kiss on it just as he had done to her mother. “And the lady who is.”

 

Lettice quickly withdraws her hand from Sir John’s touch, feeling more repugnance for him by the moment.

 

“I’m sure that could be arranged, Sir John,” Lady Sadie says with a beaming smile. “Lettice, perhaps you might show Sir John the painting of Marie Antoinette in the East Wing Long Gallery after the buffet supper tonight?”

 

“I shall look forward to that, my lady,” Sir John says without waiting for Lettice’s agreement, his gaze still piercing her, until suddenly he glances away and strides confidently in the wake of the two Miss Evanses.

 

Lettice greets the next few guests politely, yet vacantly constantly gazing at the top of her glove clad hand where she felt Sir John’s pressing lips. She is still distracted by it when a cheerful voice interrupts her uneasy thoughts.

 

“I say, Lettice my dear, are you quite well?”

 

Brought back from her unsettled imaginings, Lettice finds herself staring onto the most friendly looking pirate she has ever seen.

 

“Lord Thorley!” she says with a genuine smile forming across her lips. “How do you do.”

 

“You are looking a bit peaky, my dear.” he replies, lifting up his black felt eye patch so that he might see her with both eyes. Looking concerned, Lord Thorley Ayres continues, “Are you quite well?”

 

“Oh, quite, Lord Thorley. It’s just a little… a little warm in here, what with the fire and my costume.” She starts fanning herself with her hand.

 

“Oh, I thought you looked a bit pale, rather than flushed, my dear.”

 

“Don’t nanny poor Lettice so, Thorley,” mutters his wife, dressed as a Spanish Infanta of the Seventeenth Century in a magnificent panniered gown and fitted bodice that pushes her already evident breasts further into view. “The poor thing probably feels quite overwhelmed by the ball. It’s been a few years since there was a ball here last. Now move along and let me see the woman who was once the girl I knew.” She shoos her husband along with a wave of her hand.

 

“Lady Ayres,” Lettice says with a pleasurable smile. “How very good to see you. It’s been far too long since we had a ball here.”

 

“Quite right. But all that sadness and austerity of the war is behind us now, thank goodness!” She rolls her eyes implying the tediousness of the Great War just passed. “Now we can enjoy our fun and frivolities again, just as we used to. Now, of course you remember our son, Nicholas.” Lady Rosamund grasps the slender shoulders of a young man in a Pierrot costume and forcefully moves him forward to meet Lettice.

 

“Of course I do.” Lettice remarks kindly, smiling at the young man around her age, who is obviously reluctant to be there. She remembers the stories friends from the Embassy Club have told her about Nicholas Ayers, the reluctant heir to a vast estate, Crofton Court, in Cumbria. They giggled and blushed as they told Lettice in less than hushed whispers that his visits to a well known Molly-house** near Covent Garden and his debauched ‘at homes’ on Fridays were amongst the worst kept secrets in London. She gazes at his pale face, which was evidently white enough before being given a liberal dusting of white powder. How ironic, she thinks to herself, that his face is painted up so sadly with Pierrot’s iconic dark teardrop running from his left eye, when he is so evidently unhappy to be on parade as a reluctant suitor under the hawk eyes of both his parents. What sort of life will he live, she wonders, never mind the poor unfortunate society debutante who does eventually marry him, oblivious to his inclinations towards men rather than women? She knows her father knows about Nicholas’ inclinations, but is equally aware that her mother is innocent of such knowledge. She glances quickly at her mother and when she sees that she is talking animatedly to the next guest, she leans forward and whispers in Nicholas’ ear, “It’s alright, you only have to dance with me the once, and then you’ve done your duty.” Nicholas looks at her in genuine fear. “It’s alright. Your secrets are safe with me Nicholas. I won’t tell. I don’t want to be on parade any more than you do, so let’s just do our duty, and then you can go back to your life and I’ll go back to mine.”

 

“Can’t you two wait until you are on the dancefloor to whisper sweet nothings in one another’s ears?” chortles Thorley good naturedly, a cheeky smile painting his lips.

 

“Don’t embarrass them, Thorley!” Rosamund slaps her husband’s hand playfully with her ivory and lace fan, the pearl drop earrings at her lobes shaking about wildly. She reaches out to Nicholas and grabs him by the shoulders again, steering him away. “Come along Nicholas. You’ll have plenty of time to dance with Lettice later.”

 

Lettice glances at her mother, who has now turned all her attention to her daughter. She smiles proudly and nods her approval at a potential interest between Lettice and Nicholas Ayres and his tens of thousands of pounds a year. Lettice glances away quickly, allowing her eyes to follow the backs of Nicholas and Lord and Lady Ayres as they wend their way into the throng gathering in the antechamber adjoining the ballroom, and sighs quietly. A lecherous old man who would enjoy nothing more than a moment alone with her, and an invert*** who would probably rather face a pit of snakes than dance with her: how will she survive this ordeal of her mother’s making? Why can’t her mother just accept the fact that she is happier being unmarried and running a successful business.

 

Sighing, Lettice quickly reforms her painted smile and greets the next Hunt Ball guest.

 

*A bonheur de jour is a type of lady's writing desk. It was introduced in Paris by one of the interior decorators and purveyors of fashionable novelties called marchands-merciers around 1760, and speedily became intensely fashionable. Decorated on all sides, it was designed to sit in the middle of a room so that it could be admired from any angle.

 

**A Molly-house was a term used in 18th- and 19th-century Britain for a meeting place for homosexual men. The meeting places were generally taverns, public houses, coffeehouses or even private rooms where men could either socialise or meet possible sexual partners.

 

*** Sexual inversion is a theory of homosexuality popular primarily in the late 19th and early 20th century. Sexual inversion was believed to be an inborn reversal of gender traits: male inverts were, to a greater or lesser degree, inclined to traditionally female pursuits and dress and vice versa.

 

This grand Georgian interior may appear like something out of a historical stately country house, but it is in fact part of my 1:12 miniatures collection and includes items from my childhood, as well as those I have collected as an adult.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The Georgian style fireplace I have had since I was a teenager and is made from moulded plaster. On its mantlepiece stand two gilt blue and white vases which are from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House in the United Kingdom. They are filled with a mixture of roses made by hand by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. The marble and ormolu clock on the mantle between them is of a classical French style of the Georgian or Regency periods and comes from Smallskale Miniatures in the United Kingdom. The fire dogs and guard are made of brass and also come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House, as to the candelabra hanging on the wall either side of the central portrait.

 

The gilt Louis Quatorze chairs either side of the fireplace and the gilt swan pedestals are made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq. The candelabras on the two pedestals I have had since I was a teenager.

 

The pair of Palladian console tables in the foreground, with their golden caryatids and marble were commissioned by me from American miniature artisan Peter Cluff. Peter specialises in making authentic and very realistic high quality 1:12 miniatures that reflect his interest in Georgian interior design. His work is highly sought after by miniature collectors worldwide. This pair of tables are one-of-a-kind and very special to me.

 

The floral arrangements in urns on top of the tables consist of pink roses, white asters and white Queen Anne’s Lace. Both are unmarked, but were made by an American miniature artisan and their pieces have incredible attention to detail. The Seventeenth Century musical statues to the side of the flower arrangements were made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. They were hand painted by me.

 

All the paintings around the Glynes ballroom antechamber in their gilded frames are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States and the wallpaper of the ballroom antechamber is an authentic copy of hand-painted Georgian wallpaper from the 1770s.

 

The marquetry floor of the room is in fact a wooden chessboard. The chessboard was made by my Grandfather, a skillful and creative man in 1952. Two chess sets, a draughts set and three chess boards made by my Grandfather were bequeathed to me as part of his estate when he died a few years ago.

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 Lettice is entertaining a potential new client, Miss Wanetta Ward, an American actress come to London, in her Mayfair drawing room. Lettice’s maid, Edith, is starstruck. She coyly glances at her mistress’ guest as she sets out tea and her home made Victoria sponge on the black japanned coffee table between the two comfortable tub chairs the ladies are ensconced in. Miss Ward is tall and statuesque, with striking green eyes and auburn hair fashionably cut and styled in a bob. Dressed in an orchid silk chiffon gown, her lisle clad thighs are clearly visible. Toying with a long string of pearls between her painted fingernails, she is the embodiment of the ‘new woman’: fearless, nonchalant and bold.

 

“Thank you Edith,” Lettice says with a bemused smile, her long and elegant fingers partially hiding it. “That will be all.”

 

“Oh,” Edith replies, obviously crestfallen. “Yes Miss.”

 

Edith retreats, somewhat begrudgingly back through the adjoining dining room and though the green baize door, back into the service area of Lettice’s flat.

 

“I am sorry, Miss Ward,” Lettice apologises to her guest, draped languidly across the chair opposite her. “I’m afraid my maid might be a little in awe of you.”

 

“Oh please don’t apologise, darling!” the American replies, her joyous laughter bursting forth. “I’m used to it. Poor little thing. Does she like the flicks*?”

 

Lettice ponders the answer to her guest’s question for a moment as she pours tea into her cup. “I don’t rightly know, Miss Ward. I don’t know what my maid does on her days off.”

 

“Well, I must ask her on the way out.” The American replies, adding a generous slosh of milk and two teaspoons of sugar to her tea.

 

“I do wish you’d let Edith take your hat and cane, Miss Ward.” Lettice adds, picking up her own cup.

 

“Nonsense, darling! Can’t be without my good luck charm!” She lovingly pats the pink silk flower covered hat sitting on the chinoiserie stool next to her chair, and Lettice cannot help but notice how perfectly her guest’s nail varnish matches her hat and dress.

 

“Your good luck charm?” Lettice muses. “What on earth do you mean?”

 

“No doubt you’ll think me odd, most people do when I tell them,” She twists her pearls self consciously around her fingers. “But every time I wear this hat, I always have good luck.”

 

“I must ask your permission to borrow it then Miss Ward,” Lettice moves her hand to unsuccessfully conceal her amusement. “The next time I go to the Ascot races.”

 

“See!” the American replies, sinking back in her seat feeling vindicated. “I told you that you’d think me odd!”

 

“Not at all, Miss Ward.” Lettice soothes her guest. “When you are the daughter of an old and venerable British family like I am, a certain element of hereditary oddity is de rigueur.”

 

“De rigueur?”

 

“A must, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh, then I shan’t feel so conscious of flaunting my superstition around London.”

 

“Especially when it is such a pretty accessory too, Miss Ward.”

 

“Why thank you darling.” She flaps her long and elegant hand, batting away Lettice’s compliment. “You are just the sweetest.”

 

“Now, I believe you’ve come about redecorating your flat in Pimlico, Miss Ward?”

 

“That’s right!” She claps her hands in unabashed glee. “Well, it isn’t quite mine yet. I take possession next Thursday. Oh!” She continues, throwing up her right hand dramatically, her wrist coming to rest upon her forehead. “The place looks like a mausoleum at present! All this heavy clutter: thick velvet curtains, occasional tables covered in knick-knacks, stuffed birds beneath glass. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you my dear?” She reaches down and picks up her plate of sponge and takes a slightly larger than polite slice from it with her fork. “I just had to come and see you!”

 

Lettice smiles with pleasure, taking a sip of tea from her cup before placing it on the telephone table at her left. “So, I’m the first interior designer that you’ve visited here in London, Miss Ward?”

 

“Well, not exactly. No,” The American sits back in her seat blushing. “I did go and see Syrie Maugham**.”

 

“Oh.” Lettice frowns, unable to hide her disappointment.

 

“Oh, but I didn’t like what she suggested, darling!” Miss Ward replies quickly, assuring her host, fearful of having made a social gaffe and jeopardising her chance of having Lettice agree to decorate her flat. “All those ghastly shades of white…” The American suddenly stops mid-sentence, noticing for the first time that Lettice’s walls are papered in white and that she is sitting on a white upholstered chair. “Anyway,” She clears her throat awkwardly and looks sheepishly at Lettice. “I don’t think she approved of me.”

 

“Whyever not, Miss Ward?” Lettice asks with a tinge of pleasure in her question, feeling suddenly a little less crushed.

 

“I don’t think she approves actresses, period. She talked about forgoing worldly pleasures and went on about white representing purity.” Miss Ward shivers at the recollection. “Besides,” she continues. “I did hear that you did some redecorating for the Duchess of Whitby.”

 

“Your contacts are correct,” Lettice replies. Suspecting Miss Ward to be something of a gossip she then continues, brandishing the knowledge Lord de Virre gave her just an hour before, “What they don’t know, and this is strictly between us, you understand Miss Ward,”

 

“Oh! My lips are sealed, darling.” The American puts her finger to her lips conspiratorially as she leans forward, her excitement at the thought of a secret shared palpable.

 

“Well, I shall also soon be decorating the principal rooms of the home belonging to the eldest son of the Marquis of Taunton.”

 

“Really?” Miss Ward enthuses overdramatically. “The Marquis of Taunton! Fancy that!”

 

Lettice smiles as she picks up her plate and eats a small, ladylike portion of Victoria sponge, satisfied in the knowledge that Miss Ward has no idea who she is talking about, but being a parvenu, will quickly spread the news to those who do.

 

“Your sources of information are well informed about me, Miss Ward, and yet, I know nothing of you. Please do tell me a little bit about yourself and why it is that you wish for me to be your interior designer.”

 

“Well, that’s really why I wanted to see you, even before I saw that pious Syrie Maugham. You’re young, and bold, like me!” She looks up and off into the distance, waving her hand dramatically. “A trailblazer! I also heard that you favour oriental elements in your interior designs. I’ve just spent the last six months in the International Settlement in Shanghai you see, and I just love all those oriental designs.”

 

“Shanghai?”

 

“Yes. My brother has a club there: the Diamond Lotus Club, and I’ve been headlining there. Shanghai is so much more exciting than dull old Chicago!” she enthuses. “The clothes cost less to have made,” She grasps the hem of her skirt and squeezes the chiffon. “And the far east is so exotic and colourful.”

 

“Then forgive me for asking, but if you love it so much, why have you come to London?”

 

“Well, I loved singing in the club, but I really have my heart set on being an actress.” She takes another large mouthful of cake.

 

“Well, the West End is full of theatres, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh, not a stage actress darling!” Miss Ward dabs at the corners of her mouth for crumbs with her beautifully painted fingers. “No, a film actress. I have a screen test at Islington Studios*** on Monday.” She tilts her head and lowers her kohl framed lids in a slightly coquettish way as though already auditioning.

 

“Well, you certainly have a great presence, Miss Ward.” Lettice says diplomatically. “I’m sure you’ll do splendidly.”

 

“Thank you, darling. I can’t disagree with you. My mother always told me that everyone knew when I entered the room, even when I was a little girl in ringlets.”

 

“Yes, I’d believe that.” Lettice smiles.

 

“And what better place for a successful film actress to entertain, than in a beautiful orientally inspired drawing room decorated by you, darling! I want bold and colourful wallpapers and carpets, oriental vases, Chinese screens.” She looks hopefully at Lettice. “So, will you take me on?”

 

“Take you on, Miss Ward?”

 

“Yes, take me on, as a client?” Her face falls suddenly, her fork of cake midway between the plate and her mouth. “Oh, please don’t tell me that you don’t approve of actresses either!”

 

“Oh, I’m not Syrie Maugham, Miss Ward.” Lettice replies, smiling cheekily. “And besides, it will irritate my Mamma no end if I have a film actress as a client.”

 

“You mean,” she gasps, clasping her hands. “You’ll agree to decorate my new flat?”

 

“Well, I’ll still need to visit you new home, and we’ll need to discuss matters further.” Lettice elaborates. “However, in principle, yes.”

 

“Oh darling! I could positively kiss you!” She drops her plate with a loud clatter on the coffee table surface and leaps up from her seat.

 

“That really won’t be necessary, Miss Ward.” Lettice assures her, raising her hands gently in defence in the face of the American’s statuesque form across the crowded table. “Just make sure that you settle my accounts promptly.”

 

“American railroad dollars good enough for you?”

 

“Only if they can be converted into British currency.” Lettice beams. “And, when you are a famous actress, I expect you to tell everyone who designed your interiors.”

 

“Oh! I’ll tell all my friends to come and see you, you darling girl! You’ll have to beat them away from the door with a hickory stick.”

 

“Indeed, Miss Ward.” Lettice takes another sip from her teacup.

 

“See!” Miss Ward replies, taking her seat again and patting the top of her pink hat. “I told you this was my lucky charm! I wore a blue beret to see Syrie Maugham.”

 

“Then today must be both our lucky days, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh no! Enough of this ‘Miss Ward’ business. If you are to design somewhere as intimate as my boudoir, you must call me, Wanetta.”

 

*”Flicks” is an old fashioned term for a cinema film, named so for the whirring sound of the old projectors and flickering picture cast upon the silver screen.

 

**Syrie Maugham was a leading British interior decorator of the 1920s and 1930s and best known for popularizing rooms decorated entirely in shades of white. She was the wife of English playwright and novelist William Somerset Maugham.

 

***Islington Studios, often known as Gainsborough Studios, were a British film studio located on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in Shoreditch, London which began operation in 1919. By 1920 they had a two stage studio. It is here that Alfred Hitchcock made his entrée into films.

 

This 1920s upper-class domestic scene is different to what you may think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures including items from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableaux include:

 

Lettice’s tea set sitting on the coffee table is a beautiful artisan set featuring a rather avant-garde Art Deco Royal Doulton design from the Edwardian era. The Victoria sponge (named after Queen Victoria) is made by Polly’s Pantry Miniatures in America. The green tinged bowl behind the tea set is made of glass and has been made by hand by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering.

 

Wanetta’s lucky pink hat covered in silk flowers, which you can see poking out from behind the armchair on the right is made by Miss Amelia’s Miniatures in the Canary Islands. It is an artisan miniature made just like a real hat, right down to a tag in the inside of the crown to show where the back of the hat is! 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. Miss Amelia is an exception to the rule coming from Spain, but like her American counterparts, her millinery creations are superb. Like a real fashion house, all her hats have names. This pink raw silk flower covered hat is called “Lilith”. Wanetta’s walking stick, made of ebonized wood with a real metal knob was made by the Little Green Workshop in England.

 

The black Bakelite and silver telephone is a 1:12 miniature of a model introduced around 1919. It is two centimetres wide and two centimetres high. The receiver can be removed from the cradle, and the curling chord does stretch out. The vase of yellow tiger lilies and daisies on the Art Deco occasional table is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium. The vase of roses and lilies in the tall white vase on the table to the right of the photo was also made by hand, by Falcon Miniatures who are renowned for their realistic 1:12 size miniatures.

 

Lettice’s drawing room is furnished with beautiful J.B.M. miniatures. The black japanned wooden chair is a Chippendale design and has been upholstered with modern and stylish Art Deco fabric. The mirror backed back japanned china cabinet is Chippendale too. On its glass shelves sit pieces of miniature Limoges porcelain including jugs, teacups and saucers, many of which I have had since I was a child.

 

To the left of the Chippendale chair stands a blanc de chine Chinese porcelain vase, and next to it, a Chinese screen. The Chinese folding screen I bought at an antiques and junk market when I was about ten. I was with my grandparents and a friend of the family and their three children, who were around my age. They all bought toys to bring home and play with, and I bought a Chinese folding screen to add to my miniatures collection in my curio cabinet at home! It shows you what a unique child I was.

 

The painting in the gilt frame is made by Amber’s Miniatures in America. The carpet beneath the furniture is a copy of a popular 1920s style Chinese silk rug. 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.

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 old family home for the wedding of Leslie to Arabella, the daughter of their neighbours, Lord Sherbourne and Lady Isobel Tyrwhitt. Today is the big day, and as the weakening November sun rises in what is a remarkably sunny day for the bride and groom, Lettice will shortly join the guests to watch her brother and his future wife exchange vows at the chapel in Glynes village. Even now she can hear the chimes from the belfry ring across the rolling green undulations of Lettice’s father’s estate, calling the great and good of the village and the county to come and bear witness to the wedding of their future squire.

 

We find ourselves in Lettice’s boudoir at Glynes, a room which she considers somewhat of a time capsule now with its old fashioned Edwardian furnishings and mementoes of those halcyon pre-war summers. She hardly even considers it her room any more, so far removed is she from that giddy teenager who had crushes on her elder brothers’ friends and loved chintz covered furniture, floral wallpaper and sweet violet perfume. Lettice stands at the window of her bedroom, lolling against the dusky pink and pale green, slightly faded floral folded back curtains. Even as she stands there she can almost catch a whiff the violet perfume and hear her girlish whispers and giggles of yesteryear, like ghosts of a distant time and place. Beyond her in the great park, some stubborn traces of morning mist still loiter around a copse of trees, and the birds twitter in the topiaries and the parterre garden that lie beyond the sweeping gravel turning circle of driveway. Fingering the fine lace curtain that is always draped across the glass of her window, Lettice sighs. A pale, diffused light falls upon her face, the sunlight warming her cheeks. She closes her eyes, blocking out the cheerful golden gleam in the pale blue sky dotted with fluffy white clouds tinged with pale grey and washed out ultramarine.

 

“Were you imagining the bells ringing for your wedding, Tice?” a voice interrupts her thoughts.

 

“Oh!” Lettice gasps, spinning around, dropping the curtain pulled back idly in her hands, releasing a myriad of dust motes tumbling into the sunlight streaming through the window. “Leslie! You startled me!”

 

“Sorry Tice.” her elder brother says, as he walks into the room.

 

“Look at you, my big brother,” Lettice smiles proudly. “All dressed up for his wedding day.”

 

“I feel ridiculously overdressed.” Leslie says, running a finger around the inside of his starched collar uncomfortably.

 

She walks up to Leslie and tweaks his bow tie that he has knocked awry with his fingering of his collar before taking a step back and taking in her handsome brother dressed in his new morning suit.

 

“You never did like dressing up for fancy occasions like Mamma’s Hunt Ball, did you, Leslie?” she asks.

 

“Never. Give me a tweed jacket and tie any day.”

 

“Oh no Leslie!” Lettice chides, not unkindly. “Not today. It’s your wedding day, and even our tenant farmers who would rather be in the comfort of their workaday clothes get dressed up for their wedding.”

 

“I feel…” he begins.

 

“Sshhh!” Lettice puts one of her elegantly manicured fingers to his lips to silence her brother. “Today isn’t really about you and your feelings, Leslie. It’s about Bella. And Bella would be so disappointed if you weren’t turned out as splendidly as you are.” She considers his appearance, as if seeing him for the first time. “You know, it’s a shame you don’t like getting dressed up. You really scrub up rather handsomely. I can see what Bella saw beneath all that tweed and houndstooth you habitually wear.”

 

“Need to wear, for estate business.” Leslie corrects his sister. “Imagine the distrust if I turned up at one of the estate farms or a meeting of the tenants dressed in something like this! They’d think I didn’t understand a thing about farming.”

 

“Well, today is not about farming.” Lettice replies kindly. “It’s about pomp and show from two of the county’s great families, and no-one does pomp quite as well as the Chetwynds and the Tyrwhitts.”

 

“Were you thinking about a wedding of your own just now, listening to the bells?” Leslie asks again.

 

“Me? No,” Lettice replies. “The bells aren’t tolling for me yet.” She brushes a stray piece of lint off his frock coat. “No,” she adds dreamily. “I was just thinking about how often before the war I used to stand at the window, longing to be in the wider world.”

 

“And now you’re a part of it.”

 

“Indeed.” Lettice muses contentedly. “I was considering how much has changed since then.”

 

“Ahh yes, those halcyon days before the war.” Leslie sighs.

 

“I think before the war was the last time we were all in the house together: you, me, Lally and Lionel, Mater and Pater. One big, happy family.”

 

Leslie scoffs. “Is that what we were?”

 

“No,” Lettice admits. “Lionel has always courted trouble and caused us pain, long before he had to go to Kenya in disgrace. Do you remember how much he enjoyed teasing Lally and I when we were children?”

 

“Relentlessly.” Leslie sighs. “Especially you. Yet you two are the closest in age and should have been best friends. He always did have a beastly, nasty streak.”

 

“And you had to come and defend us.”

 

“Endlessly! Kenya might agree with his health, but Lionel’s still as mean and nasty now as he was then.”

 

“Oh yes. I’m well aware of that. We all are. Even Mater and Pater are acutely aware of it since it’s been so nice doing without it for the last few years. Who will defend me now or hold me in a special place in his heart, now that you are getting married, and I will be usurped by Bella for your affections?”

 

“You’ll always have a special place in my heart, mon petite soeur!” Leslie laughs. “You of all people should know that! You’re my baby sister. Eldest brothers always have special places in their hearts for their little sisters. Anyway, I thought things were going well between you and Spencely.”

 

“Oh they are, they are.” Lettice says distractedly.

 

“Then surely there is a place in his heart, a special place, just for you.”

 

“I don’t know. I don’t know.” Lettice says as she turns away from her brother and walks over to the floral chaise lounge on which sit her new Harriet Milford made hat, her lemon yellow gloves and her matching handbag.

 

“You have doubts as to Spencely’s affections, Tice?” Leslie looks to his sister in concern.

 

“Oh no!” she assures him. “I’m sure he’s fond of me. It’s just…”

 

“Yes?” Leslie’s eyebrows arch over his questioning eyes.

 

“It’s just that I haven’t even met his parents yet. Surely you would think if he was serious about our romance and our future together that he would introduce me to his parents.”

 

“Have you asked him, Tice?”

 

“Several times, but Selwyn always dismisses it with a wave of his hand. He says I’ll get to meet them in the fullness of time. Surely after all these months, it’s time, even if we don’t get married yet. It’s a sign of intent.”

 

Leslie thinks for a moment. “The Duke and Duchess of Walmford.” He ponders. “I can’t say I know anything much about them, what with being buried in estate business. The social round is more Mater’s thing than mine.”

 

“Oh I can read all I want to in Debrett’s*, every bit as easily as Mamma can: names, dates of birth, clubs, lineage, pedigree. That isn’t meeting someone.”

 

“True.”

 

“I just have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind, and it curdles my stomach whenever I raise the moot point between us.”

 

“You don’t think he’s a bounder, do you? Spencely’s never struck me as being a cad. In fact, I always thought he was rather decent when it came to the ladies, especially when you consider that London’s society ballrooms are full of men like Lionel, whose predatory advances towards the fairer sex aren’t bundled off to Nairobi for society’s greater good like Pappa and Mamma did with him.”

 

“For all our good.” Lettice corrects him. She looks down at the oriental carpet beneath their feet, rich and exotic, yet also sadly worn and faded in places. A troubled look crosses her pale face. “It’s not actually Selwyn that troubles me. It’s his mother.”

 

“Lady Zinnia?”

 

“Yes. Do you remember her when we, well when I was little, and they used to come here for the hunt? You are ten years older than me. I can only vaguely remember a grumpy woman in black dragging Selwyn away from me after she caught us playing in the hedgerows together. Selwyn said that he received a dreadful tongue lashing from her, and there was no puddng for him that night. What was she like?”

 

“Well, it’s hard to say.”

 

“You don’t remember her?”

 

“Oh I do, but then you also have all the mythology about her wrapping around her and obscuring my memories of her.”

 

“What mythology, Leslie?”

 

“Oh just that she was a beauty of the age, a glacial, imperious beauty who was born to be the Duchess of Walmsford. I remember the photos of her in Mamma’s copies of The Tatler**, The Lady***, Country Life**** and Horse and Hound*****. Except for the latter she was always dressed in the most elegant gowns, dripping in diamonds, a tiara atop her head, entertaining the country’s great and good at one of their estates or another. It clouds what you remember.”

 

“Did she speak to you?”

 

“I’m sure she did. I can’t say as I remember, but I was only a teenage boy. She wouldn’t have been interested in me. My presence would barely have even registered with her.” He takes his right hand to his chin and rubs it with his index finger as he thinks. “Although one thing I do remember quite clearly about her was her laugh.”

 

“Well, that’s more than I remember Leslie. I just remember this sort of dull impressionistic like face screaming at me. What was it like that you remember it?”

 

“It was like breaking glass: not shrill, beautiful, but cruel. Now, when I think back on those occasions as an adult and being more worldly, if you can call working on the estate worldly, I think she flirted with men at the hunt a lot.”

 

“But she was married to the Duke then, wasn’t she?”

 

“The Duke didn’t always come, for whatever reason, and when he didn’t, she flirted with all the men, married or otherwise. I suppose being friends with Alice Keppel******, she was part of King Edward’s racy Sandringham set where flirtations, and more,” He blushes self-consciously. “Were de riguer*******. I think she liked being a great beauty and having men, all sorts of powerful and influential men, in her thrall.”

 

“And ladies?”

 

“I don’t seem to remember her spending a great deal of time with the ladies when she visited us. I don’t think she was a drawing room type, like Mamma is, dunking dry biscuits in tea and gossiping over embroidery. She liked witty people, men especially. I think the company of most women bored her as I don’t think she cared for gossip, especially not county gossip which she considered parochial. I remember she liked talking about politics and art: things as a young teenager I had no head for, and if I’m honest, I still don’t. I’m just your dull parochial country squire. Give me a cattle show or hunt meet over the Houses of Parliament any day.”

 

“Stop that Leslie!” Lettice admonishes him with a gentle slap to his forearm. “You’re a fine man. The world isn’t made up entirely of politicians and great thinkers. Bella’s lucky to have a man as loving, kind and caring as you.” She smiles at her brother. “But go on about Lady Zinnia.”

 

“Lady Zinnia.” Leslie thinks. “She was clever, and she enjoyed making the men laugh. Engaging with men was almost like a sport to her. Even when we went on the foxhunt, she was out in front with the men. She was an excellent horsewoman and could keep up with the head of the pack, even though she rode side-saddle. She was spirited. Yes,” Leslie nods. “That’s a good word for her. She was spirited. Why all this sudden interest in Lady Zinnia, Tice?”

 

“Because I think she is the problem between Selwyn and I, or at least the obstacle to us actually getting married and being happily together.” Lettice admits. “I don’t think she likes me, or she doesn’t approve of me.”

 

“But you just said yourself that she’s never met you, well not since you were a child. How can you say she doesn’t like or approve of you if she’s never met you as an adult?”

 

“I can’t quite pinpoint it, but that’s what I sense, Leslie.”

 

“That’s a very grave allegation, Tice.” Leslie’s face clouds over. “What proof do you have?”

 

“I don’t have any, really,” Lettice admits guiltily. “But it’s just something I feel, here in the pit of my stomach. It’s like a canker, sitting there.”

 

“You must have more to go on than that in order to feel this way, surely Tice.”

 

“Well, take today for example. I asked Selwyn to come, but apparently his family is entertaining his Uncle Bertram and Aunt Rosalind, the Fox-Chavers, at their Scottish estate, Kenmarric.”

 

“Well to be fair, Tice, if he hasn’t made formal overtures of marriage, it’s really not appropriate for him to attend as your guest. Besides it is partridge season, Tice.”

 

“Yes, I know.” Lettice admits with a huff. “But it seems that whenever we seem to be making a bit of progress, plan something special beyond a dinner or a picnic, something always comes up.” She rubs a worn patch of the rug distractedly at her feet with the toe of her golden yellow leather shoe. “And it usually involves his cousin, Pamela Fox-Chavers.”

 

“I’ve not heard of her.”

 

“She hasn’t been presented yet. Apparently, she debuts next year. There is to be a rather grand coming out ball for her in London at the Cecil********. She’s young and pretty from what I’ve gathered.”

 

“Tice! Tice!” Leslie puts his hands firmly on Lettice’s sunken shoulders, squeezing them comfortingly through the lemon satin capped sleeves of the frock Gerald made for her for the wedding. She looks up into her brother’s face unhappily. “It sounds to me like you’re making something up out of… well, where there is nothing.”

 

“I knew you’d say that, Leslie.” Lettice pouts as she sticks her toe into the silk of the rug.

 

“Don’t do that, or you’ll wear a hole in it. As the future master of Glynes and all the expenses that go with it, I don’t want to have to replace the carpet unnecessarily.”

 

“Oh no,” Lettice stops rubbing the carpet and looks back into her brother’s face, a sudden steeliness replacing the soft and teary vulnerability in her eyes a moment ago. “I want you to promise me that when you inherit Glynes, one of the first things you will do is let me redecorate my boudoir.” She looks around her at the Eighteenth Century floral wallpaper, the heavy Art Nouveau dressing table, the chintz chaise lounge. “Mamma keeps this room as a mausoleum. It’s like by keeping it exactly as I left it before the war, the more obliging, more obsequious, less irritating, less outspoken Lettice of my teenage years will come back. But she won’t! Do you know that none of those photos on the chimneypiece, except perhaps the one of Nanny Webb and I, are my photos in here? I took all mine to London when I moved there. Mamma put these in here to fill the space. She even put that one of me as a flower girl at Lally’s wedding in pride of place on that table, just to remind me of what a dutiful daughter I was. There is nothing of me in this room now. Nothing!”

 

“Alright, Tice,” Leslie chuckles. “I agree. But only if you’ll put these silly ideas of Lady Zinnia trying to come between you and Spencely out of your mind.” He looks earnestly at her. “It’s not uncommon for an older male cousin to escort his younger female cousin to functions and social engagements prior to her coming out. This, what’s her name?”

 

“Pamela,” Lettice spits. “Pamela Fox-Chavers.”

 

“Pamela will benefit from knowing someone at the balls and other functions of the Season that she is to attend. As I said before, Spencely strikes me as a good egg when it comes to the ladies, so he’ll help keep her safe, advise her about the SITs and NSITs*********, and probably stop her from getting into mischief. Don’t get jealous of a girl whom you don’t even know, and whom I’m sure you’ve no reason to be jealous of. You tell me I’m handsome and smart, well,” He spins her around to face a full length cheval mirror where she can see her reflection. “Look at yourself. You are beautiful and petite. You are smart. You live your own life up in London, away from Mater and Pater, which is more than a lot of girls of your age and background have. And you have a very successful business, which you created – no-one else. Think on that the next time you go to give me a compliment. You’re the most successful of all of us. Lionel lives as a rake in disgrace in Nairobi where he can do no harm other than drink too much gin or race a few thoroughbreds that really aren’t ready to be raced. Lally is married to a nice, if dull chap, and has brought forth a few progeny to carry on Charles’ line. I’ll inherit this old pile of bricks and pray I can weather the storm and keep it all going so that one of Bella’s and my progeny can take over when I’m gone. But you, you leave a legacy of beautiful interiors that are your own distinctive style. You influence taste and fashions. You are one of those Bright Young Things********** the papers are full of, and whom the world will talk about long after I’m buried and forgotten in that churchyard.” He points out the window, across the undulating hill to where the sound of the bells is coming from.

 

“Do you really think that, Leslie?” Lettice asks.

 

“Well of course I do, Tice.” he concurs. “We all do. Well, maybe not Mamma, and certainly not Lionel. But Lally, Father, Bella and I do, so we outnumber them. Nigel, Isobel and Sherbourne too. We’re all so proud of you. Even Mamma, though she would rather eat a pound of nails than say it, must have at least some unexpressed admiration for what you do and what you’ve achieved, Tice.”

 

“Leslie! Leslie there you are, old boy! Come on!” Lionel’s unusually suntanned face and sun bleached sandy blonde hair poke around the frame of Lettice’s dressing room door. “Oh, morning, Lettuce Leaf.” He nods to his little sister as an afterthought.

 

Lettice cringes at the use of her most hated childhood nickname, which is tolerable, or even amusing on occasion when said by her best friend Gerald, but like poison spat at her when it comes from her hated sibling.

 

“Look I hate to break this tender moment of sibling bonding between you two up.” Their brother sneers mockingly at them from beneath his mean sun blonde pencil moustache, mischief in his cold, glinting eyes. “I mean, it really is charming and all, but I’d like to remind you Leslie, that the car is waiting downstairs and the bells toll. Listen, can’t you hear them?” Dressed in his morning suit with a boutonniere of a white rose and some Queen Anne’s lace sticking from his lapel, he poses dramatically, lolling against the doorframe, a hand held to his ear as he perks up and peers through Lettice’s window into the bright morning beyond.

 

“Bugger off Lionel, you pillock!” growls Leslie warningly. “You’re only here for a few days. Pray you don’t leave with broken teeth.”

 

“Alright!” Lionel holds up his hands in defence. “Don’t shoot, or punch me.” He sneers again. “I’m just the messenger. Mater and Pater are downstairs with your best man, Leslie, and he’s getting anxious that his sister is going to arrive at the church to get married before you two do. The olds are trying to placate him, so I’d shake a leg and get a move on, if I were you.”

 

Smiling smarmily, Lionel slinks away, leaving Lettice and Leslie alone again.

 

“Look, I have to go, but, but we’ll talk later, Tice, alright?” Leslie assures his sister.

 

“No we won’t,” Lettice says, smiling sadly and reaching up to her favourite brother’s boutonniere, running her fingers along the soft silken petal of the white rose buds. “Not today at any rate.” She pats his arm comfortingly. “We both may hate Lionel, but even though I’d rather eat a pound of nails than say it, he’s right. The bells are chiming, and you’re getting married. I can’t hold you up from the most important moment of your life, and Bella would never speak to me again if I did. Off you go.”

 

“Tice,” Leslie begins, a hundred unfinished thoughts catching in his voice.

 

“I’ll be alright. I have Gerald to escort me this afternoon.” She smiles as she sees a mixture of anxiety and excitement in his eyes. “Just tell Mamma I’m fixing my hat and I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

 

“Alright, Tice.” He starts to leave. “I’ll see you in the chapel then.”

 

“Just try and stop me,” she replies with a smile. “It isn’t every day my big brother gets married. Now go, before Nigel has an aneurism on the drawing room carpet.”

 

With the pattering of hurried footsteps, Leslie disappears around the frame of the door and runs down the hall.

 

Lettice picks up her hat and walks over to her dressing table where she withdraws one of the long hatpins in the container standing on its surface. Carefully positioning her pretty lemon yellow straw hat with organza and artificial flower decoration against her straw yellow blonde chignon and affixes it with the hatpin. She listens to the crisp sound of the pin piercing the straw of her hat and feels the pin slide through the back of her hair. She tugs the brim gently, just to make sure her millinery is firmly in place and sighs as she considers her reflection. She admires her figure, expertly encased in the pale yellow satin frock with the Peter Pan collar*********** Gerald has made for her for the wedding. The two strings of perfect graduating creamy white pearls her parents gave her for her coming of age sit across her collar bones and a corsage of white roses sits daintily on her wrist.

 

Satisfied, she wanders back to the window and looks down. Through the lace scrim, she can see Nigel Tyrwhitt, Leslie’s bride-to-be’s brother and his best man, walk across the gravel towards her father’s Daimler, followed closely by Leslie. The two talk, but with the window closed and being two storeys up, Lettice can’t hear what they are saying, but she catches a waft of their laughter through the glass and knows that whatever they are saying, they are very happy that Leslie is about to marry Arabella. In the distance, the Glynes Church of England chapel bells peal, beckoning guest to enter to witness the marriage of Arabella Tyrwhitt, only daughter of Lord Sherboune and Lady Isobel Tyrwhitt to Leslie Cheywnd, son and heir of the Viscount and Viscountess of Wrexham, forever enmeshing two of the county’s great families.

 

*The first edition of Debrett's Peerage of England, Scotland, and Ireland, containing an Account of all the Peers, 2 vols., was published in May 1802, with plates of arms, a second edition appeared in September 1802, a third in June 1803, a fourth in 1805, a fifth in 1806, a sixth in 1808, a seventh in 1809, an eighth in 1812, a ninth in 1814, a tenth in 1816, an eleventh in 1817, a twelfth in 1819, a thirteenth in 1820, a fourteenth in 1822, a fifteenth in 1823, which was the last edition edited by Debrett, and not published until after his death. The next edition came out in 1825. The first edition of The Baronetage of England, containing their Descent and Present State, by John Debrett, 2 vols., appeared in 1808. Today, Debrett's is a British professional coaching company, publisher and authority on etiquette and behaviour. It was founded in 1769 with the publication of the first edition of The New Peerage. The company takes its name from its founder, John Debrett.

 

**Tatler is a British magazine published by Condé Nast Publications focusing on fashion and lifestyle, as well as coverage of high society and politics. It is targeted towards the British upper-middle class and upper class, and those interested in society events.

 

***The Lady is one of Britain's longest-running women's magazines. It has been in continuous publication since 1885 and is based in London. The magazine was founded by Thomas Gibson Bowles (1842–1922), the maternal grandfather of the aristocratic and controversial Mitford sisters. Bowles also founded the English magazine Vanity Fair. He gave the Mitford girls' father (David Freeman-Mitford, Second Baron Redesdale) his first job: general manager of the magazine. Early contributors included Nancy Mitford and Lewis Carroll, who compiled a puzzle for the title

 

****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.

 

*****Horse and Hound is the oldest equestrian weekly magazine of the United Kingdom. Its first edition was published in 1884. The magazine contains horse industry news, reports from equestrian events, veterinary advice about caring for horses, and horses for sale.

 

******Alice Frederica Keppel was a British society hostess and a long-time mistress and confidante of King Edward VII. Keppel grew up at Duntreath Castle, the family seat of the Edmonstone baronets in Scotland. She was the youngest child of Mary Elizabeth, née Parsons, and Sir William Edmonstone, 4th Baronet. In 1891 she married George Keppel, an army officer, and they had two daughters. Alice Keppel became one of the best society hostesses of the Edwardian era. Her beauty, charm and discretion impressed London society and brought her to the attention of the future King Edward VII in 1898, when he was still Prince of Wales, whose mistress she remained until his death, lightening the dark moods of his later years, and holding considerable influence. Through her younger daughter, Sonia Cubitt , Alice Keppel is the great-grandmother of Queen Camilla, the former mistress and second wife of King Edward VII's great-great-grandson King Charles III.

 

*******In French, de rigueur means "out of strictness" or "according to strict etiquette"; one definition of our word rigor, to which rigueur is related, is "the quality of being strict, unyielding, or inflexible." In English, we tend to use de rigueur to describe a fashion or custom that is so commonplace within a context that it seems a prescribed, mandatory part of it.

 

********The Hotel Cecil was a grand hotel built 1890–96 between the Thames Embankment and the Strand in London, England. It was named after Cecil House, a mansion belonging to the Cecil family, which occupied the site in the Seventeenth Century. The hotel was the largest in Europe when it opened, with more than eight hundred rooms. The proprietor, Jabez Balfour, later went bankrupt and was sentenced to 14 years in prison. The Royal Air Force was formed and had its first headquarters here in the former Hotel Cecil in 1918. During the 1920s, it was one of the most fashionable hotels in London and was filled with flappers and young men, representing the spirit of the Jazz Age. The hotel was largely demolished in 1930, and Shell Mex House now stands on its site.

  

*********SIT is the acronym for “safe in taxis” and NSIT is the acronym for “not safe in taxis”. These acronyms were used by debutantes and their mothers to refer to young men who could and couldn’t be trusted to escort a debutante home in a taxi without getting handsy. Some aristocratic mothers with daughters of a marriageable age being introduced into society kept a list of these young men and the debutantes themselves would avoid them.

 

**********The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

  

***********A Peter Pan collar is a style of clothing collar, flat in design with rounded corners. It is named after the collar of Maude Adams's costume in her 1905 role as Peter Pan, although similar styles had been worn before this date. Peter Pan collars were particularly fashionable during the 1920s and 1930s.

 

Contrary to popular belief, fashion at the beginning of the Roaring 20s did not feature the iconic cloche hat as a commonly worn head covering. Although invented by French milliner Caroline Reboux in 1908, the cloche hat did not start to gain popularity until 1922, so even though this story is set in that year, picture hats, a hangover from the pre-war years, were still de rigueur in fashionable society and whilst Lettice is fashionable, she and many other fashionable women still wore the more romantic picture hat. Although nowhere near as wide, heavy, voluminous or as ornate as the hats worn by women between the turn of the Twentieth Century and the Great War, the picture hats of the 1920s were still wide brimmed, although they were generally made of straw or some lightweight fabric and were decorated with a more restrained touch.

 

This pretty and very feminine Edwardian boudoir may appear like something out of a historical house display, but it is in fact part of my 1:12 miniatures collection and includes items from my childhood, as well as those I have collected as an adult.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Lettice’s yellow straw hat decorated with ornamental flowers, fruit and organza. 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism such as these are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. The maker of this hat is unknown, but it is part of a larger collection I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel. Lettice’s lemon yellow purse is also an artisan piece and is made of kid leather which is so soft. It is trimmed with very fine braid and the purse has a clasp made from a piece of earring. The matching lemon yellow gloves are made from the same soft kid leather. They came as a set from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The floral chintz chaise lounge with its scalloped end comes from Crooked Mile Cottage miniatures in America, whilst the dainty fringed footstool with its tiny rose and leaf pattern ribbon was hand upholstered by an artisan in England.

 

The silver dressing table set on the dressing table, consisting of mirror, brushes and a comb, as well as the tray on which the perfume bottle stand has been made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.

 

On the silver tray there is a selection of sparkling perfume bottles, which are handmade by an English artisan for the Little Green Workshop. Made of cut coloured crystals set in a gilt metal frames or using vintage cut glass beads they look so elegant and terribly luxurious. The faceted pink glass perfume bottle, made from an Art Deco bead came with the dressing table, which I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop.

 

The dressing table chair did not come with the dressing table, although it does match nicely. Upholstered in a very fine pink satin, it was made by the high-end dolls’ house miniature furniture manufacturer, Bespaq.

 

The plaster fireplace and its metal grate come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom. The fire pokers and bellows I have had since I was a teenager and come from a high street stockist who specialised in dolls houses and doll house miniatures.

 

The Chetwynd family photos seen cluttering the mantlepiece are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are almost all from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and are made of metal with glass in each.

 

The porcelain clock on the mantlepiece is made by M.W. Reutter Porzellanfabrik in Germany, who specialise in making high quality porcelain miniatures. The other vases in the room, except for the one containing the irises come from various online miniatures stockists.

 

Made of polymer clay that are moulded on wires to allow them to be shaped at will and put into individually formed floral arrangements, the very realistic looking blue irises are made by a 1:12 miniature specialist in Germany. The vase they stand in is a 1950s Limoges vase – one of a pair. 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. The pink roses on the dressing table and the cream roses on the round Regency occasional table come from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering.

 

The tall Dutch style chest of drawers to the far right of the photo was one of the first pieces of miniature furniture I ever bought for myself. I chose it as payment for several figures I made from Fimo clay for a local high street toy shop when I was eight years old. All these years later, I definitely think I got the better end of the deal!

 

The oriental rug is a copy of a popular 1920s style Chinese silk rug and has been machine woven. The wallpaper is an Eighteenth Century chinoiserie design of white camellias. All the paintings on Lettice’s boudoir walls come from Melody Jane’s Doll House Suppliers in the United Kingdom.

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 south of the Thames in the London district of Rotherhithe, where, surrounded by old warehouses, right on the southern foreshore of the Thames, stands the Angel*, a little red brick pub which is always busy, but tonight is exceptionally so, for it is New Year’s Eve 1922.

 

The pub’s comfortable old Victorian décor is festooned with chains of brightly coloured paper, no doubt made by hand by the publican and his family as Edith had created such cheap home made decorations for her own family home in Harlesden for Christmas. Everywhere there is noise and chatter as patrons fill chairs and benches, lean against the bar, or fill the linoleum covered floor space. A hundred conversations, cries of excitement and laughter mix with the clink of glasses, the thud of bottles and the scrape of chairs in one vociferous noise. A fug of acrid greyish white cigarette smoke hangs in the charged air as midnight approaches. Nestled into a cosy nook near the crackling fireplace, Edith, Lettice’s maid, sits alongside her beau, Frank Leadbetter, a delivery boy for Willison’s Grocers, the grocer’s closest to Lettice’s Mayfair flat. The Angel has an interesting mix of patrons, from local workers to more artistic types, as well as a small party of Bright Young Things** shunning the bright lights and nightclubs of London’s West End, at least before midnight, as they enjoy an evening of slumming*** which no doubt they will use to regale their friends with stories about their evening later. It is with these rather noisy people that Edith and Frank share a table, the group taking up majority of it with glasses of wine and champagne, bottles of beer and packets of fashionable Craven “A” cigarettes****. Being much quieter than their table companions, enjoying the delights of freshly made hot chips delivered in to the pub from a local fish and chippery, Edith and Frank don’t tend to be included by the boisterous slum visitors who prefer the colour of equally noisy local characters, except when there is a singalong.

 

Cheering at the conclusion of a boisterous final verse of ‘The Laughing Policeman’***** the group of upper-class people nod their heads in recognition at Frank and Edith before returning to the conversation they were having with a local dock worker before the latest spontaneous singalong began.

 

“It’s a funny sort of place, this, isn’t it Frank?” Edith asks, picking up her glass of port and lemon and sipping it.

 

“Funny, Edith?” Frank queries, cocking his eyebrow questioningly before taking a sip of his own dark ale.

 

“Well, I mean look around at the people here.” She eyes a pair of painters, their occupation evident from the paint splatters on their rather shabby black coats and paint smeared rags hanging limply from their pockets. Then she glances at the young lady in the party sharing the table with them, her fashionable oriental silk frock, and the marcelling****** in her glossy chestnut coloured hair, accessories by a pair of diamond star pins, making her look more suited to her mistress’ drawing room than a Rotherhithe pub. “This isn’t your standard pub crowd, at least not in any of the pubs up around where I’m from.”

 

“Don’t you like it?” Frank asks anxiously, a tinge of hurt in his voice as speaks.

 

Edith looks into Frank’s concerned face and then reaches out her hand and places it lovingly over his, giving it a comforting squeeze. “Of course I like it, Frank. I like anywhere where I’m with you.”

 

“Oh, that’s a relief!” Frank sinks back into the round open balloon back of the red velvet upholstered chair he is sitting on, the tension in his shoulders visibly dissipating as he does. “I’d hate to take my girl somewhere she didn’t like or feel comfortable in.”

 

“Oh no. I like it just fine. The crowd is unusual is all. What made you pick here, Frank? I thought you might have taken me to the Old Crown******* up Islington way.”

 

“Well, you know how I’ve been trying to better myself by attending lectures and the like on art?” When Edith nods as she picks up a hot chip from the diminishing steaming pile of golden fingers he continues. “Well, I ran into a couple of artists, and they told me that Augustus John******** comes here sometimes.”

 

“And who is he?” Edith asks before popping the hot chip into her mouth.

 

“Blimey Edith! I can see I’m going to have to take you to a few art galleries in the New Year!” Frank shakes his head.

 

“I’d like that, Frank.” Edith admits, swallowing.

 

“Augustus John just happens to be one of the best known artists in England!”

 

“I’m so proud of you trying to better yourself and learn things, Frank. I want to keep making you proud as your girl.”

 

“Oh you do, Edith. You know I’m proud of you too. You’re bettering yourself by learning about fine things at Miss Chetwynd’s.”

 

“Yes, but learning to say luncheon or dinner rather than tea isn’t the same thing as learning about art.”

 

“Now, now! I won’t have you talking yourself down, Edith. You’re my girl and I’m proud of you. We’ll go to some galleries on our afternoons off when the spring comes next year.”

 

“Thinking of the New Year,” Edith says. “Mum and Dad talked about you coming over for dinner one night. I want you to meet them. They want to meet you too.”

 

“And they will, Edith love.” Frank apologises. “I just want to do things the right way.”

 

“I know you do, Frank.” Edith looks down into her lap, brushing a few crumbs of golden chip batter off her black coat distractedly. “I told them that too. I told them that you want me to meet your Granny first, and then he’ll meet you.”

 

“And so you will, and then I will.”

 

“When Frank? I’m starting to see comparisons between Miss Lettice and me.”

 

“What do you mean, Edith?”

 

“Well, I don’t like to gossip, you know, but I can’t help overhearing things.” She looks at Frank guiltily. “And well, she talks with Mrs. Channon about wanting to meet Mr. Spencely’s mother, who sounds like a real dragon to me, just to make things formal like. A sign of intention she and Mrs. Channon call it.”

 

“But we’re formal, Edith. You know my intentions clear enough. You heard me tell you I love you at the Premier Super Cinema********** just a few weeks ago.” He reaches over and wraps his hands around her forearms. He looks at her suddenly forlorn face and slumping shoulders. “And you told me the same. What could be more formal than that?”

 

“Meeting your Granny, Frank. I know she means so much to you.”

 

“Well, she’s the only person I have left after Mum and Dad died of the Spanish Flu, and what with my brother getting killed in France, and him being unmarried and all.”

 

“Then why can’t I meet her, Frank? Don’t tell me that she’s a dragon like Mr. Spencely’s mum.”

 

“Oh no, she’s the loveliest woman, my Granny is.”

 

“Then she wouldn’t approve of me? I’m not good enough for her grandson? Is that it?”

 

“Of course not Edith.” He shakes her gently, as if trying to shake some sense into his sweetheart.

 

The fashionable upper-class girl suddenly bursts into a peal of laughter that pierces the air around her like shattering glass, momentarily distracting the young couple. “Oh you are too funny, Charlie Boy!” she says in elegantly modulated, yet slightly slurred, tones to the dock worker as her male companions join in her laughter cheerily. She turns and plonks down her glass of champagne a little clumsily as her constant drinking starts to have an impact on her faculties. Lunging across the table to grab one of the packets of cigarettes scattered across it, she suddenly notices the quiet young couple at the other end of the table. “Gasper, darlings?” she asks, her kohl lined eyes widening seductively as he holds out the open Craven “A” packet to them, the tan coloured cork ends jutting out through the torn red and white paper and silver foil packaging. When they shake their heads warily at her, she merely shrugs. “Help yourself if you change your mind.” She smiles lopsidedly at them, her red lipstick bleeding into her skin around the edges of her painted lips. “They aren’t really mine to offer, but I know Andrew won’t mind. He’s got plenty at home back in St John’s Wood. Don’t you darling?” She turns back to her party and drapes an arm languidly around one of the young men in her party who lets his own hand stray to her bottom cheeks where he fondles her unashamedly through the thin silk of her dress. Neither turn back to see the look of shock on both Edith and Frank’s faces.

 

Turning back to Edith, Frank continues, “Granny will love you, Edith – just like I do!”

 

“Then why aren’t I meeting her yet, Frank?” Tears begin to well in her eyes.

 

“Well, you were partially right, Edith.” Frank admits.

 

“About which part?”

 

“Well, she’s a bit protective of me, you see.” He looks earnestly into Edith’s eyes. “You can’t blame her, can you? If like she is to me, I am her only close living relation, she is always going to scrutinise any girl I show an interest in – not that there have been many,” he adds quickly. “And certainly none as serious as I am with you, Edith.”

 

“Well if you say that she’ll like me, what’s the problem, Frank?”

 

“Look I only told her about you recently, when we both knew we were sure about our feelings for one another. She isn’t upset, but Granny is a bit jealous of no longer being my best girl any longer. Once she’s adjusted herself to the idea, I can ask you around for tea at her house in Upton Park.”

 

“And when will that be, Frank?” Edith asks sulkily.

 

“Oh only a few weeks away, Edith. She’s already starting to come around to the idea, but I think now she knows about you and how serious I am about you, she just wanted what will probably be our last Christmas alone to be.. well, just us. It gives her a chance to deal with being usurped.”

 

“Usurped? What’s that mean, Frank?”

 

“It means to take the place of someone.” Frank replies proudly.

 

The gratified look on his face makes Edith chuckle and her concerns are broken.

 

“That’s my girl.”

 

Frank leans further forward in his chair and wraps his arms around Edith, pulling her to him. He can smell the comforting scent of fresh laundering and soap flakes in her coat as he buries his head into the nape of her neck and nuzzles her gently. He feels her arms tighten around his middle. After a few minutes the pair slowly break apart again and resume their seats properly.

 

“So, what else do you want to do this year, Edith?” Frank smiles.

 

“Well, besides going to a few galleries, and,” she pauses for effect. “Meet your Granny,”

 

“I promise Edith! Just a few weeks from now you’ll be sitting in her kitchen in Upton Park and you won’t be able to get away. I swear!”

 

“Then I was thinking again about having my hair bobbed.”

 

“Oh no, Edith love!” Frank reaches out a hand which he lovingly runs along the chignon at the back of her neck poking out from beneath her black straw cloche decorated with purple silk roses and black feathers. “Not your beautiful hair.”

 

“Oh it’s easy for you to say, Frank. You aren’t wearing it all day, every day. It gets awfully hot when I’m cooking and cleaning at Miss Lettice’s, and it takes ages to wash and dry.”

 

“Well, don’t do anything rash just yet. Meet my Granny first before you decide to bob your hair.”

 

“Doesn’t she approve of girls with bobbed hair then?”

 

“She gets all her fashion tips from Queen Mary, Edith!” Frank laughs. “Of course she doesn’t approve of bobbed hair!”

 

“Then I won’t,” Edith promises. The she adds the caveat, “Just yet.”

 

“That’s my girl!”

 

“Just yet, Frank.” she cautions again. “I have a feeling that nineteen twenty-three is going to be a year of change.”

 

“What gives you that idea, Edith?”

 

“I don’t know.” Edith admits. “But I just have this feeling.”

 

“Well, I don’t want things to change too much.”

 

“But I thought you were all about improvement and betterment, Frank.”

 

“And so I am.”

 

“Well improvement and betterment are just different words for change.”

 

“Well, as long as your feelings for me don’t change.” Frank says with a hopeful look.

 

“As if they would, Frank!”

 

“’Ere! Shurrup you lot!” the publican suddenly shouts loudly from the bar over the top of all the hubbub of human chatter. “It’s nearly midnight!”

 

Edith and Frank stand up and join everyone else in the Angel pub as they start the countdown to midnight. As Big Ben strikes, clusters of cheers can be heard momentarily in the distance across the inky black Thames before they are consumed by the cheers of the people around them as they begin to jump up and down and embrace one another.

 

“Happy nineteen twenty-three!” Frank yells, embracing Edith in his arms.

 

“Happy nineteen twenty-three!” Edith echoes as she sinks against his chest clad in a thick knitted vest and grey worsted wool jacket.

 

As a young woman begins to play the first few notes of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ on the old upright piano in the bar, Edith and Frank begin to sing along with everyone else, joining hands with each other and the people immediately around them.

 

*The Angel, one of the oldest Rotherhithe pubs, is now in splendid isolation in front of the remains of Edward III's mansion on the Thames Path at the western edge of Rotherhithe. The site was first used when the Bermondsey Abbey monks used to brew beer which they sold to pilgrims. It is located at 24 Rotherhithe St, opposite Execution Dock in Wapping. It has two storeys, plus an attic. It is built of multi-coloured stock brick with a stucco cornice and blocking course. The ground floor frontage is made of wood. There is an area of segmental arches on the first floor with sash windows, and it is topped by a low pitched slate roof. Its Thames frontage has an unusual weatherboarded gallery on wooden posts. The interior is divided by wooden panels into five small rooms. In the early 20th Century its reputation and location attracted local artists including Augustus John and James Abbott McNeil Whistler. In the 1940s and 50s it became a popular destination for celebrities including Laurel and Hardy. Today its customers are local residents, tourists and people walking the Thames Path.

 

**The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

 

***The Oxford English Dictionary dates the first use of the word “slumming” to 1884. It applies to a phenomenon called slum tourism, poverty tourism or ghetto tourism which involves wealthy people visiting impoverished areas of cities. Originally focused on the slums and ghettos of London and Manhattan in the Nineteenth Century, in London people visited slum neighbourhoods such as Whitechapel or Shoreditch to observe life in this situation – a phenomenon which caused great offence to the locals, since they seldom if ever gained from the ogling of their social superiors who were there for the spectacle rather than philanthropic reasons, the spoils going to the tour operators. By 1884 wealthier people in New York City began to visit the Bowery and the Five Points, Manhattan on the Lower East Side, neighbourhoods of poor immigrants, to see "how the other half lives". Sadly, slum tourism still exists today and is now prominent in South Africa, India, Brazil, Kenya, Philippines, Russia and the United States.

 

****Craven A (stylised as Craven "A") is a British brand of cigarette, currently manufactured by British American Tobacco under some of its subsidiaries; it was originally created by the Carreras Tobacco Company in 1921 and made by them until its merger into Rothmans International in 1972, who then produced the brand until Rothmans was acquired by British American Tobacco in 1999. The cigarette brand is named after the third Earl of Craven, after the "Craven Mixture", a tobacco blend formulated for the 3rd Earl in the 1860s by tobacconist Don José Joaquin Carreras. The year of release of the Craven "A" brand coincided with the well-publicised death of the 4th Earl of Craven in a yachting accident on the 10th of July 1921. It was the first machine-made cork-tipped cigarette, and it became a household name in over one hundred and twenty countries with the slogan "Will Not Affect Your Throat".

 

*****’The Laughing Policeman’ is a music hall song recorded by British artist Charles Penrose, published under the pseudonym Charles Jolly in 1922, making it one of the most popular songs of 1922 in Britain. It is an adaptation of ‘The Laughing Song’ by American singer George W. Johnson with the same tune and form but different subject matter, first recorded in 1890. Charles Penrose used the melody of "The Laughing Song" as well as the same hook of using laughter in the chorus, but changed the lyrics to be about a policeman, and recorded it under the title of ‘The Laughing Policeman’. The composition of the song is, however, credited entirely to Billie Grey, a pseudonym of Penrose's second wife Mabel. The song describes a fat jolly policeman who cannot stop laughing and has a chorus in which the sound of laughter is made in a sustained semi musical way by the singer. It is thought that the character of the Laughing Policeman was inspired by real-life police officer PC John 'Tubby' Stephens, a popular figure in Leicester.

 

******Marcelling is a hair styling technique in which hot curling tongs are used to induce a curl into the hair. Its appearance was similar to that of a finger wave but it is created using a different method. Marcelled hair was a popular style for women's hair in the 1920s, often in conjunction with a bob cut.

 

*******The Old Crown is a pub built on the corner of Hornsey Lane and Highgate Hill in the north London suburb of Highgate, opposite Highgate Cemetery. Established in 1821 on the steepest part of Highgate Hill, the current building dates from 1908 and features a very ornate and pretty façade including a corner turret with a green tower. The Old Crown closed its doors in 2018 to become a restaurant/bar called Tourian Lounge, where food and drink were still served, but not in an old English pub style. A century after our story is set in 2022, it is Brendan the Navigator, a self-styled gastropub with live music.

 

********Augustus John (1878 – 1961) was a Welsh painter, draughtsman, and etcher. For a time he was considered the most important artist at work in Britain: Virginia Woolf remarked that by 1908 the era of John Singer Sargent and Charles Wellington Furse "was over. The age of Augustus John was dawning." He was the younger brother of the painter Gwen John. Although known early in the century for his drawings and etchings, the bulk of John's later work consisted of portraits. Those of his two wives and his children were regarded as among his best. By the 1920s when this story is set, John was Britain's leading portrait painter. John painted many distinguished contemporaries, including T. E. Lawrence, Thomas Hardy, W. B. Yeats, Aleister Crowley, Lady Gregory, Tallulah Bankhead, George Bernard Shaw, the cellist Guilhermina Suggia, the Marchesa Casati and Elizabeth Bibesco.

 

**********The Premier Super Cinema in East Ham was opened on the 12th of March, 1921, replacing the 800 seat capacity 1912 Premier Electric Theatre. The new cinema could seat 2,408 patrons. The Premier Super Cinema was taken over by Provincial Cinematograph Theatres who were taken over by Gaumont British in February 1929. It was renamed the Gaumont from 21st April 1952. The Gaumont was closed by the Rank Organisation on 6th April 1963. After that it became a bingo hall and remained so until 2005. Despite attempts to have it listed as a historic building due to its relatively intact 1921 interior, the Gaumont was demolished in 2009.

 

This jolly festive New year celebratory scene may not appear to be all it appears at first, for it is in fat made up of 1:12 scale miniatures from my large miniatures collection, including pieces from my childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Made of polymer clay glazed to look oily and stuck to miniature newspaper print, the serving of golden hot chips on the table were made in England by hand 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. Made from real glass with great attention to detail on the labels, the bottles of ale come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom, as does the glass of dark ale, also made of glass. The glass of golden champagne is made of real glass and comes from Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom. The two glasses of port and lemon in the low glasses come from an online stockist of miniatures on E-Bay. The packets of Craven “A” cigarettes come from Shephard’s Miniatures in the UK. Great attention has been paid to the labelling which makes them clearly identifiable and specific to the time between the 1920s and the late 1940s. Made of cut clear crystals set in a silver metal frames the square silver ashtray is made by an English artisan for the Little Green Workshop. It is filled with “ash” and even has a tiny cigarette sitting on its lip. The cigarette is a tiny five millimetres long and just one millimetre wide! Made of paper, I have to be so careful that it doesn’t get lost when I use it! Also made by an artisan, only an Indian one, the black ashtray also features miniature cigarettes, although all of them are affixed within the ashtray. The other glasses on the table and the carafe are all made of clear glass and were acquired from a high street stockist of miniatures when I was a young teenager.

 

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 fireplace surround in the background comes from Melody Jane’s Doll House Supplies in the United Kingdom.

 

On the mantle stand more glasses acquired from a high street stockist of miniatures when I was a young teenager. There is also a bottle of beer from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop and a bottle of champagne from Karen Ladybug Miniatures.

 

The Staffordshire hound and fox and the “Dieu et Mon Droit” (God and My Right) vase on the mantle have all been hand made, painted and gilded by Welsh miniature ceramist Rachel Williams who has her own studio, V&R Miniatures, in Powys.

 

The parlour palm in the background comes from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The colourful paper chains were made by me.

 

The two chairs I acquired from a deceased estate as part of a larger collection of miniatures. They date from the 1970s.

 

The wood panelling in the background is real, as I shot this scene on the wood panelled mantle of my drawing room.

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’s latest client, American film actress Wanetta Ward is living whilst her Edwardian Pimlico flat is redecorated by Lettice. We find ourselves in the busy dining room of the hotel where the gentle burble of voices fills the room 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. Surrounded by suited politicians and a smattering of older women, Lettice and Miss Ward sit at a table for two where a splendid selection of sweet and savory afternoon tea has been presented to them on a fluted glass cake stand by a smartly dressed waiter.

 

“Isn’t this fun?” Miss Ward giggles delightedly, looking at the delicacies placed before them. “Taking afternoon tea in London. What a wonderfully British thing to do. I’ve really taken to enjoying this rather quaint observance.” Pouring coffee from a silver coffee pot with an ebonised handle into her cup, she takes a sip. “Ugh!” she exclaims as she shudders and pulls a face. “Which is more than I can say for this sludge you British call coffee.” With a look of distain, she deposits the cup back into its saucer with a loud clatter. “No one makes coffee like we do back home.”

 

“Perhaps you might care for tea?” Lettice remarks quietly and diplomatically, indicating to the silver teapot beside her. “We’re very well known for our excellent tea.”

 

“Ugh!” Miss Ward says again, only this time without the melodrama of face pulling. “I think I’ll stick to the sludge, if it’s all the same to you, darling. You people might have conquered India and her tea plantations, but no-one makes tea like they do in Shanghai.” She sighs. “It’s almost an art form.”

 

“Perhaps we should have had cocktails then.”

 

“Now you’re talking, darling girl.”

 

“Only it might be frowned upon – two ladies alone, sitting and drinking in a hotel dining room.”

 

“See,” Miss Ward remarks in a deflated tone. “It’s like I told you when we met at my flat. You British are all a bunch of stuffed shirts**.” Looking around at the table of older gentlemen next to them, enjoying a fine repast as well as some good quality claret from a faceted glass decanter, she adds somewhat conspiratorially with a flick of her eyes, “And they don’t get much more stuffed that this bunch of politicians.”

 

“Are you always so frank, Miss Ward?”

 

“I’m American, darling. We’re known for our frankness as much as you are known for your diplomacy. I’d be letting the home side down if I wasn’t, especially whilst on foreign soil. Anyway,” she continues as a burst of guffaws come from the table as the gentlemen laugh at something one of them said. “I think they have been here for most of the afternoon, and that isn’t their first bottle. They aren’t going to pay enough attention to either of us to care what we two ladies are saying. I think they are happy if our secret women’s business stays secret. Don’t you agree Miss Chetwynd?”

 

Lettice discreetly looks over at them, noticing their florid faces and slightly rheumy eyes. “Yes, most probably.”

 

“In spite of the sludge they pass off as coffee here, I can say that afternoon tea at the Metropole is delicious.” The American woman picks up the cake stand and holds it aloft before Lettice for her to select a petit four. “Here! Try one.”

 

“I haven’t been here since before the war.” Lettice remarks, choosing a ham and tomato savoury before gazing around the room at the elegant Georgian revival furnishings, the restrained Regency stripe wallpaper, the watercolours of stately British homes in gilt frames and the white linen covered tables with stylish floral arrangements on each.

 

“Has it improved?”

 

“In looks, undoubtedly. It used to be very Victorian: lots of flocked wallpaper, dark furniture and red velvet. No, this is much brighter and more pleasant. The food however,” Lettice glances at the pretty petit four on her plate. “Is yet to be tested.” She picks up her cup and sips her tea. “Do you have your first script from Islington Studios*** yet, Miss Ward?”

 

“Oh I do, darling!” Miss Ward’s eyes grow wide and glisten with excitement. “The film is called ‘After the Ball is Over’. It’s a bit of a Cinderella story. A beautiful girl, despised by her haughty stepmother and stepsister wins the heart of a local lord, all set against the beautiful English countryside.” She picks an egg and lettuce savoury from the cake stand and takes a larger than polite bite from it before depositing the remains on her own plate.

 

“And are you the heroine?”

 

“Good heavens, no!” Miss Ward nearly chokes on her mouthful of egg and pastry. Placing the back of her hand to her mouth rather than her napkin, she coughs roughly, finishes her mouthful and then adds, “I’d rather die than play the heroine! They are always such insipid characters.” She pulls a face and then clears her throat of the last remaining crumbs. “No, I’m playing the stepsister, who uses her womanly wiles to charm the local lord in the first place.” She lowers her kohl lined eyes and smiles seductively. “She’s much more fun as a character, as are all mistresses and villainesses. Just think about the faerie tales you read when you were a girl. What a dull life Snow White or Cinderella would have led were it not for their wicked stepmothers.”

 

“I’d never considered that.” Lettice takes a small bite from her savoury.

 

“Trust me, I may not win the hearts of the audience, but I’ll be more memorable for playing the baddie than I ever would be for playing the helpless heroine.”

 

“How shockingly cynical, Miss Ward.”

 

“Cynical yes,” The American looks thoughtfully towards the ceiling for a moment before continuing, “But also truthful.”

 

“Well,” Lettice says a little reluctantly. “Thinking of truth, you haven’t invited me to afternoon tea just so I can enjoy the selection of sweet and savoury petit fours.” She withdraws her folio from beside her seat and places it on the table.

 

“Ahh!” Miss Ward’s green eyes sparkle with excitement. “The designs for my flat! I finally get to see them!” She rubs her elegant hands with their painted fingernails together gleefully.

 

“Now first, your boudoir.” Lettice withdraws a small pencil and watercolour sketch.

 

The sight of the picture makes Miss Ward gasp with delight as she stretches out her fingers to clutch the drawing. Bringing it closer to her, her painted lips curl up in pleasure.

 

“I thought a treatment of gold embellishment and brocade on black japanned furnishings might give a sense of luxury. I have kept the white ceiling, and white linens for the bed, but as you can see I’ve included some elements of red to bring that exotic oriental feel to the room you so wanted.”

 

“Delicious darling girl!” Miss Ward enthuses. “I have to admit, you were right when you said that white wouldn’t be boring if you used it. It helps balance the intensity of the black, red and gold.”

 

“I’m pleased you approve, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh I do!” She hands the drawing back to Lettice. “What else?”

 

Lettice shows her a few more sketches showing her designs for the dressing room and the vestibule until she finally reaches the two for the drawing room and dining room. She places them on top of her folio, the pools of garish colour standing out against the white linen of the tablecloth and the buff of her folio.

 

“I remembered you telling me how much you like yellow, Miss Ward, but try as I might, I remain unconvinced that yellow walls are a suitable choice.” The American glances first at the drawings and then at Lettice but says nothing. “The colour is bold, and I know you wanted boldness,” Lettice continues. “But since we are being truthful, this strikes me as showy and déclassé.”

 

“Déclassé, Miss Chetwynd?”

 

“Inferior and lacking in the class and elegance of the other rooms’ schemes.”

 

Miss Ward leans forward and picks up the drawing room painting, scrutinising it through narrowed eyes. Dropping it back down, she picks up her coffee cup and takes a sip before asking with a shrug, “Alright, so what do you suggest then?”

 

“Well, it’s funny you should be holding your cup while you ask, Miss Ward.” Lettice observes astutely.

 

“My coffee cup?” Miss Ward holds the cup in front of her and screws up her nose in bewilderment. “You want to paint the walls coffee coloured?”

 

“Oh no, Miss Ward,” Lettice cannot help but allow a small chuckle of relief escape her lips. “No, I was referring more to the outside, which is blue with a gold trim. Here, let me show you what I mean.” She reaches inside her folio and withdraws a piece of wallpaper featuring a geometric fan design in rich navy blue with gold detailing. “I thought we might paper the walls instead, with this.” She holds it out to her client. “It’s very luxurious, and it makes a bold statement, but with elegance. I thought with a suitable array of yellow venetian glass and some pale yellow oriental ceramics, this would both compliment any yellow you add to the room, and give you that glamour and sophistication you desire.”

 

Lettice doesn’t realise it, but she holds her breath as the American picks up the piece of wallpaper and moves it around so that the gold outlines of the fans are caught in the light of the chandeliers above. The pair sit in silence - Lettice in anxiety and Miss Ward in contemplation – whilst the sounds of the busy dining room wash about them.

 

“Pure genius!” Miss Ward declares, dropping the wallpaper dramatically atop Lettice’s sketches.

 

“You approve then, Miss Ward?” Lettice asks with relief.

 

“Approve? I love it, darling girl!” She lifts her savoury to her mouth and takes another large bite.

 

“I’m so pleased Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh it will be a sensation, darling! Cocktails surrounded by golden fans! How delicious.” She replies with her mouth half full of egg, lettuce and pastry. She rubs her fingers together, depositing the crumbs clinging to them onto her plate. “And it will compliment my yellow portrait so well, you clever girl.”

 

“Your, yellow portrait, Miss Ward?” Lettice queries, her head on an angle.

 

“Yes, didn’t I tell you?”

 

“Ahh, no.”

 

“Well, I had my portrait painted whilst I was in Shanghai, draped in beautiful yellow oriental shawls. It’s really quite striking,” she declares picking up the remnants of her savoury. “Even if I do say so myself.”

 

“For above the fireplace?”

 

“Oh no! My Italian landscape will go there.”

 

“Your Italian landscape?”

 

“Yes, I bought it off a bankrupt merchant in Shanghai trying to get back home to the States along with a few other nice paintings.”

 

“How many paintings do you have, Miss Ward?”

 

She contemplates and then silently starts counting, mouthing the numbers and counting on her fingers. “Eleven or so. My beloved brother had them packed up and sent over. They should be arriving from Shanghai in Southampton next week. I’ll get them sent directly to the flat. I’ll leave it up to you darling girl to decide as to where they hang.”

 

“You are full of surprises, Miss Ward.” Lettice remarks with a sigh, picking up her teacup and taking a sip from it.

 

“Evidently, so are you,” the American replies, indicating with her eyes to the wallpaper. “I wasn’t expecting anything as modern and glamourous as that in London!”

 

Smiling, Lettice says, “We aim to please, Miss Ward.”

 

*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 phrase “stuffed shirt” refers to a person who is pompous, inflexible or conservative.

 

***Islington Studios, often known as Gainsborough Studios, were a British film studio located on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in Shoreditch, London which began operation in 1919. By 1920 they had a two stage studio. It is here that Alfred Hitchcock made his entrée into films.

 

An afternoon tea like this would be enough to please anyone, but I suspect that even if you ate each sweet or savoury petit four 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 savoury petite fours on the lower tier of the cake stand and the sweet ones on the upper tier 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 selection includes egg and lettuce, ham and tomato, Beluga caviar, salmon and cucumber and egg, tomato and cucumber savouries and iced cupcakes for the sweet petit fours.

 

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. Several pieces of the same service appear on the table in the background and the tiered sideboard to the left of the table.

 

The fluted glass cake stand, the glass vase on Lettice and Miss Ward’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 teapot is made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The coffee pot with its ornate handle and engraved body is one of three antique Colonial Craftsman pots I acquired from a seller on E-Bay. The two matching pots are on the sideboard in the background. Lettice’s folio was made by British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Lettice’s interior design paintings are 1920s designs. They are sourced from reference material particular to Art Deco interior design in Britain in the 1920s.

 

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.

 

On the table in the background luncheons of fish and salad and spaghetti bolognaise are waiting to be eaten. The fish and salad plates are made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures and the plates of spaghetti bolognaise are made by Frances Knight. The vases of flowers on the table and on the stands 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.

Hello in Myanmar - Mingalaba

 

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Last but not least, a photography journey of life time for a trip to explore South Island of New Zealand and Africa.

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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 have left the hustle and bustle of London, travelling southwest to a stretch of windswept coastline just a short drive the pretty Cornish town of Penzance. Here, friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot, encouraged by her father Lord de Virre who will foot the bill, has commissioned Lettice to redecorate a few of the principal rooms of ‘Chi an Treth’. In the lead up to the wedding, Lord de Virre has spent a great deal of money making the Regency house habitable after many years of sitting empty and bringing it up to the Twentieth Century standards his daughter expects, paying for electrification, replumbing, and a connection to the Penzance telephone exchange. Now, with their honeymoon over, Dickie and Margot have finally taken possession of their country house gift and have invited Lettice to come and spend a Friday to Monday with them so that she might view the rooms Margot wants redecorating for herself and perhaps start formulating some ideas as to how modernise their old fashioned décor. As Lettice is unable to drive and therefore does not own a car, Margot and Dickie have extended the weekend invitation to one of their other Embassy Club coterie, Lettice’s old childhood chum, Gerald, also a member of the aristocracy who has tried to gain some independence from his family by designing gowns from a shop in Grosvenor Street. Gerald owns a Morris*, so he can motor both Lettice and himself down from London on Friday and back again on Monday. After the retirement of the housekeeper, Mrs. Trevethan, from the main house to the gatekeeper’s cottage the previous evening, the quartet of Bright Young Things** played a spirited game of sardines*** and in doing so, potentially solved the romantic mystery of ‘Chi an Treth’ after discovering a boxed up painting purportedly by the artist Winterhalter****, long forgotten, and of a great beauty.

 

Now we find ourselves out in the elements, along ‘Chi an Treth’s’ own stretch of wild coast on a remarkably sunny day for this time of year. Dickie, Margot, Gerald and Lettice all headed out after breakfast to allow the bracing sea air help to clear their heads, addled by too much champagne the previous evening. Lettice suggested it and Margot added that there were some vistas that Lettice might enjoy painting. So, Lettice packed up her folio and her watercolours and has just finished painting a view of an old lighthouse standing on a rocky outcrop whilst Margot, Dickie and Gerald all fossick for seashells and other treasures washed up into ‘Chi an Treth’s’ own little cove.

 

“Incoming!” cries Gerald as a warning as he collapses dramatically onto the sand next to Lettice, sending a spray of golden granules up into the air.

 

“Oh Gerald! Must you?” cries Lettice in exasperation with an anguished expression, gently wiping sand off her watercolour of the lighthouse.

 

“Oh, what’s wrong my little Lettuce Leaf?” Gerald teases, pinching her dainty chin between his right thumb and forefinger.

 

“Don’t call me that, Gerald!” she scolds, her face crumpling even more. “We aren’t four anymore and you know how much I detest it.”

 

“Then tell me what’s wrong, darling.”

 

Lettice takes a deep breath of bracing sea air and looks around her. In the distance along the sparkling water’s edge, Margot and Dickie walk arm in arm, a pair of silhouetted lovers with their heads buried together conspiratorially, the conversation too distant to hear, but their body language giving a clue as to the sweet nothings and giggles being shared between them. The sun shines in the partly cloudy sky overhead and gulls caw and screech as they sail on the breeze, looking for food.

 

“Oh it’s just my head, Gerald, that’s all.”

 

“Ah-ah!” he tuts, wagging a warning finger at her. “You had no pity for me at breakfast.”

 

“That’s because you were being a sulky pillock this morning.”

 

“I had every right to be!” Gerald defends, settling back on his elbows into the soft dry sand. “I had a sore head. I still do.”

 

“You were rude about Mrs. Trevethan again,” Lettice points out. “Which was unfair. I don’t know why you’ve set against her. She’s a harmless old woman.”

 

“I think she’s a Cornish witch, and she has you in her thrall, especially after that story about the Rosevear sisters this morning.”

 

“Oh wasn’t it thrilling, Gerald?” gushes Lettice. “So romantic and tragic.”

 

“If a bit fanciful,” Gerald replies with doubt in his voice. “Like any local piece of folklore.”

 

“Well, I thought it was beautifully sad, even if you don’t.”

 

“Oh, I’m just saying that you should take what that old woman says with a grain of sand, is all, darling.”

 

“Don’t you mean a grain of salt, Gerald?” Lettice asks, looking across at her friend.

 

“Considering we’re on the Cornish coast,” He picks up a fistful of sand and allows it to pour from his enclosed fingers like an hourglass. “I think sand is more appropriate.” He smiles at Lettice.

 

“Oh you!” She gives him a friendly push before sinking back a little into her sand pillow.

 

Gerald sits up and looks at Lettice’s painting as it leans against her emerald green leather folio with its golden brown marbled lined interior. “I say,” he remarks, looking out across the water to the lighthouse and comparing the watercolour with the real view. “This is really rather good, Lettice.”

 

“You sound surprised, Gerald.” she replies. “You’re the one who keeps telling me I could do worse than apply for the Slade School of Art*****.”

 

“And so you could.”

 

“Oh, I don’t think I want to go to all that bother.” She yawns quietly, not bothering to cover her mouth as she lolls back against the sand. “Besides, I also don’t want some tutor telling me how to paint. Painting is an individual and unique experience, not to be dictated to by others who think they know better.” She looks at Gerald, who is watching her intently, listening to every word she says. “And now my interiors business is finally taking off.”

 

“Until Sadie marries you off at the Hunt Ball.”

 

Lettice’s eyes narrow. “I should throw sand in your face for that remark!” she quips.

 

“But you won’t, because you love your Gerry-werry to much to hurt him,” Gerald replies in a babyish voice. Clearing his throat, he then continues in a normal tone, “Plus you don’t want to get on my bad side and find yourself stuck in the wilds of Cornwall when I refuse to motor you back to London.”

 

“I don’t know,” Lettice muses, looking up into the blue sky spattered with fast moving white roiling clouds. “There could be worse places to find myself stuck.”

 

“Like ‘Uddersfield,” remarks Gerald in a mock Yorkshire brogue.

 

“Like Huddersfield,” agrees Lettice with a laugh. “After all, Cornwall is the home of the legend of King Arthur.”

 

“You’d miss London too much, darling. All the latest west end shows, the dinners in Soho,” Gerald looks seriously at Lettice. “The fabulous frocks from Grosvenor Street. Somehow Lettice, I don’t think the Penzance Repertory, Mrs. Cornwall’s Ye Olde Arthurian Teashop and her side line in dressmaking can complete with The Palladium******, The Café Royal******* and…”

 

“And your frocks!” Lettice scoffs, completing his sentence for him.

 

“Exactly.” Gerald replies with a satisfied sigh.

 

“You really are an awful snob, Gerald.”

 

“Thank you darling.” he sighs with satisfaction. “When you are as well lineaged as I am, yet practically destitute, what is there left to be but a snob? Anyway,” he adds, leaning over and picking up Lettice’s painting and glancing at the others carefully tucked into her portfolio’s interior. “All I was saying was that I think you should consider painting murals as part of your interior designs. Other designers do, and you have the talent, which some of them don’t.”

 

“Maybe,” Lettice muses with a sigh, repossessing her painting and putting it back next to her watercolours.

 

The pair sit back in companionable silence for a little while, basking in the dappled sunlight with their eyes closed until Lettice breaks it.

 

“Do you really think it’s a Winterhalter?” She gazes back over to Dickie and Margot, now ambling slowly back across the beach towards she and Gerald.

 

“Well,” Gerald sighs, sitting up and following Lettice’s gaze. “Dickie certainly seems to think so: especially after that story spun by that old Cornish witch about the young and beautiful Miss Rosevear.”

 

“And tragic,” Lettice adds.

 

“And tragic.” Gerald concedes.

 

“I do wish he wouldn’t get his hopes up. He’ll be crushed if it turns out not to be.”

 

“Too late, darling. I’d say all Dickie sees when he looks into the face of the younger Miss Rosevear are the pound signs.”

 

“Surely you don’t mean?” Lettice begins, turning to her friend with wide eyes.

 

“Obtain a young heiress, or sell a great master.” Gerald replies prosaically.

 

“But Margot is an heiress. Just look at all the money Lord de Virre has spent on fixing up ‘Chi an Treth’. Electrifying such an old house wouldn’t have been cheap, never mind the plumbing and the telephone.”

 

“Since when have you ever known Dickie to live within his, or someone else’s means, darling? He’s just like his father, or my father for that matter. None of them can live within their means, and as soon as they get hold of any money, it’s spent. Margot may have brought a sizeable dowery, but its not enough to line the empty vaults of the Marquess.”

 

“But Dickie said only this morning after breakfast that he would bring it back with them to London to take to Bonhams******** for authentication by an expert.”

 

“You mark my words, darling,” Gerald taps his nose in a knowing way with a sad smile. “The moment Dickie gets confirmation that it is a Winterhalter, Miss Rosevear’s fate will be sealed and she will never return to ‘Chi an Treth’.”

 

“Oh that is sad!” Lettice remarks.

 

“What’s sad, darling?” Marot asks, collapsing onto the picnic rug next to Lettice, weighed down by the picnic basket carefully packed by Mrs. Trevethan earlier in the day.

 

“Oh, nothing Margot.” she replies with a false joviality in her voice.

 

“We were just saying that it’s a shame we have to return to London tomorrow.” Gerald quickly chimes in, saving Lettice any embarrassment at trying to think of a story on the fly.

 

“Well, you can always come back,” Margot says with a friendly smile. “I’m so glad this place has cast its spell on you two, like it has on Dickie and I.”

 

“You can come and go as you please,” Dickie adds. “Treat the place as your own. You know there’s a train from London to Penzance, Lettice. You can always come down and Mr. Trevethan can pick you up from the station in the pony trap.”

 

“Anyway Lettice,” Margot continues. “You’ll have to come back soon to begin the redesigns to the drawing room, dining room and the reception hall. Have you had any ideas yet? I can’t wait to hang Miss Rosevear in her rightful place in my newly painted and papered, modern, drawing room.”

 

“Yes, of course, Margot darling.” Lettice says with a painted smile on her lips as she looks over at Dickie and wonders whether Gerald’s wry observation of his motives is correct.

 

*Morris Motors Limited was a privately owned British motor vehicle manufacturing company established in 1919. With a reputation for producing high-quality cars and a policy of cutting prices, Morris's business continued to grow and increase its share of the British market. By 1926 its production represented forty-two per cent of British car manufacturing. Amongst their more popular range was the Morris Cowley which included a four-seat tourer which was first released in 1920.

 

**The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

 

***Sardines is an active game that is played like hide and go seek — only in reverse! One person hides, and everyone else searches for the hidden person. Whenever a person finds the hidden person, they quietly join them in their hiding spot. There is no winner of the game. The last person to join the sardines will be the hider in the next round. Sardines was a very popular game in the 1920s and 1930s played by houseguests in rambling old country houses where there were unusual, unknown and creative places to hide.

 

****Franz Xaver Winterhalter (1805 – 1873) was a German painter and lithographer, known for his flattering portraits of royalty and upper-class society in the mid-19th century. His name has become associated with fashionable court portraiture. Among his best known works are Empress Eugénie Surrounded by her Ladies in Waiting (1855) and the portraits he made of Empress Elisabeth of Austria (1865).

 

*****Established by lawyers and philanthropist Felix Slade in 1868, Slade School of Fine Art is the art school of University College London and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the United Kingdom’s top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as a department of University College London's Faculty of Arts and Humanities. Two of its most important periods were immediately before, and immediately after, the turn of the twentieth century. It had such students as Dora Carrington, Mark Gertler, Paul Nash, C.R.W. Nevinson and Stanley Spencer.

 

******Located on Argyll Street, London, in the famous area of Soho the London Palladium Theatre started life as The Palladium in 1910. The theatre holds 2,286 seats. Of the roster of stars who have played there, many have televised performances. Between 1955 and 1969 Sunday Night at the London Palladium was held at the venue, which was produced for the ITV network. The show included a performance by The Beatles on 13 October 1963. One national paper's headlines in the following days coined the term "Beatlemania" to describe the increasingly hysterical interest in the band. Whilst the theatre has a resident show, it is also able to host one-off performances, such as concerts, TV specials and Christmas pantomimes. It has hosted the Royal Variety Performance forty-three times, most recently in 2019. In March 2020, the venue closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic's effect on the theatre industry, but reopened over four months later on 1 August 2020.

 

*******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.

 

********Established in 1793, Bonhams is a privately owned international auction house and one of the world's oldest and largest auctioneers of fine art and antiques. It was formed by the merger in November 2001 of Bonhams & Brooks and Phillips Son & Neale.

 

Beautiful as it may be, this picturesque pastime on the beach may not be all it seems, for it is in fact made up of miniatures from my 1:12 miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Renown in miniature collectors’ circles for making miniature books that you can actually read, the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe did not make books exclusively. He also made other small pieces like this artist’s portfolio. He did several different types of portfolios including this nautically themed one which contains four watercolour paintings which slip in and out of their marbled paper housing. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make these miniature artisan pieces. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago and through his estate courtesy of the generosity of his daughter and son-in-law. This was the first piece I bought from his estate. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter.

 

The box of watercolours, paint brushes and black paint box all come rom Melody Jane’s Doll House Suppliers in the United Kingdom.

 

The shells scattered about on the sand are miniature shells I have collected from Apollo Bay and Brighton Beach over various visits with friends.

 

The sand that is spread about is in actual fact Très Or Sucre Or (golden sugar) imported from France which was a gift to me from a dear friend a few years ago. Too beautiful to stir into tea, I have used it numerous times for different photographic purposes.

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Truro

DB (German Railways) 111 012-1 arrives from the west at Köln Hbf with a regional service formed of a double-deck push-pull set.

 

I was travelling from Brussels to Linz in Austria, after travelling on Mercia Charters' "The Resurrection" the previous day, but eventually heading for the PTG Tours "Slovenian Spanka". I'd bought a cheap DB "Europaspezial" ticket on the first ICE of the day from Brussels to Köln - which I'm fairly certain was also the first passenger train to use the new Belgian High Speed Line 3 to the German border - and then had a different cheap DB "Europaspezial" ticket for the journey onward, taking an ICE to Munich and then one of the recently-introduced "RailJet" trains from there - but I travelled from Köln to Linz first class as, being a Sunday, first class advance purchase tickets were slightly cheaper than second class ones!

 

I had a fairly generous connection here, with time to photograph a handful of arriving trains, although this was by far the best angle.

 

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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 south of the Thames in the middle-class London suburb of Putney in the front room of a red brick Edwardian villa in Hazelwood Road, where Lettice has come to collect a hat from her childhood chum Gerald’s friend, Harriet Milford. The orphaned daughter of a solicitor with little formal education, Harriet has taken in lodgers to earn a living, but more importantly for Lettice, has taken up millinery semi-professionally to give her some pin money*. As Lettice’s mother, Lady Sadie, has forbidden Lettice to wear a shop bought hat to Leslie, Lettice’s brother’s, wedding in November and Lettice has quarrelled with her own milliner, Madame Gwendolyn, Gerald thought that Harriet might benefit as much from Lettice’s patronage as Lettice will by purchasing one of Harriet’s hats to resolve her fashion conundrum. Today is judgement day as Harriet presents Lettice with her millinery creation.

 

Lettice’s critical eye again glances around the front parlour of the Putney villa, which doubles as Harriet’s sewing room and show room for her hats. She crinkles her nose in distaste. She finds the room’s middle-class chintzy décor an affront to her up-to-date interior design sensitivities, with its flouncy floral Edwardian sofa and roomy armchair by the fire, a pouffe hand embroidered by Harriet’s deceased mother and the busy Edwardian floral wallpaper covered with a mixture of cheap botanical prints and quaint English country scenes, all in gaudy gilded plaster frames. Yet what makes it even worse is that no attempt has been made to tidy the room since her last visit a month ago. Harriet’s concertina sewing box on casters still stands cascaded open next to the armchair, threads, embroidery silks, buttons and ribbons pouring from its compartments like entrails. Hats in different stages of being made up and decorated lie about on furniture or on the floor in a haphazard way. The brightly patterned rug is littered with spools of cotton, scissors, ribbon, artificial flowers and dogeared copies of Weldon’s** magazines. A cardboard hatbox spewing forth a froth of white tissue paper perches precariously on the arm of the sofa, whilst in an equally hazardous position on the right arm of the armchair, a sewing tin threatens to spill its content of threads, thimbles and a black velvet pincushion all over the chair’s seat and the floor.

 

“Sorry, Miss Chetwynd,” Harriet mutters apologetically as she ushers Lettice into the front parlour. “I still haven’t had an opportunity to tidy up in here yet.”

 

“It’s of no consequence, Miss Milford.” Lettice lies as she sweeps into the room swathed in a powder blue coat trimmed with sable that Gerald has made for her. She perches on the sofa in the same place where she sat on her last visit and deposits her crocodile skin handbag against its overstuffed pink and floral arm.

 

“Your censorious gaze and the reproving way you pass that remark tell me otherwise, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

“Are you always so observant, Miss Milford?”

 

“Just like my father,” Harriet replies, glancing up at a very Edwardian photographic portrait of a dour bespectacled man in a large oval frame on the mantelpiece.

 

“I’m sorry Miss Milford,” Lettice acknowledges her criticality politely. “But I must confess I am used to visiting tidier establishments.”

 

“Yes, I suppose Madame Gwendolyn’s shop is far tidier than my front parlour is.” Harriet admits. “But then again, I would imagine that she also has a retinue of staff to keep it so for her.”

 

“Perhaps,” Lettice agrees with a half-smile. “I’m only concerned that if you wish for your little enterprise to be taken seriously, you need to present a professional front. I myself use my own drawing room as a showroom for my clients, so I make sure to keep it tidy when I have clients or prospective clients visiting.”

 

“Or you maid does, Miss Chetwynd: the same one who bakes biscuits for you.”

 

“Touché, Miss Milford.” Lettice replies, cocking her eyebrows in amused surprise at Harriet’s quick, yet adroit remark. “I think your father should have taken more interest in your education. You might have made a very fine lawyer, had you been given the opportunity.”

 

“Thank you, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet replies, blushing at the compliment.

 

“The lack of education afforded to women in our country, just because we are women, is a scandal. Yet our patriarchal society is what will ensure that we remain the fairer and less educated sex.”

 

“You sound like you might have made a fine lawyer too, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet acknowledges. “I’m sure had you been born a few decades earlier you would have made a fine suffragette.”

 

“Or a radical.”

 

“However, that isn’t why you’ve come here today. You’ve come about a far more appropriately feminine pursuit, the acquisition of the hat for your brother’s wedding.”

 

“Indeed, Miss Milford. My mother would be suitably gratified to see me passing my time thus rather than in radical discussion, even if she would prefer it was at Madame Gwendolyn’s establishment.”

 

“Then I do hope I shan’t disappoint Lady Sadie, or you, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

Harriet walks over to a corner of the parlour and withdraws a yellow straw hat on a hatstand that she has kept concealed behind a brass firebox. She reverently carries it across the room and deposits it on the tilt chess table sitting empty between the seats of the two women s that Lettice might inspect it closely.

 

“Considering your colourings, the shape of your face and the soft chignon you wear at the nape of your neck, I’ve opted for a rather romantic picture hat rather like that featured on the cover of Weldon’s Spring Fashions.” Harriet explains as she holds up the magazine’s cover next to the hat for Lettice to make comparisons. “I know it’s autumn now, but it has been remarkably mind, and,” she adds. “This is for a wedding after all.”

 

Lettice examines the hat before her. The shape of the wide brimmed hat that sits low on its stand immediately appeals to Lettice, and she can easily see herself wearing it very comfortably. “Very observant again, Miss Milford.” she says approvingly.

 

“As you can see, I’m acknowledging the season and once again trying to compliment your own colourings with the trimmings.” Harriet says proudly as she carefully turns the hat on its stand. “A russet and golden brown satin rose and some ornamental autumnal fruits in golds and vermillion. I hope you will agree.”

 

Lettice reaches out and touches the satin rose, rubbing the luxuriant fabric between her thumb and forefinger with satisfaction. “Agree? Why my dear Miss Milford, you have managed to do something Madame Gwendolyn has never done for me.” She beams with delight. “You have made a hat that suits my personality beautifully. How could I fail but to be pleased? I must confess that I am more impressed with what you have created than I even dared hope for.”

 

“Then may I take it that you won’t quibble over my price of seven guineas, nine and sixpence?” Harriet asks, trying to keep the nerves out of her well modulated voice. She has never charged such an exorbitant price for one of her creations before, but Gerald told her that seven guineas, nine and sixpence should be the price she should ask Lettice for it. Thinking quickly she adds, “It is quite comparable to the cost of a mode from Selfridges.”

 

“You sell your skills to cheaply, Miss Milford.”

 

“I may possibly increase my fees if my ‘little enterprise’ as you continue to call it, really takes off, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

“I shouldn’t speak so disparagingly of your enterprise, Miss Milford. I must sound unspeakably rude and patronising. Please forgive me.”

 

“Rude, no Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet acknowledges.

 

“As amends for my snobby behaviour,” Lettice proffers hopefully. “I shall happily promote your name to anyone at the wedding who asks me who made my hat.”

 

“I’d be grateful, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet replies with a grateful smile. “And I’ll try and get this place tided up should any of your friends come knocking. I did at least keep the telephone connected after father died, so I am in the book. I found it useful to have a telephone for enquiries about rooms to let initially, but now also for queries about hats.”

 

“Most prudent, Miss Milford.”

 

Harriet stands up, reaches past Lettice’s shoulder and takes up the plain cardboard hatbox stuffed with white tissue paper and places it on the seat of her armchair. She proceeds to pick up Lettice’s new hat, and like a mother tucking its child into bed, she lovingly places her creation into the box, nestling it amongst the nosily crumpling paper.

 

“Miss Chetwynd, do you mind if I make another frank observation?” she asks.

 

“My dear Miss Milford, you have made several so far,” Lettice laughs. “Why should I stop you now?”

 

Harriet snatches up the box and resumes her seat, placing the open hatbox on her lap.

 

“I’m glad you said yes Miss Chetwynd, for you see, something has been bothering me since your first visit here.”

 

“And what is that, Miss Milford.”

 

“Well, I couldn’t help but notice how ill at ease you seemed. Could it be because Gerry didn’t tell you about our friendship?”

  

Lettice looks across at Harriet whose mousy brown hair cut into a soft bob frames her pretty face, free of makeup. Her brown eyes have an earnest look in them. Lettice acknowledges Harriet’s question with a quick and curt nod, before casting her eyes down, ashamed that her feelings have been so easily perceived by someone she barely knows.

 

“I thought so.”

 

“I didn’t know you existed until Gerald pulled his motor up outside the front of your house.”

 

“I must confess I’m surprised, as Gerry talks about you all the time. You two are obviously the greatest of friends, and have been since you were children.” Harriet licks her lips a little awkwardly before continuing. “Perhaps he is a little embarrassed by our friendship, after all, I’m not an aristocrat’s daughter like you and some of your other friends he tells me about.”

 

“I’m sure that isn’t true, Miss Milford.” Lettice assures her hostess. “Gerald can be a frightful snob. I’ve pulled him up on it enough in recent times, and,” she admits a little begrudgingly. “He’s done the same with me. If Gerald really was ashamed of you, he wouldn’t have introduced us. That I do know.”

 

“He’s been wonderful to me since we met. I’m not sure if he told you, but I’m guessing not if he didn’t really tell you about me prior to our first meeting, but we met at the haberdashers we share in Fulham.”

 

“That Gerald did tell me.”

 

“Well, he’s given me encouragement and guidance as I try to get this millinery business up and running, and, well after my difficulties with the handsy General when I first started letting rooms, I feel more comfortable with gentlemen friends who don’t want to paw me.”

 

“Like Gerald and your Cyril, you mean.”

 

“Yes.” Harriet acknowledges with a blush.

 

“Where is Cyril, by the way? I haven’t heard his oboe playing today.”

 

“He’s in Norfolk, visiting his mother.” Harriet explains. She hesitates for a moment before carrying on. “I’ve never had many friends, you see. I was always the shy one at school, and not at all popular. What few friends I have had up until recently have been rather bookish and shy like me, so it was like a breath of fresh air when Gerry took an interest in plain and shy little me.”

 

“Hardly plain, Miss Milford.” Lettice counters kindly.

 

“You do know that I’d never want to intrude on your friendship with Gerry, don’t you? You’re his oldest and best friend, and he’s so proud of you and how you’ve set up your own business all by yourself. You inspire him you know.” Lettice blushes and glances back down into her lap at Harriet’s admission. “And you’re such a chum to him. He says you use the word ‘brick’ to describe your good friends, so you are his ‘brick’ then. Now that I know that he didn’t tell you about me, I must have come across as an interloper: a middle-class girl of no particular note trying to usurp you in Gerry’s affections. However, I can assure you that I’m not. Your friendship with him is perfectly safe. I’m just happy to bask in Gerry’s minor attentions for as long as he wishes to bestow them upon me.”

 

“Well, I must confess that I did suffer a few pangs of jealously when I first saw the two of you being so familiar together, but I realised after we left you, that you are no threat. Gerald and I had a frank conversation of our own on the way home.” Lettice admits. “Not that Gerald is bound to me by any means. He can be friends with whomever he likes, and so long as his dalliances with gentlemen are discreet, I’m happy. He just needs to be careful in that respect.”

 

“I tell Cyril the same thing.”

 

“So, if Gerald wants to be friends with you, who am I to argue? All the same, I am pleased to hear from you that you are no threat, Miss Milford.”

 

“Not at all, Miss Chetwynd.” She sighs with relief and places the lid on the hatbox on her lap before putting it aside. “Well, now that we have that awkward little conversation out of the way, might I interest you in some tea?”

 

“Some tea would be splendid, Miss Milford. Thank you.”

 

Harriet gets up and walks across the room. As she reaches the threshold of the parlour door she turns back and says, “You know we really do have quite a lot in common, you know, Miss Chetwynd?”

 

“How so, Miss Milford?” Lettice looks up from smoothing down the hem of her frock over her knees.

 

“Well, we both have Gerry as our friend, and we are both forward thinking women in a patriarchal world.”

 

“That’s true, Miss Milford.”

 

“We both are trying to establish names for ourselves, albeit in different areas. And we both have progressed ourselves in spite of our parents’ lack of interest in furthering our education. We could almost form a sisterhood.”

 

Lettice doesn’t necessarily agree with Harriet’s point about her education, which is quite presumptuous. Her father, the Viscount Wrexham, unlike Lady Sadie, was quite indulgent with Lettice’s education, giving her far more opportunities than were afforded to her elder sister Lally. Harriet realises that she has overstepped the mark by being overly familiar when she sees a cool steeliness darken Lettice’s sparkling blue eyes and harden her features slightly, but it is too late for her to retract her words.

 

“I wouldn’t go so far as to presume that we will ever be bosom friends***, Miss Milford. However, let me get used to your existence,” Lettice concedes with all the good grace of a Viscount’s daughter. “And I’m sure that we can be friends of a sort that goes beyond a passing acquaintance or an agreeable business arrangement.”

 

“Very well, Miss Chetwynd.” Harriet replies with a half-smile. “I’ll be satisfied with that. Better that we be friends of a sort than enemies for no reason. I think as women wanting to forward ourselves in this male dominated world, we probably have enough of them as it is.”

 

“Perhaps, Miss Milford. Let us see.”

 

*Originating in Seventeenth Century England, the term pin money first meant “an allowance of money given by a husband to his wife for her personal expenditures. Married women, who typically lacked other sources of spending money, tended to view an allowance as something quite desirable. By the Twentieth Century, the term had come to mean a small sum of money, whether an allowance or earned, for spending on inessentials, separate and in addition to the housekeeping money a wife might have to spend.

 

**Created by British industrial chemist and journalist Walter Weldon Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was the first ‘home weeklies’ magazine which supplied dressmaking patterns. Weldon’s Ladies’ Journal was first published in 1875 and continued until 1954 when it ceased publication.

 

***The term bosom friend is recorded as far back as the late Sixteenth Century. In those days, the bosom referred to the chest as the seat of deep emotions, though now the word usually means a woman's “chest.” A bosom friend, then, is one you might share these deep feelings with or have deep feelings for.

 

Contrary to popular belief, fashion at the beginning of the Roaring 20s did not feature the iconic cloche hat as a commonly worn head covering. Although invented by French milliner Caroline Reboux in 1908, the cloche hat did not start to gain popularity until 1922, so even though this story is set in that year, picture hats, a hangover from the pre-war years, were still de rigueur in fashionable society and whilst Lettice is fashionable, she and many other fashionable women still wore the more romantic picture hat. Although nowhere near as wide, heavy, voluminous or as ornate as the hats worn by women between the turn of the Twentieth Century and the Great War, the picture hats of the 1920s were still wide brimmed, although they were generally made of straw or some lightweight fabric and were decorated with a more restrained touch.

 

This rather cluttered and chaotic scene of a drawing room cum workroom may look real to you, but believe it or not, it is made up entirely with pieces from my 1:12 miniatures collection, including pieces from my teenage years.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

At the centre of our story is Lettice’s yellow straw hat decorated with ornamental flowers, fruit and organza. 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism such as these are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. The maker of this hat is unknown, but it is part of a larger collection I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel. The hat stand the hat rests on is also part of Marilyn Bickel’s collection.

 

The copy of Weldon’s Dressmaker Spring Fashions edition on the tabletop is a 1:12 size miniature made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Most of the books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. In this case, the magazine is non-opening, however what might amaze you is that all Ken Blythe’s books and magazines are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, as well as through his estate via his daughter and son-in-law. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter.

 

The spools of ribbon, the tape measure, the silver sewing scissors in the shape of a stork and the box of embroidery threads and the box of cottons I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls’ House in the United Kingdom.

 

The tilt chess table on which these items stand I bought from Mick and Marie’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The concertina sewing box on casters to the left of the photograph which you can see spilling forth its contents is an artisan miniature made by an unknown artist in England. It comes from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the in the United Kingdom. All the box’s contents including spools of ribbons, threads scissors and buttons on cards came with the work box. The box can completely expand or contract, just like its life-sized equivalent.

 

The round white metal sewing tin on the armchair is another artisan piece I have had since I was a young teenager. If you look closely you will see it contains a black velvet pin cushion, a pair of sewing scissors, needles, threads and two thimbles. Considering this is a 1:12 artisan miniature, imagine how minute the thimbles are! This I bought from a high street shop that specialised in dolls and doll house furnishings. It does have a lid which features artificial flowers and is trimmed with braid, but I wanted to show off the contents of the tin in this image, so it does not feature.

 

The spools of yellow, purple and blue cottons come from various online shops who sell dollhouse miniatures.

 

The bookshelf in the background comes from Babette’s Miniatures, who have been making miniature dolls’ furnishings since the late eighteenth century.

 

Harriet’s family photos seen cluttering the bookshelf in the background are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are almost all from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and are made of metal with glass in each. The castle shaped cottage orneé (pastille burner) on the bookshelf has been hand made, painted and gilded by Welsh miniature ceramist Rachel Williams who has her own studio, V&R Miniatures, in Powys. The bowl decorated with fruit on the bookshelf was hand decorated by British artisan Rachael Maundy.

 

Lettice’s snakeskin handbag with its gold clasp and chain comes from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniature Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The parlour palm in its striped ceramic pot I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The floral chintz settee and chair and the Art Nouveau china cabinet are made by J.B.M. miniatures who specialise in well made pieces of miniature furniture made to exacting standards.

 

The paintings and prints on the walls all come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll’s House in the United Kingdom.

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, and whilst we have not travelled that far physically across London, the tough streets and blind alleys of Poplar in London’s East End is a world away from Lettice’s rarefied and privileged world. On Tuesday Mrs. Boothby, Lettice’s charwoman*, discovered that Edith, Lettice’s maid, didn’t have a sewing machine when the Cockney cleaner found the young maid cutting out the pieces for a new frock. Mrs. Boothby made overtures towards Edith, inviting her to her home in Poplar in London’s East End with an air of mystery, saying she might be able to help her with her predicament of a sewing machine.

 

Friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) in Penzance as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot in her desire to turn ‘Chi an Treth’ from a dark Regency house to a more modern country house flooded with light, has commissioned Lettice to help redecorate some of the rooms in a lighter and more modern style, befitting a modern couple like the Channons. Lettice has decamped to Penzance for a week where she is overseeing the painting and papering of ‘Chi an Treth’s’ drawing room, dining room and main reception room, before fitting it out with a lorryload of new and repurposed furnishings, artwork and objets d’arte that she has had sent down weeks prior to her arrival. In her mistress’ absence, Edith has more free time on her hands, and so she was able to agree to Mrs. Boothby’s mysterious invitation. Even though she is happy with her current arrangement to take any items she wants to sew home to her parent’s house in Harlesden, where she can use her mother’s Singer** sewing machine on her days off. The opportunity of gaining access to a sewing machine of her own is too good for Edith to refuse.

 

So it is that we find ourselves in the kitchen cum living room of Mrs. Boothby’s tenement in Merrybrook Place in Poplar. By her own admission, it is a haven of cleanliness amidst the squalor of surrounding Poplar. Mrs. Boothby was just about to explain to Edith who someone called Ken is, when she was interrupted by the sound of his whistle. Moments later the door to Mrs. Boothby’s house flew open and the frame was filled by a tall bulking man wearing a flat cap with a parcel beneath his right arm wrapped in newspaper and tied up with twine.

 

“Ken!” Mrs. Boothby gasps, releasing a fresh plume of smoke as she exhales after drawing on her lit cigarette. “You’re ‘ome at last.”

 

“’Ome now!” he replies loudly and laconically as he steps across the threshold.

 

“Well don’t just stand there in the door, lettin’ all the cold air in and the ‘ot air out!” Mrs. Boothby scolds. “Come inside wiv you, and close the door behind you.”

 

The man pushes the door closed behind him with rather more force than is required and it slams loudly, and his violent slamming makes the crockery in the dresser behind Edith rattle. “Closed now!” he says defiantly.

 

Rather startled by the arrival of this man, Edith looks up at him with wide eyes filled with concern. Without the sun from the courtyard outside blinding her, Edith can see the man towering over them is very tall and muscular beneath his clothes, and rather than being Mrs. Boothby’s age, as she thought he was at first, she finds he is actually much younger. Clean shaven, he is dressed in a long grey coat and he has a collarless blue and white striped shirt and dusty black trousers held up by suspenders on beneath. There is a bright red and white spotted handkerchief tied around his neck. His face is as white as Mrs. Boothby’s, but his face is quite unlike hers. Where her face is drawn and pinched, his is fresh and rounded. He looks to Mrs. Boothby with bright eyes which are just like hers.

 

“Ken!” Mrs. Boothby says admonishingly. “What ‘ave I told you ‘bout slammin’ the door! Lawd you’ll frighten Old Mr. and Mrs. Blackfriar upstairs, not to mention Mrs. Conway next door.”

 

“Sorry Ma!” Ken replies in the same loud and rather toneless voice. It is then that he sees the Regency china teapot on the table. “Good pot, Ma!” He exclaims. “Good pot!”

 

“Well of course it’s the good pot, Ken. You knew I was havin’ someone ‘ome for tea today. I told you that this mornin’. You remember don’t you?”

 

“Nice lady!” he says loudly, and then suddenly he notices Edith sitting, rather frightened in his presence, in her chair. Realising Mrs. Boothby has company he quickly whisks off his cap with his empty left hand, revealing a mop of unruly curly red hair.

 

“That’s right. The nice lady I work wiv up the West End. Nah, Ken, this his ‘er. This is Miss Watsford. Edith, this is my son, Kenneth, but we just call him Ken, don’t we son?”

 

“I’m Ken! That’s me!”

 

“Yes son,” Mrs. Boothby says soothingly. “That’s you alright. You’re my big little Ken, ain’t cha?”

 

“Son?” Edith gasps. It is then she suddenly sees the gormless grin that teases up the corners of his mouth and plumps his lips and the childish delight highlighting his glinting eyes as he looks down at her. Only then does she realise that Ken might be big and bulky, but he’s never hurt another living being.

 

“How do, Miss Watsford!” Ken says dropping his flat cap on the table and thrusting the paper wrapped parcel out in front of him like an offering.

 

“Nah, nah!” Mrs. Boothby fusses, dropping the cigarette she holds in her hand into the ashtray and standing up. “Miss Watsford don’t want that right nah. ‘Ere.” She takes one of the shortbread biscuits from the plate and gives it to the bulking lad. “Nah, go sit dahn on your bed and play wiv your toys for a bit, and let Miss Watsford and I ‘ave a nice chat. Then you can show ‘er what you got when I tell you. Alright?”

 

“Alright Ma.”

 

“Good boy.” She reaches up and runs a hand along her child’s soft cheek before planting a tender kiss on it. “And later, after I’ve taken Miss Watsford back ‘ome, I’ll read you one of them Beatrix Potter books you like. Alright?”

 

“Peter Rabbit?” Ken points to the teapot of the rabbit coming out of a watering can standing on one of the upper shelves of the dresser.

 

“Yes if you want, son. Nah, go sit dahn on your bed, and I’ll call you in a bit.”

 

Snatching up his cap, Ken quietly plods over to a bed that Edith hadn’t noticed before, in the corner of the room. Around and on it sit a few precious toys: a stuffed rabbit and a teddy bear, both clearly very well loved, and a few children’s books.

 

“Son?” Edith says, her eyes darting about the room as she puts the pieces of Ken’s presence together in her mind. “Oh Mrs. Boothby, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you had a son. I… I…” she stammers in an embarrassed fashion. “I just assumed that with your husband passed away, and no mention of a child.”

 

“That I ‘ad no children.” Mrs. Boothby completes Edith’s unspoken assumption.

 

“I actually thought you might have had a son who… well, who died in the war.”

 

“Why would you fink that, Edith dearie?” Mrs. Boothby gives her a quizzical look.

 

“Well, there are so many widows and grieving mothers about.”

 

The old woman sits back down again and releases another fruity cough. As she clears her throat roughly she picks up her cigarette and continues. “Well ‘how were you to know that I ‘ad a son, dead or otherwise, if I ain’t never told you. ‘Ere, ‘ave some more tea.” She lifts the pot and pours Edith some fresh tea into her half empty cup.

 

“So how old is your son, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Well that depends who you ask. If you ask me, ‘e’s fourty-two, cos that’s ‘ow old ‘e is. I brought ‘im into the world in April eighteen eighty.” Then she pauses before continuing. “But if you ask any of them fancy do-gooder doctors, they’d tell you ‘e’s six, cos that ‘ow old they say ‘e is in ‘is own ‘ead.”

 

The old Cockney woman sighs and takes a long drag on her cigarette, the paper and tobacco crackling as she draws deeply, the sound clear in the sudden heavy silence that hangs thickly in the room like the acrid smoke of her cigarette. Edith looks at Ken sitting in his bed a childlike smile of delight brightening his face, playing happily like a six year old holding the floppy arms of his toy rabbit, making him dance on his knee. Mrs. Boothby follows Edith’s gaze with her own sharp eyes before continuing.

 

“So, nah you see why it’s a bit easier for me not to mention that I ‘ave a son.” She exhales another plume of bitter blueish grey smoke. “Not that I’m ashamed of ‘im, cos I ain’t. “E’s a good lad ‘e is, but ‘e’s got ‘is own cross to bear. I ‘ad problems you see, when ‘e was born. I’d been scrubbin’ floors right up ‘till me waters broke almost, what wiv Bill bein’ away in the merchant navy and ‘is pay not coverin’ all I ‘ad to pay for. I ‘ad to make ends meet someow and ‘ave everythin’ ready for Ken when ‘e arrived. Anyway, ‘e must ‘ave been in the wrong position, ‘cos the midwife couldn’t get ‘im in the right spot and she ‘ad to get the doctor.” She takes another long drag of her cigarette before stumping it out in the ashtray as she blows out another plume of cigarette smoke. She takes out her papers and quietly begins rolling another cigarette. “Not that I wanted ‘im. I couldn’t afford a doctor, but ‘e’s one of them do-gooder doctors what don’t charge those what can’t afford to pay, and that was me. I needed every brass farvin’ I could get my grubby ‘ands on. They said Ken didn’t get enough oxygen when ‘e was being born and as such that ‘is mind wouldn’t develop much beyond a six year old. That bloody Irish Catholic priest offered to take Ken away.” Mrs. Boothby spits angrily before putting the cigarette between her lip and lighting it.

 

“Priest!” Ken calls angrily from his truckle bed. “Priest bad!”

 

“Yes son! The priest is bad, but ‘e ain’t ‘ere so don’t you trouble your pretty ‘ead about it.” Mrs. Boothby says comfortingly. She looks over at her son, and just like a cloud momentarily blocking out the sun, Ken’s angry spat dissipates and he happily mumbles something to his rabbit before laughing.

 

“But you kept Ken.” Edith ventures gingerly as she watches Mrs. Boothby draw the rolled cigarette paper filled with tobacco to her lips and lick it, before rolling it closed.

 

“I ain’t no Irish trash. I’m a Protestant, not that I’m all that bovvered wiv God, and certainly not that Irish God when the priest said I should just give Ken up and put ‘im in one of them ‘ouses for unwanted kiddies with mental problems. But Mrs. Conway next door told ‘im to clear off quick smart. She told me that all kiddies is a blessin’, and she was right.”

 

“So you raised him then.”

 

“I did!” Mrs. Boothby replies proudly. “And when Bill came ‘ome from bein’ on the sea, I knew Mrs. Conway was right. Bill and I loved Ken, faults ‘n all. Mrs. Conway was right. Kiddies are a blessin’. Bill and I became closer ‘cos of Ken. ‘E still drank, but not like ‘e did before Ken were born. It were our job to raise ‘im propper and make sure ‘e could take care of ‘imself, and Bill took that serious like. They says it takes a village to raise a child, and well, I got a village right ‘ere outside this door. Mrs. Conway looked after Ken just like any uvver kiddie when Bill went back to sea and I took up charring again.”

 

“So that’s why you said you owe her so much.” Edith says, suddenly understanding Mrs. Boothby’s statement about Mrs. Conway earlier.

 

The old woman nods. “And cos ‘e was raised wiv all the uvver kiddies, they all grew up togevva, and they protected Ken, ‘till ‘e could protect ‘imself. When ‘e were older, when Bill were ‘ome, he taught Ken ‘ow to box, not to fight like some ‘round ‘ere, but just to defend ‘imself. You know what I mean?”

 

Edith nods. “Somehow, I suspect Ken wouldn’t hurt a fly.” Edith muses, smiling over at Ken.

 

“You got that right, Edith dearie. When Ken were a bit older, course ‘e couldn’t do school wiv the uvver kiddies, not bein’ as good wiv words and numbers like them, but ‘e were a big and strong lad, so I got ‘im a job wiv the local rag’ n’ bone man***.”

 

“So Ken is accepted in the neighbourhood then?”

 

“Course ‘e is, dearie. “E’s a local lad, and we look after our own dahn ‘ere. All the ladies ‘round these parts love ‘im when ‘e comes by wiv the wagon, cos they know Ken won’t try and cheat ‘em out of nuffink, and Mr. Pargiter and ‘is boys love ‘im too cos ‘e’s good for business, and they take good care of ‘im.”

 

“Did he have to go to war, Mrs. Boothby?” She looks again at the happy man now playing with both his bear and his rabbit.

 

“Fank the Lawd, no!” Mrs. Boothby casts her eyes to the stained ceiling above. “‘E were deemed mentally unfit for service,” The old woman blows out a ragged breath full of cigarette smoke before continuing a moment later. “And Lawd knows I ain’t never been so grateful as I were that day that our Ken came out baked the way ‘e did. Lads came ‘ome from the war more mentally unfit than the way they went to it. More mentally unfit than our Ken!”

 

“And some never came home.” Edith mumbles, dropping her head sadly.

 

Mrs. Boothby reaches out a careworn hand and takes hold of Edith’s squeezing it comfortingly.

 

“’Ere, let’s not get all upset when the sun is shin’ outside and Ken’s ‘ere wiv us.” Mrs. Boothby says, her voice full of false joviality as she blinks back tears. “Nah workin’ for Mr. Pargiter like ‘e does, Ken comes across a lot of good stuff. Ain’t that right, Ken?”

 

“What Ma?” Ken asks expectantly, raising his head from his toys and looking up happily at his old mother in her chair.

 

“You comes across lots of nice fings when you take Mr. Pargiter’s cart ‘round, don’t you?” she asks him patiently.

 

“Yes Ma.”

 

“Includin’ somfink you wanna show to Miss Watsford, ain’t that right, Ken?”

 

“Yes Ma!” Ken replies excitedly bouncing on his truckle bed, making the wooden frame squeak under his weight.

 

“So come show what you got to Miss Watsford then.” Mrs. Boothby says to her son encouragingly.

 

Obediently Ken tears the newspaper and twine enthusiastically from around the parcel he was carrying when he arrived home. Moving the gilt blue and white plate of uneaten shortbread biscuits to the middle of the table, Mrs. Boothby makes way for Ken’s surprise. With a groan he deposits a hand treadle Singer sewing machine on the edge of the table. Edith gasps.

 

“There you go Edith, dearie!” Mrs. Boothby says proudly.

 

“Oh Mrs. Boothby, I… I can’t afford this on a maid’s wage.” Edith stammers.

 

“You don’t know ‘ow much it is yet.” the old woman counters with a doubtful look.

 

“Well it’s sure to be exp…” Edith begins, but is silenced by Mrs. Boothby’s raised hand.

 

“Ken, ‘ow much Mr. Pargiter sell this to you for?” Mrs. Boothby asks her son.

 

“Five bob, Mum.” Ken replies proudly, smiling his gormless grin, turning his head, first to his mother and then Edith for approval.

 

“Well that sounds a fair price from old Mr. Pargiter.” Mrs. Boothby confirms as she eyes up the machine. “So if we add on an extra shillin’ for Ken’s time, that’ll be six bob, Edith.”

 

Edith gasps. “Six shillings!” She runs her hand lovingly along the machine’s black painted treadle and admires the beautiful gold and red painted decoration. “But it’s worth so much more than that.”

 

“But that ain’t what it’s bein’ sold for, Edith dearie. It’s six shillins. You fink six shillins a good price to sell this ‘ere sewin’ machine to Miss Watsford, Ken my boy?”

 

“Yes Ma!” Ken replies, nodding emphatically.

 

“Well, you ‘eard the man. Six shillins, that’s the price then, Edith dearie.” Mrs. Boothby says with a cheeky smile. "Take it or leave it.”

 

“Oh Mrs. Boothby, Ken…” Edith breathes with delight. “How can I say no?”

 

“You can’t.” Mrs. Boothby concludes as she blows out a final billowing cloud of cigarette smoke and squashes the stub of her cigarette into the ashtray with the others. “Nah, just pay me the six shillins when I come in on Tuesday.”

 

“Oh Ken,” Edith says, looking up at the tall man with his beaming smile and glittering eyes. “How can I ever thank you?”

 

*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.

 

**The Singer Corporation is an American manufacturer of consumer sewing machines, first established as I. M. Singer & Co. in 1851 by Isaac M. Singer with New York lawyer Edward C. Clark. Best known for its sewing machines, it was renamed Singer Manufacturing Company in 1865, then the Singer Company in 1963. In 1867, the Singer Company decided that the demand for their sewing machines in the United Kingdom was sufficiently high to open a local factory in Glasgow on John Street. The Vice President of Singer, George Ross McKenzie selected Glasgow because of its iron making industries, cheap labour, and shipping capabilities. Demand for sewing machines outstripped production at the new plant and by 1873, a new larger factory was completed on James Street, Bridgeton. By that point, Singer employed over two thousand people in Scotland, but they still could not produce enough machines. In 1882 the company purchased forty-six acres of farmland in Clydebank and built an even bigger factory. With nearly a million square feet of space and almost seven thousand employees, it was possible to produce on average 13,000 machines a week, making it the largest sewing machine factory in the world. The Clydebank factory was so productive that in 1905, the U.S. Singer Company set up and registered the Singer Manufacturing Company Ltd. in the United Kingdom.

 

***A rag-and-bone man is a person who goes from street to street in a vehicle or with a horse and cart buying things such as old clothes and furniture. He would then sell these items on to someone else for a small profit.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful domestic scene is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection. Some pieces come from my own childhood. Other items I acquired as an adult through specialist online dealers and artists who specialise in 1:12 miniatures.

 

The Singer hand treadle sewing machine with its hand painted detail I acquired from American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel as part of a lot of her miniature hats from a milliner’s tableau.

 

Mrs. Boothby’s beloved collection of decorative “best” blue and white china on the kitchen table come from various online miniature stockists through E-Bay. The Scottish shortbreads on the cake plate 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. They actually come in their own 1:12 miniature artisan tin, complete with appropriate labelling.

 

Also on the table are Mrs. Boothby’s Player’s Navy Cut cigarette tin and Swan Vesta matches, which are 1:12 miniatures hand made by Jonesy’s Miniatures in England. The black ashtray is also an artisan piece, the bae of which is filled with “ash”. The tray as well as having grey ash in it, also has a 1:12 cigarette which rests on its lip (it is affixed there). Made by Nottingham based tobacconist manufacturer John Player and Sons, Player’s Medium Navy Cut was the most popular by far of the three Navy Cut brands (there was also Mild and Gold Leaf, mild being today’s rich flavour). Two thirds of all the cigarettes sold in Britain were Player’s and two thirds of these were branded as Player’s Medium Navy Cut. In January 1937, Player’s sold nearly 3.5 million cigarettes (which included 1.34 million in London). Production continued to grow until at its peak in the late 1950s, Player’s was employing 11,000 workers (compared to 5,000 in 1926) and producing 15 brands of pipe tobacco and 11 brands of cigarettes. Nowadays the brands “Player” and “John Player Special” are owned and commercialised by Imperial Brands (formerly the Imperial Tobacco Company). Swan Vestas is a brand name for a popular brand of ‘strike-anywhere’ matches. Shorter than normal pocket matches they are particularly popular with smokers and have long used the tagline ‘the smoker’s match’ although this has been replaced by the prefix ‘the original’ on the current packaging. Swan Vestas matches are manufactured under the House of Swan brand, which is also responsible for making other smoking accessories such as cigarette papers, flints and filter tips. The matches are manufactured by Swedish Match in Sweden using local, sustainably grown aspen. The Swan brand began in 1883 when the Collard & Kendall match company in Bootle on Merseyside near Liverpool introduced ‘Swan wax matches’. These were superseded by later versions including ‘Swan White Pine Vestas’ from the Diamond Match Company. These were formed of a wooden splint soaked in wax. They were finally christened ‘Swan Vestas’ in 1906 when Diamond merged with Bryant and May and the company enthusiastically promoted the Swan brand. By the 1930s ‘Swan Vestas’ had become ‘Britain’s best-selling match’.

 

The various bowls, cannisters and dishes and the kettle I have acquired from various online miniatures stockists throughout the United Kingdom, America and Australia.

 

The black Victorian era stove and the ladderback chair on the left of the table and the small table directly behind it are all miniature pieces I have had since I was a child. The ladderback chair on the right came from a deceased estate of a miniatures collector in Sydney.

 

The grey marbleised fireplace behind the stove and the trough sink in the corner of the kitchen come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Mrs. Boothby’s picture gallery in the corner of the room also came from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop.

 

The green wallpaper is an authentic replica of real Art Nouveau wallpaper from the first decade of the Twentieth Century which I have printed onto paper. The floorboards are a print of a photo taken of some floorboards that I scaled to 1:12 size to try and maintain a realistic look.

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 is Tuesday and we are in the kitchen of Lettice’s flat: Edith her maid’s preserve, except on Tuesdays, every third Thursday of the month and occasionally after a big party. That is when Mrs. Boothby, Lettice’s charwoman*, comes from her home in Poplar to do all the hard jobs and Edith shares the space with her. Although this can be a bit of challenge, especially as Mrs. Boothby likes to smoke indoors, Edith is grateful that unlike her previous positions, she does not have to scrub the black and quite chequered kitchen linoleum, nor polish the parquetry floors, not do her most hated job, black lead the stovetop. Mrs. Boothby does them all without complaint, with reliability and to a very high standard. She is also very handy on cleaning and washing up duty with Edith after one of Lettice’s extravagant cocktail parties. Edith also has to admit that after her original reluctance, Mrs. Boothby has turned out to be rather pleasant company and the two have had many fine chats over time.

 

“Oh Mrs. Boothby, after you’ve finished polishing the floors in the drawing room this morning, would you mind laying down this sheet on the space behind Miss Lettice’s chair and the Chinese screen?” Edith pushes a neatly folded white sheet across the kitchen table to the old char.

 

“Why ‘ave I got to put dahn an old sheet for?” She looks perplexed at the pile of fabric before her. “Don’t Miss Chetwynd ‘ave enough rugs?”

 

“Oh yes, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith trys somewhat unsuccessfully to cover her amused smile. “It isn’t for that.”

 

“Then what’s it for, if you don’t mind me askin’?”

 

“It’s a drop sheet, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith elucidates.

 

“Oh. She getting’ painters in then? I bet I could find her cheaper ‘ouse painters than ooever she got. My Bruvver does a bit a ‘ouse paintin’, an I reckon ‘e does a very fine job ‘n all.”

 

“Oh no, Mrs. Boothby. Miss Lettice is going to paint a table today.”

 

“Paint a table?” The old woman looks queryingly at her younger counterpart. “Why? Ain’t it any good as is?”

 

“Apparently not, Mrs. Boothby. However, it isn’t for her. It’s for Miss de Virre, I mean, Mrs. Channon. It’s a table from her house in Cornwall.”

 

“Tartin’ up tables!” The old cockney woman tuts as she casts her eyes to the ceiling. “What them rich fancy folk won’t fink up next. I just throw an oilcloth over my table when I got friends comin’ for tea. That covers up the marks good and proper.”

 

“Oh no, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith explains. “Miss Lettice is going to redecorate it as part of her re-design of Mrs. Channon’s drawing room.”

 

“Well,” grumbles the old woman. “Whatever she’s doin’ it for, I hope she don’t get paint on my nice clean polished floors.”

 

“That’s what the drop sheet is for, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Ere dearie, pop the kettle on so as we can ‘ave a nice cup of Rosie-Lee** before I get started on the floors.” Mrs. Boothby says to Edith. “Washin’ floors can be firsty work for a woman, so best I get a cuppa before I start.”

 

“Yes, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith replies, lighting the gas ring underneath the bright copper kettle and walking over to the pine dresser to fetch two Delftware cups, saucers a milk jug and the sugar bowl.

 

Mrs. Boothby groans as she bends her wiry body to the floor to check what she calls her ‘Boothby boxes’, which are two boxes kept in the corner of the kitchen next to the dresser. One contains her scrubbing brushes, dustpan, and polishing rags, whilst the other contains a plethora of cleaning products.

 

“Ah,” the old Cockney woman mutters as she delves through the latter, metal cans clunking against one another as she does her inventory. “Pop Vim on the shopping list, will you Edith love. This can’s all but empty nah.” She continues fossicking. “Oh, and we need some more floor polish too.”

 

“Do you like that Kleen-eze Mr. Willison sent me last time, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks as she lays out the tea things on the deal kitchen table above the char’s head.

 

“It weren’t bad stuff, that. Yeah, ta. Get ‘him to get us some more of it if ‘e can.” The old woman affirms.

 

“I’ll see if Frank can get me some,” Edith says blithely, yet as soon as the words are out of her mouth, she realises her mistake as a frisson of energy electrifies the kitchen.

 

Edith likes Mrs. Boothby, but she knows that any news will soon be spread around Poplar and the surrounding area once Mrs. Boothby hears it. She and the other charwomen she knows run a very well informed gossip chain, and there is little Mrs. Boothby can’t tell Edith about the comings and goings on in the household of her former employer Mrs. Plaistow, thanks to her charwoman friend Jackie who does work for her and quite a few other houses in Pimlico, including that of Lettice’s former client, successful Islington Studios*** actress, Wanetta Ward. Edith, who is a little starstruck by the glamourous American, often gets tasty titbits of gossip about her from Mrs. Boothby thanks to Jackie who also cleans for her, however Edith does not fancy the shoe being on the other foot. However, as she turns back from fussing unnecessarily over the kettle, she sees it is too late. Mrs. Boothby’s pale and wrinkled face, framed by her wiry grey hair tied up in a brightly coloured scarf is paying close attention to the young maid. Her dark eyes are gleaming with delight, and she smiles like the cat who ate the cream.

 

“Oh!” she says with one of her bushy eyebrows arching upwards. “Frank now, is it?”

 

“Well I…” Edith stutters, her own pale cheeks growing warm as a blush fills them with colour.

 

“Yes my girl?” Mrs, Boothby asks, as with another groan she resumes her upright state. “And just when did Mr. Willison’s young delivery boy go from bein’ Mr. Leadbeater or bein’ Frank? Last I ‘eard, you weren’t interested in ‘im.”

 

“I didn’t say I wasn’t interested in him, Mrs. Boothby,” Edith worries the blue rimmed edge of a saucer self-consciously. “I’d just never considered him as a prospect, is all. And I hadn’t Mrs. Boothby. Not until,”

 

“Yes,”

 

“Well, not until you’d mentioned it, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Aha!” the old cockney woman crows. “Ada Boothby does it again!”

 

“Does what, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks.

 

“Matchmakes, of course.” She smiles broadly, a glow of pride emanating from her slender figure in her grey dress and brightly printed cotton pinny. She rubs her careworn hands together with glee. “Oh I can’t wait to tell that damned Golda Friedmann dahn the end of my rookery****. She’ll be fit to be tied.”

 

“Wait!” Edith gasps, not understanding. “Who’s Golda Friedmann, and how she know about Frank and I? I don’t know her. She doesn’t work in the haberdashers in Poplar you sent me to.”

 

“Oh Lawd love you,” chortles Mrs. Boothby, the action resulting on one of her fruity hacking coughs that seem remarkably loud from such a diminutive figure. After catching her breath, she continues breathily, “She don’t know anyfink about you an’ your Frank.” She gulps again. “Nah! She’s the local matchmaker round our way, along with a few other Yids***** in Poplar. Goes around wiv ‘er nose in the air wrapped up in a fancy paisley shawl tellin’ folk she’s the one to match their son or daughter, like she was the Queen of Russia ‘erself.”

 

“Well she didn’t match me with Frank.” Edith says defensively.

 

“I know, Edith love.” Mrs. Boothby assures her with a calming wave of her hands.

 

“And nor did you, Mrs. Boothby,” Edith continues. “So I don’t see why you should feel so proud of yourself.”

 

“But you just said that if it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t of considered ‘im!”

 

“Well,” Edith takes the kettle off the stove and pours hot water into the white teapot. “That’s true, but I’m the one that mentioned what you’d said to me about he and I on the night of Miss Lettice’s supper party for Mr. Channon and Miss de Virre.” She puts the lid on the pot with a clunk. “Err, I mean Mrs. Channon.”

 

Mrs. Boothby drags up a chair to the deal kitchen table and takes a seat, never taking her eyes off Edith’s face. “So ahh, when did you and Mr. Leadbeater, or should I say Frank, start, walkin’ out togevva?” She walks her index and middle finger across the clean table in front of her, as if to demonstrate her meaning.

 

“Only a few weeks now.” Edith admits with downcast eyes and a shy smile.

 

“A few weeks?” Mrs. Boothby gasps in outrage. “And you didn’t think to tell me?”

 

“I guess it just slipped my mind, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith defends herself, setting out the tea cups in the saucers, pushing one across to the charwoman. “What with one thing an another. Besides,” she adds. “I didn’t want to tell you unless I was sure. I wouldn’t want to go disappointing you if it all came to aught.”

 

“But nah fings is workin’ out for the two of you then?” Mrs. Boothby asks as she accepts the cup and saucer and reaches for the milk jug, slopping a good glug into the bottom of her empty cup******.

 

“We seem to have struck a nice rhythm, and Frank and I have a lot in common.”

 

“Oh that’s lovely to ‘ear, dearie.” the old woman watches as Edith pours tea into her cup. “I told you, youse was pretty, didn’t I?” She takes hold of the sugar bowl and greedily spoons in several heaped teaspoons of fine white sugar into her tea before stirring it loudly. “And you never knew ‘till I told you. So where’ve you been goin’? The ‘Ammersmith Palais*******?”

 

“Yes, we’ve been there a few times, along with my friend Hilda.”

 

“She’s the parlour maid from your Mrs. Plaistow’s isn’t she?” Mrs. Boothby asks, before adding unnecessarily, “The plain one.”

 

“Oh I wouldn’t call her plain, Mrs. Boothby!” Edith defends her friend hotly as she pours tea into her own empty cup, before then adding a dash of milk. “That’s most uncharitable.”

 

“I didn’t say that, Jackie told me when I mentioned to ‘er that you was still friends wiv ‘er from when you worked there togevva.”

 

“Oh yes, I remember Jackie,” Edith picks up her cup and sips her tea. “Always with an ear out for gossip.”

 

“We chars ‘ave to take our pleasures where we can get ‘em, dearie.” Mrs. Boothby says with a slightly haughty tone as she slurps her own tea loudly. “Bein’ a char is ‘ard graft day in, day out. And you can ‘ardly take the moral ‘ighground, what wiv you askin’ me about the goings on at Miss Ward’s, nah can you?”

 

Edith, suitably chastened, remains silent, her lack of response serving as an affirmation of the old Cockney’s statement.

 

“Anyway, I might never ‘ave met your ‘Ilda, but I bet she’s not a patch on you deary, what wiv your peaches n’ cream complexion and beautiful hair. What you got natural from God, so many women I know get from lotions and potions. Nah wonder Frank was nervous ‘bout askin’ you to step out wiv ‘im. Youse a real catch Edith love.”

 

“I never said he was nervous, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith giggles.

 

“But ‘e were, weren’t ‘e?” The old woman chuckles knowingly as she cradles her warm cup in both her hands. “All little boys what fink they’re big men, get nervous round a pretty girl.”

 

“Well,” Edith admits. “Maybe just a little.” Then she adds, “But I was nervous too.”

 

“Well, that’s nice, dearie. Youse just enjoy bein’ young an’ ‘appy togevva.” The old woman gazes into the distance, a far away look sodtening the sharpness of her gaze and the squareness of her jaw as her mouth hangs open slightly. She stays that way for a moment or two before she regains her steely composure and sharp look. Turning back to Edith she says, “Nah, ‘ow does this sound, Edith love? Mrs. Ada Boothby, Matchmaker and ‘Igh Class Char? That would shove it right up that uppity Golda Friedmann and ‘er matchmaker friends!”

 

“Oh Mrs. Boothy!” Edith giggles.

 

*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.

 

**Rosie-Lee is Cockney slang for tea, and it is one of the most well-known of all Cockney rhyming slang.

 

***Islington Studios, often known as Gainsborough Studios, were a British film studio located on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in Shoreditch, London which began operation in 1919. By 1920 they had a two stage studio. It is here that Alfred Hitchcock made his entrée into films.

 

****A rookery is a dense collection of housing, especially in a slum area. The rookeries created in Victorian times in London’s East End were notorious for their cheapness, filth and for being overcrowded.

 

*****The word Yid is a Jewish ethnonym of Yiddish origin. It is used as an autonym within the Ashkenazi Jewish community, and also used as slang. When pronounced in such a way that it rhymes with did by non-Jews, it is commonly intended as a pejorative term. It is used as a derogatory epithet, and as an alternative to, the English word 'Jew'. It is uncertain when the word began to be used in a pejorative sense by non-Jews, but some believe it started in the late Nineteenth or early Twentieth Century when there was a large population of Jews and Yiddish speakers concentrated in East London, gaining popularity in the 1930s when Oswald Mosley developed a strong following in the East End of London.

 

******In the class-conscious society of Britain in the 1920s, whether you added milk to your cup of tea first or the tea was a subtle way of defining what class you came from. Upper-class people, or those who wished to ape their social betters added milk after the tea, whereas middle-class or working class people comfortable in their own skins were known to add milk before the tea.

 

*******The Hammersmith Palais de Danse, in its last years simply named Hammersmith Palais, was a dance hall and entertainment venue in Hammersmith, London, England that operated from 1919 until 2007. It was the first palais de danse to be built in Britain.

 

This busy domestic kitchen scene is a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

In front of Mrs. Boothby’s box is a can of Vim with stylised Art Deco packaging and some Kleeneze floor polish. Vim was a common cleaning agent, used in any Edwardian household. Vim scouring powder was created by William Hesketh Lever (1st Viscount Leverhulme) and introduced to the market in 1904. It was produced at Port Sunlight in Wirrel, Merseyside, a model village built by Lever Brothers for the workers of their factories which produced the popular soap brands Lux, Lifebuoy and Sunlight. Kleeneze is a homeware company started in Hanham, Bristol. The company's founder, Harry Crook, had emigrated to the United States with his family several years earlier, and whilst there joined Fuller Brush as a sales representative. He returned to Bristol several years later, and started a business making brushes and floor polish which were sold door-to-door by salesmen. Technically Kleeneze didn’t start until 1923, which is one years after this story is set. I couldn’t resist including it, as I doubt I will ever be able to photograph it as a main part of any other tableaux. Thus, I hope you will forgive me for this indulgence.

  

In the box are two containers of Zebo grate polish, a bottle of Bluebell Metal Polish and a can of Brasso. Zebo (or originally Zebra) Grate Polish was a substance launched in 1890 by Reckitts to polish the grate to a gleam using a mixture that consisted of pure black graphite finely ground, carbon black, a binding agent and a solvent to keep it fluid for application with a cloth or more commonly newspaper. Brasso Metal Polish is a British all-purpose metal cleaning product introduced to market in 1905 by Reckitt and Sons, who also produced Silvo, which was used specifically for cleaning silver, silver plate and EPNS. Bluebell metal cleaning products were a household name in the 1920s and 1930s after the business was incorporated in 1900.

 

The tin buckets, wooden apple box, basket, mop, brush and pan are all artisan made miniatures that I have acquired in more recent years.

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 the very modern and up-to-date 1920s kitchen of Lettice’s flat: Edith her maid’s preserve. Two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things are getting married: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and Margot de Virre, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre. Lettice is hosting an exclusive buffet supper party in their honour at the end of the week, which is turning out to be one of the events of the 1921 London Season. Over the last few days, the flat has been in upheaval as Edith and Lettice’s charwoman* Mrs. Boothby have begun cleaning the flat thoroughly in preparation for the occasion. Things have been so tumultuous that Lettice has decamped and fled to Margot’s parents’ house in Hans Crescent in nearby Belgravia. This leaves Edith with a little more time to do the chores that need doing in the led up to the party, without having to worry about Lettice’s needs.

 

Whilst Edith awaits the arrival of Mrs. Boothby, she takes advantage of the beautiful morning and gathers pieces of silverware from around the flat and sets them up on her green baize cloth in the middle of the kitchen table where a pool of beautiful sunlight pours through the kitchen window. She takes out her tin of Silvo silver polish paste and her cleaning rags and sets about polishing each piece. Taking up one of the tall, elegant candlesticks that sit on either end of the console in the dining room Edith applies the paste with a small brush and then proceeds to wipe it with her cloth, burnishing away any sign of golden tarnish until the piece gleams in her hands. She sighs with satisfaction as she sets it aside where it winks and shines in the sunlight.

 

“A job worth doing is a job well done.” she says quietly as she grasps the next candlestick.

 

Edith is grateful that unlike her previous positions, she does not have to scrub the black and quite chequered kitchen linoleum, nor polish the parquetry floors, not do her most hated job, black lead the stovetop, as Mrs. Boothby does them all without complaint, with reliability and to a very high standard. However, unlike the butler of the townhouse in Pimlico where she held her last position, Edith doesn’t mind polishing silver. She finds it more gratification in seeing the silver pieces shine, whereas for her a floor is just that – a floor. The items she polishes have elegant lines like the Georgian water jug and the Edwardian sugar castor, and in some cases, like the avant-garde Art Deco decanter and goblet set, are artisan pieces purchased by her mistress from the Portland Gallery in Soho. Putting aside the second candlestick, Edith reaches out and picks up one of the goblets from the drinks set. They each have several bands around the cup and have a sturdy weight to them. Applying Silvo paste she starts to hum ‘Look for the Silver Lining’**.

 

“Morning dearie!” Mrs. Boothby calls cheerily as she comes through the servants’ entrance door into the kitchen, a fruity cough that comes from deep within her wiry little body and her footfall in her low heeled shoes announcing her presence just as clearly as her greeting. “Oooh. Someone’s cheery today. Meetin’ a sweetheart this afternoon, are we?”

 

“Good morning Mrs. Boothby,” Edith replies without getting up from her Windsor chair. “No, I’m not meeting anyone this afternoon. I just happen to enjoy cleaning the silver.”

 

The older cockney woman shirks off her long dark blue coat and hangs it on the hook she has claimed as her own by the door. “You what?” Her eyes bulge from her wrinkled face as her mouth falls open in surprise.

 

“I enjoy cleaning silver.” Edith reiterates, holding out the half polished goblet. “See how nicely it burnishes up.”

 

Mrs. Boothby recoils from the proffered goblet with a disdainful look as she turns and hangs her pre-war blue toque up on the hook too. “Nah, just let me rest me weary bones for a few minutes before I start, Edith love!”

 

“There’s tea in the pot by the stove, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith indicates with a movement of her head to the stove behind her. “I’ve only just finished my own so it’s still warm and not too steeped.”

 

“Aah, nah that’s the ticket!” Mrs. Boothby drops her beaded bag on the table with a thud before bustling over to the dresser where she withdraws a Delftware teacup and saucer. “I’m parched after me trip up from Poplar this mornin’! Tottenham Court Road was a sewer of traffic! I swear I’m gonna get ‘it by a crazy cabby or lorry driver one a these days! Now, I’ll just sit ‘ere and ‘ave a reviving cup of Rosie-Lee*** and a fag before I get started.”

 

“What are you going to do this morning?”

 

“Give Miss Lettice’s barfroom a good scrub ‘n polish.” She pours tea into her cup and then walks over to the food safe where she takes out a pint of milk and adds it to her tea. “’Er makeup don’t half leave marks. Lawd knows ‘ow she gets that muck off ‘er face.” She shakes her head in disbelief.

 

“Snowfire Cold Cream.” Edith replies matter-of-factly as she puts aside the gleaming goblet and sets to task on an ornate Georgian lidded serving dish which has been borrowed from Glynes**** silver selection for the soirée.

 

“You know, in my day, a lady what painted ‘er face was, well, a you-know-what.” The old Cockney charwoman’s eyebrows arch over her eyes, wrinkling her forehead more as she gives Edith a knowing look.

 

“Yes, well, this is the 1920s, and some ladies paint their faces now.” Edith starts applying Silvo paste to the crimped edge of the serving dish’ lid. “It’s quite fashionable these days you know.”

 

“Don’t I evva!” Mrs. Boothby utters another barking cough. “It’s indecent the way some girls dress an’ paint their faces nowadays. Not that Miss Lettice is one of ‘em girls. She’s got a bit of class what does our Miss Lettice,” She pauses. “But only just.”

 

“My poor Mum would be horrified if I came home on my day off wearing makeup.” Edith remarks. “She might even take to scrubbing my face rather than the linens she has to wash.”

 

Both women chuckle lightly at the thought as they exchange smiles.

 

“Nah, you don’t need no makeup Edith, love! Youse pretty as a picture, you are, wiv your peaches ’n cream complexion. Youse a right English rose!”

 

“That’s very kind of you to say so, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith blushes awkwardly at the compliment from the old woman and busies herself even harder with burnishing the lid on the green baize before her.

 

Mrs. Boothby starts fossicking through her capacious beaded bag before withdrawing her cigarette papers, Swan Vestas and tin of Player’s Navy Cut. Rolling herself a cigarette she reaches over to the deal dresser and grabs a small black ashtray. Lighting her cigarette with a satisfied sigh and one more of her fruity coughs, she wanders over to the open window with her cup of tea in one hand, the ashtray in the other, and her cigarette between her teeth. She deposits the ashtray and her cup and saucer on the wide window ledge.

 

“You must be the only maid in London, what likes cleanin’ silver, dearie.” she observes as she blows a plume of blueish white smoke out of the window. “How can you get pleasure from cleanin’ somethin’ that’s just gonna get tarnished again?”

 

“Well, don’t you take pleasure from seeing the drawing room floor beautifully waxed, or the bathroom clean?”

 

The wry laugh that erupts from Mrs. Boothby’s ends up morphing into more barking, fruity coughs. “Good lawd, no!” She wipes her mouth with a cleanly laundered handkerchief from her pocket. “It’s the same! No sooner are them floors polished, than some la-di-dah toff comes along wiv their dirty boots traipsing muddy prints all over ‘em.” She shakes her head. “Nah! What I take pleasure from, is the thought of the bunse I get skivvying, and what I’m gonna do wiv that bunse.”

 

“Bunse, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Money, Edith love. Money!”

 

“Oh.”

 

“Yeah, it’s the bunse wot get me frough cleanin’, scrubbin’ and skivvying all day, ev’ry day. Do you fink any of the toffs at this party is gonna look at the candlesticks you just polished and fink of the elbow grease you put into makin’ ‘em shine? No!”

 

“Oh I know, Mrs. Boothby. I don’t expect them to.” Edith replies. “But I’ll know. I want to do my job to the best of my ability. Mum always taught me, and Dad too, that any job doing, is worth doing right. If Miss Lettice or any of her friends notice the nicely polished silver, even if I never hear about it, that is an added bonus.”

 

Mrs. Boothby shakes her head in mild disbelief. “Youse too good for any of ‘em, dearie.”

 

“It’s funny you should say that, Mrs. Boothby. It’s what I keep telling Mum about old Widow Hounslow. I told her just the other week that she was too good for her when she told me that she was monogramming the nasty old so-and-so’s pillowcases.”

 

“Like mum, like daughter, then.” the older Cockney woman observes with a long and noisy slurp of tea.

 

“I suppose,” Edith smiles shyly.

 

“’Ere! Thinkin’ of your mum.” Mrs. Boothby points her smoking cigarette end at Edith. “Did she like the teapot you bought ‘er dahwn the Caledonian Markets**** then?”

 

“Oh yes!” Edith deposits the nicely polished ornamental lid onto the green baize. “Of course, she did exactly what I told you she would do.”

 

“Keepin’ it for good?”

 

“She says she’ll use it on Christmas Day when my brother Bert and I are home.”

 

“Well, Christmas Day is as good a day to use it as any, ‘specially if you and your bruvver is comin’ ‘ome. Better use it once a year, than not at all. Eh?”

 

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

 

“Course I’m right.” Mrs. Boothby remarks with a satisfied smile, before taking another loud slurp of tea from her cup.

 

The two women remain in comfortable silence for a little while, each lost in their own thoughts, whilst outside the quiet kitchen, the constant burble of distant London traffic coming Mortimer and Regent Streets and the occasional twitter of a bird carries across the rooftops of Mayfair.

 

“Well, this ain’t gonna get the barfroom done, nah is it?” the old Cockney char remarks at length with a resigned sigh. She stubs out the butt of her cigarette in the ashtray where it is extinguished with a hiss and a final long curl of blueish white smoke. Downing the last of her tea, she thrusts herself forward forcefully, causing another of her rasping coughs to burst forth from within her diminutive frame.

 

“Just leave your cup and saucer in the sink, Mrs. Boothby, and I’ll wash it when I’ve finished polishing.” Edith remarks as she picks up a silver spoon to burnish.

 

“Alight dearie.” she replies. “Ta!”

 

Depositing the cup and saucer as instructed, the char reaches down below the sink to fetch her box of cleaning agents.

 

“When you’ve finished the bathroom, let me know, Mrs. Boothby,” Edith adds. “And we’ll borrow the caretaker’s ladder so we can dust and polish the crystal on the chandeliers in the drawing room and dining room.”

 

“Right-oh, dearie.” she replies.

 

As Mrs. Boothby is about to walk through the green baize door that leads from the kitchen into the dining room of the flat, Edith pipes up, “I do think of the wages I earn too, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“I should ‘ope so, dearie!” she replies with a smile. “I’s glad to ‘ear it though.”

 

“And why is that?” Edith deposits the spoon and picks up another to apply Silvo paste to.

 

“Cos, for a minute there I fought I was workin’ wiv a bloomin' saint!” Her smile changes, betraying her cheeky nature as her eyes light up. “Gawn!”

 

After the old woman has disappeared through the door with her cleaning box, Edith smiles and starts humming ‘Look for the Silver Lining’ again as she picks up another goblet to polish.

 

*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.

 

**’Look for the Silver Lining’ was a popular 1919 song written by Jerome Kern, popularised by singer Marion Harris in 1921.

 

***Rosie-Lee is Cockney slang for tea, and it is one of the most well-known of all Cockney rhyming slang.

 

****Glynes is the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds in Wiltshire, the childhood home of Lettice and the current home of Lettice’s parents, the presiding Viscount and Countess of Wrexham and the heir, their eldest son Leslie.

 

***** The original Caledonian Market, renown for antiques, buried treasure and junk, was situated in in a wide cobblestoned area just off the Caledonian Road in Islington in 1921 when this story is set. Opened in 1855 by Prince Albert, and originally called the Metropolitan Meat Markets, it was supplementary to the Smithfield Meat Market. Arranged in a rectangle, the market was dominated by a forty six metre central clock tower. By the early Twentieth Century, with the diminishing trade in live animals, a bric-a-brac market developed and flourished there until after the Second World War when it moved to Bermondsey, south of the Thames, where it flourishes today. The Islington site was developed in 1967 into the Market Estate and an open green space called Caledonian Park. All that remains of the original Caledonian Markets is the wonderful Victorian clock tower.

 

This selection of silver for Edith to polish is a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

All of Edith’s silver to clean are 1:12 artisan miniatures. The pair of candelabra at the end of Edith’s deal table are sterling silver artisan miniatures from Karen Ladybug Miniatures in England. The silver drinks set and tray 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. The sugar castor of sterling silver is one and a half centimetres in height and half a centimetre in diameter. It has holes in its finial actually and actually comes apart like its life size equivalent. The finial unscrews from the body so it can be filled. I am told that icing sugar can pass through the holes in the finial, but I have chosen not to try this party trick myself. A sugar castor was used in Edwardian times to shake sugar onto fruits and desserts. Georgian water jug, the salt and pepper in the foreground and the two Georgian lidded serving dishes were made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.

 

The green baize cloth on the table is actually part of a green baize cleaning cloth from my linen cupboard, and Edith’s sliver cleaning rag is cut from one of my own old Goddard silver cleaning cloths. The Silvo Silver Polish tub was made by me, and the label is an Edwardian design. Silvo was a British silver cleaning product introduced to market in 1905 by Reckitt and Sons, who also produced Brasso. Silvo has a Royal Warrant.

 

Edith’s Windsor chair is a hand-turned 1:12 artisan miniature which came from America. Unfortunately, the artist did not carve their name under the seat, but it is definitely an unmarked artisan piece.

 

On the left hand draining board of the sink in the background stands a box of Sunlight soap. Produced at Port Sunlight in Wirrel, Merseyside, a model village built by Lever Brothers for the workers of their factories, Sunlight was one of the most popular brands of soap created by Lever Brothers in England. Port Sunlight also produced the popular soap brands Lux, and Lifebuoy. Sunlight Soap was first introduced in 1884.

 

To the left of the sink is the food safe with a mop leaning against it. In the days before refrigeration, or when refrigeration was expensive, perishable foods such as meat, butter, milk and eggs were kept in a food safe. Winter was easier than summer to keep food fresh and butter coolers and shallow bowls of cold water were early ways to keep things like milk and butter cool. A food safe was a wooden cupboard with doors and sides open to the air apart from a covering of fine galvinised wire mesh. This allowed the air to circulate while keeping insects out. There was usually an upper and a lower compartment, normally lined with what was known as American cloth, a fabric with a glazed or varnished wipe-clean surface. Refrigerators, like washing machines were American inventions and were not commonplace in even wealthy upper-class households until well after the Second World War.

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, and whilst we have not travelled that far physically across London, the tough streets, laneways and blind alleys of Poplar in London’s East End is a world away from Lettice’s rarefied and privileged world. On Tuesday Mrs. Boothby, Lettice’s charwoman*, discovered that Edith, Lettice’s maid, didn’t have a sewing machine when the Cockney cleaner found the young maid cutting out the pieces for a new frock. Mrs. Boothby made overtures towards Edith, inviting her to her home in Poplar in London’s East End with an air of mystery, saying she might be able to help her with her predicament of a sewing machine.

 

Friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) in Penzance as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot in her desire to turn ‘Chi an Treth’ from a dark Regency house to a more modern country house flooded with light, has commissioned Lettice to help redecorate some of the rooms in a lighter and more modern style, befitting a modern couple like the Channons. Lettice has decamped to Penzance for a week where she is overseeing the painting and papering of ‘Chi an Treth’s’ drawing room, dining room and main reception room, before fitting it out with a lorryload of new and repurposed furnishings, artwork and objets d’arte that she has had sent down weeks prior to her arrival. In her mistress’ absence, Edith has more free time on her hands, and so she was able to agree to Mrs. Boothby’s mysterious invitation. Even though she is happy with her current arrangement to take any items she wants to sew home to her parent’s house in Harlesden, where she can use her mother’s Singer** sewing machine on her days off. The opportunity of gaining access to a sewing machine of her own is too good for Edith to refuse.

 

Now the two women walk through the narrow streets of Poplar, passing along walkways, some concrete, some made of wooden planks and some just dirt, between tenements of two and three stories high. The streets they traverse are dim with the weakening afternoon light from the autumn sky blocked out by the overhanging upper floors of the buildings and the strings of laundry hanging limply along lines between them. Although Edith is not unfamiliar with the part of Whitechapel around Petticoat Lane*** where she shops for second hand clothes to alter and for haberdashery to do them, she still feels nervous in the unfamiliar maze of streets that Mrs. Boothby is guiding her down, and she sticks closely next to or directly behind the old Cockney char. The air is filled with a mixture of strong odours: paraffin oil, boiled cabbage and fried food intermixed with the pervasive stench of damp and unwashed bodies and clothes. Self-consciously, Edith pulls her three quarter length coat more tightly around her in an effort to protect herself from the stench.

 

“Below!” comes a Cockney female voice from above as a sash window groans in protest as it is opened.

 

“Ere! Look out, Edith dearie!” Mrs. Boothby exclaims, grabbing Edith by the arm and roughly pulling the maid out of the way, thrusting her behind her.

 

A moment later the air is filled with the harsh sound of slops splattering against the concrete path, and a pool of dirty liquid stains the concrete a dark muddy brown as it slowly dribbles down into a shallow drain that runs down the middle of the laneway.

 

“Wouldn’t want your nice clothes to get spoilt nah, would we dearie.” Mrs. Boothby says as she turns and smiles into Edith’s startled face.

 

“Was that?” Edith begins but doesn’t finish her question as she peers at the puddle draining away, leaving lumps on the path.

 

“I shouldn’t look too closely if I were you, dearie.” Mrs. Boothby says kindly in a matter-of-fact way. “If you ‘ave to ask, you’re better off not knowin’. That’s my opinion, anyway. Come on. Not much further nah.”

 

“You… you will take me home, won’t you Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks a little nervously as they continue their progress down the lane which she notices is getting narrower and darker as they go.

 

“Course I will, dearie! You can rely on old Ida Boothby. I know these streets like the back of my ‘and. Youse perfectly safe wiv me.”

 

The laneway ends suddenly, and Edith is blinded for a moment by bright sunlight as they step out into a rookery**** with two storey Victorian tenements of grey stone and red brick either side of a concrete courtyard with a narrow drain running down its centre. The original builders or owners of the tenements obviously have meant for the sad buildings to be at least a little homely, with shutters painted a Brunswick green hanging to either side of the ground floor windows. Looking up, Edith notices several window boxes of brightly coloured geraniums and other flowers suspended from some of the upper floor windowsills. Women of different ages walk in and out of the open front doors, or sit in them on stools doing mending, knitting or peeling potatoes, all chatting to one another, whilst children skip and play on the concrete of the courtyard.

 

“Welcome to Merrybrook Place,” Mrs. Boothby says with a hint of pride in her voice. “My ‘ome. Though Lawd knows why they called it that. I ain’t never seen no brook, merry or otherwise, runnin’ dahn ‘ere, unless it’s the slops from the privvies dahn the end.” She points to the end of the rookery where, overlooked by some older tenements of brick and wooden shingling most likely from the early Nineteenth Century, a couple of ramshackle privies stand. “So just watch your step, Edith dearie. We don’t want you steppin’ your nice shoes in nuffink nasty.” She gives her a warm smile. “Come on.”

 

As they start walking up the rookery, one woman wrapped in a paisley shawl stands in her doorway staring at Edith with undisguised curiosity and perhaps a little jealousy as she casts her critical gaze over her simple, yet smart, black coat and dyed straw hat decorated with silk flowers and feathers.

 

“Wanna paint a picture Mrs. Friedmann?” Mrs. Boothby calls out hotly to her, challenging her open stare with a defensive one of her own. “Might last you longer, your royal ‘ighness!” She makes a mock over exaggerated curtsey towards her, hitching up the hem of her workday skirts.

 

The woman tilts her head up slightly, sniffs in disgust and looks down her nose with spite at both Edith and the Cockney charwoman before muttering something in a language Edith doesn’t need to speak to understand. Turning on her heel, the woman slams her door sharply behind her, the noise echoing off the hard surfaces of the court.

 

“Who was that, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks nervously.

 

“Lawd love you dearie,” chortles Mrs. Boothby, the action resulting on one of her fruity hacking coughs that seem remarkably loud from such a diminutive figure. “That’s that nasty local Yid***** matchmaker what I told you ‘bout.” Raising her voice she continues, speaking loudly at the closed door. “Golda Friedmann goes around wiv ‘er nose in the air wrapped up in that fancy paisley shawl actin’ like she was the Queen of Russia ‘erself. But she ain’t! She’s no better than the rest of us.”

 

As Mrs. Boothby trudges on up the rookery another doorway opens and an old woman with a figure that shows many years of childbirth steps out, dressed in a black skirt and an old fashioned but pretty floral print Edwardian high necked blouse. “Afternoon Ida.”

 

“Oh! Afternoon Lil!” Mrs. Boothby replies. “Oh Lil! I got somefink in ‘ere for you.” She opens up her capacious blue beaded bag and fossicks around making the beads rattle before withdrawing a couple of thin pieces of soap, one bar a bright buttercup yellow, a second pink and the last white. “’Ere. For the kiddies.”

 

“Oh fanks ever so, Ida!” the other woman replies, gratefully accepting the pieces of soap in her careworn hands.

 

“Edith,” Mrs. Boothby calls. “This ‘ere is my neighbour, Mrs. Conway.” A couple of cheeky little faces with sallow cheeks, but bright eyes, poke out from behind Mrs. Conway’s skirts and smile up shyly at Edith with curiosity. “Hullo kiddies.” Mrs. Boothby says to them. “Nah sweeties from me today. Sorry. Mrs. Conway, this ‘ere is Miss Watsford, what works for one of my ladies up in Mayfair.”

 

“Oh ‘ow do you do?” Mrs. Conway says, wiping her hands down her skirts before reaching out a hand to Edith.

 

“How do you do, Mrs. Conway.” Edith replies with a gentle smile, taking her hand, and feeling her rough flesh rub against her own as the old woman’s bony fingers entwine hers.

 

“Well, must be getting on, Lil,” Mrs. Boothby says. “Ta-ta.”

 

“Ta-ra, Ida. Ta-ra Miss Watsford.” Mrs. Conway replies before turning back and shooing the children inside good naturedly.

 

“Goodbye Mrs, Conway. It was nice to meet you.” Edith says.

 

At the next door, one painted Brunswick green like the shutters, Mrs. Boothby stops and takes out a large string of keys from her bag and promptly finds the one for her own front door. As the key engages with the lock the door groans in protest as it slowly opens. The old woman says, “Just stand ‘ere in the doorway, Edith dearie, while I’ll open the curtains.”

 

She disappears into the gloom, which vanishes a moment later as with a flourish, she flings back some heavy red velvet curtains, flooding the room with light from the front window. It takes a moment for Edith’s eyes to adjust as the old Cockney woman stands for a moment in the pool of light, so brilliant after the gloom, surrounded by a floating army of illuminated dust motes tumbling over one another in the air. As her eyes adjust, Edith discerns things within the tenement front room: a kitchen table not too unlike her own at Cavendish Mews, a couple of sturdy ladderback chairs, an old fashioned black leaded stove and a sink in the corner.

 

“Close the door behind you and come on in, dearie. The ‘ouse is still warmish from this mornin’.” Mrs. Boothby says kindly as she tosses her beaded handbag carelessly onto the table where it lands with a thud and the jangle of beads. “Take a seat and I’ll get the range goin’ and pop the kettle on for a nice cup of Rosie-Lee******! I dunno ‘bout you, but I’m parched.”

 

“Yes, thank you, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith replies as she closes the door.

 

Shutting out the unpleasant mixture of odours outside with the closing of the door, Edith is comforted by the smells of carbolic soap and lavender. Looking about she notices a couple of little muslin bags hanging from the curtains.

 

“Good. Nah, give me your ‘at ‘n coat and I’ll ‘ang them up.” Mrs. Boothby says. Noticing Edith’s gaze upon the pouches she explains. “Lavender to ‘elp keep the moths and the smells from the privy at bay.”

 

“Oh.” Edith replies laconically.

 

As Mrs. Boothby hangs up Edith’s coat and hat as well as her own on a hook behind the door and then bustles about stoking up the embers of the fire left in the stove, Edith says, “Mrs. Conway seems like a nice person to have as your neighbour, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“She’s a good un, that one. She takes care of all the little kiddies round ‘n ‘bout while their parents is at work.” Mrs. Boothby throws some coal into the stove and shoves it with a poker. “She’s got an ‘eart of gold she does. I owe ‘er a lot. She does ‘er best by them kiddies. Gives ‘em a meal made outta what she can, which for some might be the only meal they get. And she gives ‘em a good bath too when she can. That’s why I give ‘er the left over soap ends from the ‘ouses I go to.”

 

“Oh I’m sorry Mrs. Boothby. I always take Miss Lettice’s soap ends to Mum to grate up and make soap flakes from for washing.”

 

“Ahh, don’t worry dearie. I gets plenty from some of the other ‘ouses I go to. Some of ‘em even throws out bars of soap what’s been barely used cos they get cracked and they don’t like the look of ‘em no more. Some of them ladies up the West End don’t know just ‘ow lucky they is to ‘ave as many bars of soap as they like. Nah, you keep takin’ Miss Lettice’s ends to your mum. So long as they’s bein’ used, I’m ‘appy. Waste not, want not, I always say.”

 

With nothing to do whilst the older woman goes about filling the large kettle with water from the sink in the corner of the room, Edith has more time to look at her surroundings. The floor is made of wooden boards whilst the walls are covered in a rather dark green wallpaper featuring old fashioned Art Nouveau patterns. The house must one have had owners or tenants with grander pretentions than Mrs. Boothby for the stove is jutting out of a much larger fireplace surround, which although chipped and badly discoloured from years of coal dust, cooking and cigarette smoke, is marble. However, it is the profusion of ornaments around the small room that catches the young girl’s eye. Along the mantle of the original fireplace stand a piece of Staffordshire, a prettily painted cow creamer, a jug in the shape of a duck coming out of an egg and a teapot in the shape of Queen Victoria. Turning around behind her to where Mrs. Boothby gathers a pretty blue and white china teapot, some cups, saucers and a sugar bowl, she sees a large dresser that is cluttered with more decorative plates, teapots, jugs, tins and a cheese dish in the shape of a cottage.

 

“Not what you was expectin’ I’ll warrant.” Mrs, Boothby remarks with a knowing chuckle that causes her to emit yet another of her throaty coughs.

 

“Oh no Mrs. Boothby!” Edith replies, blushing with shame at being caught out staring about her so shamelessly. “I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I mean… I had no expectations.”

 

“Well, it’s nuffink special, but this is my ‘aven of calm and cleanliness away from the dirty world out there.” She points through the window where, when Edith turns her head, she can see several scrawny children playing marbles on the concrete of the courtyard. “And it’s ‘ome to me.”

 

“Oh yes, it’s lovely and clean and cheerful, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith assures her hostess. “No, I was just admiring all your pretty crockery. It reminds me of my Mum’s kitchen, actually. She is always collecting pretty china and pottery.”

 

“Well, who was it what told you to go dahn to the Caledonian Markets******* to buy a gift for your mum?” the old woman says with a cheeky wink. “Me that who!” She pokes her chest proudly, before coughing heavily again.

 

“So did you get all these from the Caledonian Markets then, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks, looking around again.

 

“Well, most, but not all. I got meself an art gallery from the Caledonian Markets, for when I washes the dishes.” She points to two cheap prints of classic paintings in equally cheap wooden frames hanging on the walls above the little sink. “Better than starin’ at a blank wall, even if it’s covered in wallpaper. Course, some a them ladies up the West End is awfully wasteful wiv much more than soap, and just like them soap ends, I get my share. Somethin’ a bit old fashioned or got a tiny chip in it and they’s throwin’ it out like it was a piece of rubbish, so I offer ta take it. Take that nice cow up there,” She points to the cow creamer on the mantle. “The lid got lost somewhere, so the lady from Belgravia what owned it told ‘er maid to throw it out, so I said I’d take it instead. That,” She points to the Staffordshire statue. “Was one of a pair, what the uvver ‘alf got broken, so it was being chucked, so I took it. I don’t care if it don’t ‘ave the uvver ‘alf. I like it as it is. It’s pretty. The Queen Victoria teapot was getting’ chucked out just ‘cos the old Queen died, and King Bertie was takin’ ‘er place. Well, I wasn’t ‘avin’ none of that. Poor old Queen! I said I’d ‘ave it if no-one else wanted it. And this teapot,” She withdraws the pretty blue and white china teapot from atop the stove. “This was just bein’ thrown out ‘cos it’s old and they’s no bits of the set left but this. But there ain’t nuffink wrong wiv it, and it must be at least a ‘undred years old!”

 

Mrs. Boothby pulls out a gilt edged blue and white cake plate which she puts on the table along with the tea cups, sugar bowl and milk jug. She then goes to the dresser and pulls down a pretty tin decorated with Art Nouveau ladies from which she takes several pieces of shortbread, which she places on the cake plate.

 

“That’s very lovely, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith points to a teapot in the shape of a rabbit sitting in a watering can. “It looks rather like Peter Rabbit.”

 

“Ahh… my Ken loves that too.” Edith’s ears prick at the mention of someone named Ken, but she doesn’t have time to ask who he is before Mrs. Boothby continues, “That bunny rabbit teapot is one of the few pieces I got what ‘as a sad story what goes wiv it. Poor lady what I cleaned for up in St. James’, it were ‘er baby’s, from the nursery, you know?” Edith nods in understanding. “Well, ‘e died. ‘E was a weak little mite ‘e were, ever since ‘e was born, and my poor lady was so upset when ‘e died that she got rid of everyfink in the nursery. She didn’t want nuffink to remind her of that little baby. So, I brought it ‘ome wiv me.” She sighs. “Well, the kettle’s boiled now, so ‘ow about a cup of Rosie-Lee, dearie?”

 

A short while later, Edith and Mrs. Boothby are seated around Mrs. Boothby’s kitchen table with the elegant Regency teapot, some blue and white china cups and the plate of shortbreads before them.

 

“Oh I tell you Edith dearie, I’m dying for a fag!” Mrs Boothby says. She starts fossicking through her capacious beaded bag before withdrawing her cigarette papers, Swan Vestas and tin of Player’s Navy Cut. Rolling herself a cigarette she lights it with a satisfied sigh and one more of her fruity coughs, dropping the match into a black ashtray that sits on the table full of cigarette butts. Mrs. Boothby settles back happily in her ladderback chair with her cigarette in one hand and reaches out, taking up a shortbread biscuit with the other. Blowing out a plume of blue smoke that tumbles through the air around them, the old woman continues. “Nah, about this sewin’ machine. My Ken’ll be ‘ome soon, I ‘ope. ‘E’s a bit late today.”

 

“Mrs. Boothby, who is Ken?” Edith asks with a questioning look on her face.

 

Just as Mrs. Boothby is about to answer her, she gasps as she hears a rather loud and jolly whistle.

 

“Well, speak of the devil, ‘ere ‘e comes nah!”

 

The front door of the tenement flies open and the space is instantly filled by the bulk of a big man in a flat cap with a large parcel wrapped in newspaper tied with twine under his right arm.

 

*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.

 

**The Singer Corporation is an American manufacturer of consumer sewing machines, first established as I. M. Singer & Co. in 1851 by Isaac M. Singer with New York lawyer Edward C. Clark. Best known for its sewing machines, it was renamed Singer Manufacturing Company in 1865, then the Singer Company in 1963. In 1867, the Singer Company decided that the demand for their sewing machines in the United Kingdom was sufficiently high to open a local factory in Glasgow on John Street. The Vice President of Singer, George Ross McKenzie selected Glasgow because of its iron making industries, cheap labour, and shipping capabilities. Demand for sewing machines outstripped production at the new plant and by 1873, a new larger factory was completed on James Street, Bridgeton. By that point, Singer employed over two thousand people in Scotland, but they still could not produce enough machines. In 1882 the company purchased forty-six acres of farmland in Clydebank and built an even bigger factory. With nearly a million square feet of space and almost seven thousand employees, it was possible to produce on average 13,000 machines a week, making it the largest sewing machine factory in the world. The Clydebank factory was so productive that in 1905, the U.S. Singer Company set up and registered the Singer Manufacturing Company Ltd. in the United Kingdom.

 

***Petticoat Lane Market is a fashion and clothing market in Spitalfields, London. It consists of two adjacent street markets. Wentworth Street Market and Middlesex Street Market. Originally populated by Huguenots fleeing persecution in France, Spitalfields became a center for weaving, embroidery and dying. From 1882, a wave of Jewish immigrants fleeing persecution in eastern Europe settled in the area and Spitalfields then became the true heart of the clothing manufacturing district of London. 'The Lane' was always renowned for the 'patter' and showmanship of the market traders. It was also known for being a haven for the unsavoury characters of London’s underworld and was rife with prostitutes during the late Victorian era. Unpopular with the authorities, as it was largely unregulated and in some sense illegal, as recently as the 1930s, police cars and fire engines were driven down ‘The Lane’, with alarm bells ringing, to disrupt the market.

 

****A rookery is a dense collection of housing, especially in a slum area. The rookeries created in Victorian times in London’s East End were notorious for their cheapness, filth and for being overcrowded.

 

*****The word Yid is a Jewish ethnonym of Yiddish origin. It is used as an autonym within the Ashkenazi Jewish community, and also used as slang. When pronounced in such a way that it rhymes with did by non-Jews, it is commonly intended as a pejorative term. It is used as a derogatory epithet, and as an alternative to, the English word 'Jew'. It is uncertain when the word began to be used in a pejorative sense by non-Jews, but some believe it started in the late Nineteenth or early Twentieth Century when there was a large population of Jews and Yiddish speakers concentrated in East London, gaining popularity in the 1930s when Oswald Mosley developed a strong following in the East End of London.

 

******Rosie-Lee is Cockney slang for tea, and it is one of the most well-known of all Cockney rhyming slang.

 

*******The original Caledonian Market, renown for antiques, buried treasure and junk, was situated in in a wide cobblestoned area just off the Caledonian Road in Islington in 1921 when this story is set. Opened in 1855 by Prince Albert, and originally called the Metropolitan Meat Markets, it was supplementary to the Smithfield Meat Market. Arranged in a rectangle, the market was dominated by a forty six metre central clock tower. By the early Twentieth Century, with the diminishing trade in live animals, a bric-a-brac market developed and flourished there until after the Second World War when it moved to Bermondsey, south of the Thames, where it flourishes today. The Islington site was developed in 1967 into the Market Estate and an open green space called Caledonian Park. All that remains of the original Caledonian Markets is the wonderful Victorian clock tower.

 

I would just like to point out that I wrote this story some weeks ago, long before The Queen became ill and well before her passing. However it seems apt that this story of all, which I planned weeks ago to upload today as part of the Chetwyn Mews narrative, mentions the passing of The Queen (albeit Queen Victoria). I wish to dedicate this image and chapter to our own Queen of past and glorious times Queen Elizabeth II (1926 – 2022). Long did she reign over us, happy and glorious. God bless The Queen.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful domestic scene is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection. Some pieces come from my own childhood. Other items I acquired as an adult through specialist online dealers and artists who specialise in 1:12 miniatures.

 

Mrs. Boothby’s beloved collection of ornaments come from various different sources. The Staffordshire cow (one of a pair) and the cow creamer that stand on the mantlepiece have been hand made and painted by Welsh miniature ceramist Rachel Williams who has her own studio, V&R Miniatures, in Powys. If you look closely, you will see that the Staffordshire cow actually has a smile on its face! Although you can’t notice it in the photo, the cow creamer has its own removable lid which is minute in size! The duck coming from the egg jug on the mantle, the rooster jug, the cottage ware butter dish, Peter Rabbit in the watering can tea pot and the cottage ware teapot to its right on the dresser were all made by French ceramicist and miniature artisan Valerie Casson. All the pieces are authentic replicas of real pieces made by different china companies. For example, the cottage ware teapot has been decorated authentically and matches in perfect detail its life-size Price Washington ‘Ye Olde Cottage Teapot’ counterparts. The top part of the thatched roof and central chimney form the lid, just like the real thing. Valerie Casson is renown for her meticulously crafted and painted miniature ceramics. The Queen Victoria teapot on the mantlepiece and the teapot on the dresser to the left of the Peter Rabbit teapot come from Mick and Marie’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom. All the other plates on the dresser came from various online miniature stockists through E-Bay, as do the teapot, plate and cups on Mrs. Boothby’s kitchen table.

 

Mrs. Boothby’s picture gallery in the corner of the room come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

Mrs. Boothby’s beaded handbag on the table is also a 1:12 artisan miniature. Hand crocheted, it is interwoven with antique blue glass beads that are two millimetres in diameter. The beads of the handle are three millimetres in length. It came from Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

Spilling from her bag are her Player’s Navy Cut cigarette tin and Swan Vesta matches, which are 1:12 miniatures hand made by Jonesy’s Miniatures in England. The black ashtray is also an artisan piece, the bae of which is filled with “ash”. The tray as well as having grey ash in it, also has a 1:12 cigarette which rests on its lip (it is affixed there). Made by Nottingham based tobacconist manufacturer John Player and Sons, Player’s Medium Navy Cut was the most popular by far of the three Navy Cut brands (there was also Mild and Gold Leaf, mild being today’s rich flavour). Two thirds of all the cigarettes sold in Britain were Player’s and two thirds of these were branded as Player’s Medium Navy Cut. In January 1937, Player’s sold nearly 3.5 million cigarettes (which included 1.34 million in London). Production continued to grow until at its peak in the late 1950s, Player’s was employing 11,000 workers (compared to 5,000 in 1926) and producing 15 brands of pipe tobacco and 11 brands of cigarettes. Nowadays the brands “Player” and “John Player Special” are owned and commercialised by Imperial Brands (formerly the Imperial Tobacco Company). Swan Vestas is a brand name for a popular brand of ‘strike-anywhere’ matches. Shorter than normal pocket matches they are particularly popular with smokers and have long used the tagline ‘the smoker’s match’ although this has been replaced by the prefix ‘the original’ on the current packaging. Swan Vestas matches are manufactured under the House of Swan brand, which is also responsible for making other smoking accessories such as cigarette papers, flints and filter tips. The matches are manufactured by Swedish Match in Sweden using local, sustainably grown aspen. The Swan brand began in 1883 when the Collard & Kendall match company in Bootle on Merseyside near Liverpool introduced ‘Swan wax matches’. These were superseded by later versions including ‘Swan White Pine Vestas’ from the Diamond Match Company. These were formed of a wooden splint soaked in wax. They were finally christened ‘Swan Vestas’ in 1906 when Diamond merged with Bryant and May and the company enthusiastically promoted the Swan brand. By the 1930s ‘Swan Vestas’ had become ‘Britain’s best-selling match’.

 

The meagre foodstuffs on Mrs. Boothby’s shelf represent items not unusually found in poorer households across Britain. Before the Second World War, the British populace consumed far more sugar than we do today, partially for the poor because it was cheap and helped give people energy when their diets were lacking good nutritious foods. Therefore finding a tin of treacle, some preserved fruit or jam, and no fresh fruits or vegetables was not an unusual sight in a lower class home. All the tined foodstuffs, with the exception of the tin of S.P.C. peaches, are 1:12 size artisan miniatures made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire, with great attention to detail paid to their labels and the shapes of their jars and cans. The S.P.C. tin of peaches comes from Shepherd’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom. S.P.C. is an Australian brand that still exists to this day. In 1917 a group of fruit growers in Victoria’s Goulburn Valley decided to form a cooperative which they named the Shepperton Fruit Preserving Company. The company began operations in February 1918, canning pears, peaches and nectarines under the brand name of S.P.C. On the 31st of January 1918 the manager of the Shepparton Fruit Preserving Company announced that canning would begin on the following Tuesday and that the operation would require one hundred and fifty girls or women and thirty men. In the wake of the Great War, it was hoped that “the launch of this new industry must revive drooping energies” and improve the economic circumstances of the region. The company began to pay annual bonuses to grower-shareholders by 1929, and the plant was updated and expanded. The success of S.P.C. was inextricably linked with the progress of the town and the wider Goulburn Valley region. In 1936 the company packed twelve million cans and was the largest fruit cannery in the British empire. Through the Second World War the company boomed. The product range was expanded to include additional fruits, jam, baked beans and tinned spaghetti and production reached more than forty-three million cans a year in the 1970s. From financial difficulties caused by the 1980s recession, SPC returned once more to profitability, merging with Ardmona and buying rival company Henry Jones IXL. S.P.C. was acquired by Coca Cola Amatil in 2005 and in 2019 sold to a private equity group known as Shepparton Partners Collective.

 

The rather worn and beaten looking enamelled bread bin and colander in the typical domestic Art Deco design and kitchen colours of the 1920s, cream and green, which have been aged on purpose, are artisan pieces I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls’ House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The various bowls, cannisters and dishes, the kettle and the Brown Betty teapot I have acquired from various online miniatures stockists throughout the United Kingdom, America and Australia. A Brown Betty is a type of teapot, round and with a manganese brown glaze known as Rockingham glaze. In the Victorian era, when tea was at its peak of popularity, tea brewed in the Brown Betty was considered excellent. This was attributed to the design of the pot which allowed the tea leaves more freedom to swirl around as the water was poured into the pot, releasing more flavour with less bitterness.

 

The black Victorian era stove and the ladderback chair on the left of the table and the small table directly behind it are all miniature pieces I have had since I was a child. The ladderback chair on the right came from a deceased estate of a miniatures collector in Sydney. The Welsh dresser came from Babette’s Miniatures, who have been making miniature dolls’ furnishings since the late Eighteenth Century. The dresser has plate grooves in it to hold plates in place, just like a real dresser would.

 

The grey marbleised fireplace behind the stove and the trough sink in the corner of the kitchen come from Kathleen Knight’s Doll House Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The green wallpaper is an authentic replica of real Art Nouveau wallpaper from the first decade of the Twentieth Century which I have printed onto paper. The floorboards are a print of a photo taken of some floorboards that I scaled to 1:12 size to try and maintain a realistic look.

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 have followed Lettice south-west, through the neighbouring borough of Belgravia to the smart London suburb of Pimlico and its rows of cream and white painted Regency terraces. There, in a smart red brick Edwardian set of three storey flats on Rochester Row, is the residence of Lettice’s client, recently arrived American film actress Wanetta Ward.

 

Now that the flat is completely redecorated under Lettice’s deft hands, Miss Ward has vacated her suite at the Metropole Hotel* and has been living at her Pimlico address for a few weeks now. As a thank you to Lettice, the American has invited her to afternoon tea. And so, we find ourselves in the beautifully appointed, spacious drawing room.

 

“Now, darling girl!” Miss Ward says as she sweeps into the drawing room through the green baize door that leads from the service area of the flat. “You must try my own brew of coffee!” She enthusiastically hoists a beautiful china coffee pot decorated with cherry blossoms in the air. “I promise you that you’ll never go back to that sludge you British call coffee after you’ve had this.”

 

Lettice smells the rich aroma from the pot’s spout as Miss Ward places it with an appropriately theatrical swoop, enhanced by the brightly coloured Spanish shawl draped over her bare shoulders, onto the silver tray on the cherrywood table between the Queen Anne style settee and the matching pair of Chinese armchairs. “It smells divine, Miss Ward.”

 

“Darling!” Miss Ward enthuses. “Divine isn’t the word for this!”

 

“I look forward to tasting it, then.” Lettice replies with a bemused smile. “And afternoon tea, Miss Ward?”

 

“I know! I know!” the American brandishes her hands in the air. “I admit I said it was a quaint observance, but it’s one that I’ve come to enjoy since living here in England. We might not have petit fours like they do at the Metropole, but trust me, Harriet has found the most wonderful little local bakery that makes an amazing selection of cookies. Try one!” She indicates to the plate piled generously with an assortment of brightly coloured and delicious looking biscuits.

 

“Harriet, Miss Ward?”

 

The American picks up a biscuit as she speaks and then pauses with it to her lips. “My new maid, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

Lettice considers the woman with a rather angular face in black silk moiré afternoon uniform and lace collar, cuffs, cap, apron and cap who answered the door. She didn’t strike her as having such a lovely name. She looked to be more of an Augusta or Bertha.

 

Miss Ward’s American voice interrupts Lettice’s contemplation. “Oh, I must thank you too, for the number of that domestics employment agency you gave me.”

 

“You can thank my mother, Miss Ward.” Lettice selects a small pink macaron and takes a ladylike bite from it before depositing the remainder on her plate. She feels the pastry and filling melt in her mouth. “She and I may not agree about a good many things, but Mater certainly knows the best agency In London for staff.”

 

“Well, Harriet is perfect!” Miss ward exclaims. “She fits in here so well, and she doesn’t throw a fit with all my comings and goings at all hours to and from the studio, taking telephone messages for me with the efficiency of a secretary, and she doesn’t even seem to mind the unannounced arrivals when friends come to pay call.”

 

“I do hope you told her about me coming today, Miss Ward.” Lettice remarks in alarm.

 

“Oh I did, Miss Chetwynd! It’s quite alright!” She stuffs the biscuit into her mouth, rubbing her fingers together to rid them of crumbs which tumble through the air and onto her lap where they disappear amidst the fuchsia coloured georgette of her dress. “Mind you,” she continues, speaking with her mouth full. “I don’t think Harriet likes it when I insist on making my own coffee.” She gulps loudly. “She doesn’t like it when I go onto the kitchen. She says it’s her domain.” She looks across at Lettice perched elegantly on the settee, dressed in a pretty pastel yellow frock that matches the trim of her straw hat. “I imagine your maid is the same.”

 

“I’m sure I haven’t asked Edith, Miss Ward.”

 

“Well, perhaps you should, Miss Chetwynd.”

 

“What a ridiculous notion!” Lettice laughs. “Of course she wouldn’t mind! It’s my flat. I can come and go where and when I please.”

 

“If you’ll pardon me, my dear girl,” Miss Ward picks up the coffee pot and pours the steaming, rich golden brown liquid first into Lettice’s cup and then her own. “But it’s a ridiculous notion that you don’t. If I may be so bold: it may be your flat, but you’re a lady, and even I, the egalitarian American in the room, knows that masters and servants don’t mix. You probably vex the poor little mouse when you swan into her domain, rather than ring the servant’s bell. Not that she would tell you that of course! Your maid is much to meek to speak her mind, whereas Harriet tells me that god invented servants’ bells, so I don’t have to go into her kitchen.” She smiles cheekily. “Mind you, I draw the line at her making coffee for me or my guests.” She indicates to the milk jug and sugar bowl. “Now, there is cream in the jug and sugar in the bowl Miss Chetwynd. Do help yourself.” She picks up the jug and glugs a dollop of cream into her coffee before scooping up two large heaped teaspoons of sugar.

 

After Lettice has added a small amount of cream and a flat teaspoon of sugar to her own coffee, she looks around the drawing room observantly whilst she stirs her cup’s contents. To her delight, and no little amount of surprise, the room remains as she designed it. She was quite sure that Wanetta would rearrange her well thought out designs as soon as she moved in, yet against her predictions the furniture remains where she had them placed, the gold and yellow Murano glass comport still standing in the centre of the mantelpiece, the yellow celadon vase with gold bamboo in place on the console table. Even the small white vase, the only piece left over from the former occupier’s décor, remains next to the comport on the mantle. The American was ready to throw it into the dustbin at every opportunity, yet it happily nestles between the comport and a large white china vase of vibrant yellow roses and lilies. It is as she notices the celadon vase that she sees the painting of Wanetta, which only arrived at the flat when its sitter did.

 

“So that’s the famous yellow portrait, Miss Ward,” Lettice remarks, admiring the likeness of the dark haired American, draped in a golden yellow oriental shawl, sitting languidly in a chair.

 

“Oh yes!” gasps Miss Ward as she turns around in her armchair to look at the painting hanging to the right of the fireplace, above a black console table. “You haven’t seen it, have you? Do you like it?”

 

“Yes I do,” acknowledges Lettice. “It’s a remarkable likeness, and the artist has captured the light in your eyes so well.”

 

“Thank you, darling girl! I think it’s beautiful.”

 

“So is your coffee!” Lettice remarks. “It’s quite delicious, and not at all what Bramley makes for me at Glynes**.”

 

“I told you, you British drink sludge.” She takes an appreciative, if overly large, gulp of her own coffee. “Now this, is real coffee.”

 

“So, have you christened your cocktail cabinet, yet?”

 

“Yes I have. I threw a cocktail party for the actors, actresses, director and crew when we wrapped up ‘After the Ball is Over’. It was quite the occasion!”

 

“Oh I could well imagine, Miss Ward.”

 

“Of course,” the American quickly adds. “I’m sure it wasn’t anywhere near as extravagant as your cocktail party that you threw for Mr. and Mrs. Channon.”

 

“You heard about that then, Miss Ward?”

 

“Heard about it? My darling girl,” Her eyes widen and sparkle with excitement. “I immersed myself in the article published by the Tattler, drinking in every little detail of your fabulous soiree. You looked stunning, darling!”

 

Lettice blushes and shuffles awkwardly in her seat on the settee at the brazen compliment. “Thank you, Miss Ward.”

 

“So did Mrs. Channon, of course! And wasn’t Lady Diana Cooper’s*** robe de style**** to die for?”

 

“Err, yes… quite, Miss Ward.” Lettice replies awkwardly. Anxious to change the subject and move away from her own private life, and thereby avoid the American’s potential attempts to try and gather some gossip to share with her fellow actors and actresses at Islington Studios*****, Lettice asks. “And what’s the next moving picture you will be making, Miss Ward? Another villainess role in a historical romance?”

 

“Oh, the studio is shutting for Christmas, so I’m sailing on the Aquitania****** on Monday, back to the States to visit my parents. I haven’t seen them in an age, and, well, they aren’t getting any younger. Besides, Islington Studios are paying for the journey and are organising for me to promote ‘After the Ball is Over’ at a few functions whilst I’m back home.”

 

“That will be lovely for you, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh don’t worry, I’ll be back in the new year, when we start filming ‘Skating and Sinning’.”

 

“’Skating and Sinning’, Miss Ward?”

 

“Yes!” the American gushes as she picks up the coffee pot which she proffers to Lettice, who declines, and then proceeds to fill her own cup. “It’s the first picture planned for 1922. Another historical drama, set in London in the Seventeenth Century, when the Thames froze over.”

 

“Yes, 1607 I believe.”

 

“You’re a font of knowledge, Miss Chetwynd!” Miss Ward exclaims, clapping her ring decorated hands in delight. “You never cease to amaze me! A first-class interior designer and a historian!”

 

“Knowing trivial historical facts is just part and parcel of an education in a family as old as mine, Miss Ward.” Lettice deflects, taking another sip of her coffee. “And the sinning?”

 

“The sinning, Miss Chetwynd?” the American woman queries.

 

“Well, I assume the frozen Thames explains the skating part of the film’s title, Miss Ward.”

 

“Oh, the sinning!” Miss Ward settles back in her armchair with a knowing smile, placing her coffee cup on the black japanned table between the two Chinese chairs. “Well, that’s me, darling!” She raises both her arms dramatically, the Spanish shawl gathering about her shoulders as she does. “I will be playing a merry young, recently widowed, Duchess, with her eyes on our heroine’s young betrothed!”

 

“And do you succeed, Miss Ward?”

 

“Ah-ah! That,” She wags her finger playfully at Lettice. “Would be telling, darling girl. I can’t go giving away the ending, or you won’t come see the film.”

 

Lettice smiles at the actress. “Well, I’m glad that London has entranced you enough to return from the delights of America.”

 

“Well of course it has! And anyway, I have to come back to enjoy and show off my beautiful new home!”

 

Lettice blushes at the compliment.

 

“I’ll have you know Miss Chetwynd, that at my cocktail party, I had so many compliments about this beautiful room, the furnishings and the décor. You’ll be hearing from directors and future starlets in the new year, I’ll guarantee!”

 

“I shall have to see whether I can accommodate them, Miss Ward.” Lettice replies. “As you know, I will be decorating some of the principal rooms of Mr. and Mrs. Channon’s country house in the new year, and I have a few other potential commissions currently under negotiation.”

 

“Oh, I’m sure you’ll be able to squeeze them in, darling! When the moving pictures come knocking, you just won’t be able to say no.”

 

“Well…” Lettice begins, imagining her mother’s face drained of colour, and her father’s flushed with anger, if she takes on another commission from a moving picture actress.

 

“Oh, and thinking of my flat. The other reason why I asked you here.” Miss Ward interrupts, standing up and walking over to the console table beneath her portrait, where some papers sit beneath the base of one of the Murano glass bottles. She fumbles through them and withdraws a small slip of paper. Walking over to Lettice she hands it to her. “A cheque to settle my bill before I set sail for home, darling girl.”

 

“Thank you, Miss Ward.” Lettice replies, opening her lemon yellow handbag sitting between her and her black and yellow straw hat on the settee and depositing the cheque safely inside. “I appreciate your prompt payment.”

 

“It’s my pleasure, Miss Chetwynd.” the American replies. “And thank you again for all that you have done.” Her glittering eyes flit about the room. “I just love being here! It’s so perfect! It’s so, so me! A mixture of the old, and the new, the oriental and the European, all of which I love.”

 

“I’m so pleased you approve, Miss Ward. It is your home, after all.”

 

“I even have to concede that you were right about having touches of white in here. It adds a touch of class. And that wonderful wallpaper you suggested,” She indicates to the walls. “Well, it is the pièce de résistance of this room’s décor!” Stepping over to the fireplace, she picks up the small white vase. “This puzzles me though.” Her face crumples. “Why were you so anxious that I keep this vase?”

 

“Well, “ Lettice explains. “Call me sentimental, but I felt that it is part of your home’s story and coming from an old family home surrounded by history, I thought it would be a shame to see it just tossed away. I hope you don’t disagree.”

 

Miss Ward considers the small Parian vase in her manicured hands for a moment before replacing it. “Not at all, you sentimental girl you!”

 

The pair smile at one another, happily.

 

*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.

 

**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.

 

***Born Lady Diana Manners, Diana Olivia Winifred Maud Cooper, Viscountess Norwich was an English aristocrat who was a famously glamorous social figure in London and Paris. As a young woman, she moved in a celebrated group of intellectuals known as the Coterie, most of whom were killed in the First World War. She married Duff Cooper in 1919. In her prime, she had the widespread reputation as the most beautiful young woman in England, and appeared in countless profiles, photographs and articles in newspapers and magazines. She was a film actress in the early 1920s and both she and her husband were very good friends with Edward VIII and were guests of his on a 1936 yacht cruise of the Adriatic which famously caused his affair with Wallis Simpson to become public knowledge.

 

****The ‘robe de style’ was introduced by French couturier Jeanne Lanvin around 1915. It consisted of a basque bodice with a broad neckline and an oval bouffant skirt supported by built in wire hoops. Reminiscent of the Spanish infanta-style dresses of the Seventeenth Century and the panniered robe à la française of the Eighteenth Century they were made of fabric in a solid colour, particularly a deep shade of robin’s egg blue which became known as Lanvin blue, and were ornamented with concentrated bursts of embroidery, ribbons or ornamental silk flowers.

 

*****Islington Studios, often known as Gainsborough Studios, were a British film studio located on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in Shoreditch, London which began operation in 1919. By 1920 they had a two stage studio. It is here that Alfred Hitchcock made his entrée into films.

 

******The RMS Aquitania was a British ocean liner of the Cunard Line in service from 1914 to 1950. She was designed by Leonard Peskett and built by John Brown and Company in Clydebank, Scotland. She was launched on the 21st of April 1913 and sailed on her maiden voyage from Liverpool to New York on the 30th of May 1914. Like her sister ships the ill fated Lusitania and the renown Mauritania, she was beautifully appointed and was a luxurious way for first and second-class passengers to travel across the Atlantic between Britain and America.

 

This upper-class 1920s Art Deco drawing room scene may be different to how it may appear, for the whole scene is made up entirely with pieces from my 1:12 miniatures collection, including pieces I have had since I was a teenager and others that I have collected on my travels around the world.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The cherry blossom patterned tea set, which if you look closely at the blossoms, you will see they have gilt centres, I acquired from an online stockist on E-Bay. It stands on a silver tray that is part of tea set that comes from Smallskale Miniatures in England. To see the whole set, please click on this link: www.flickr.com/photos/40262251@N03/51111056404/in/photost.... The wonderful selection of biscuits on offer were made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering.

 

The wooden Chinese dragon chairs and their matching low table ,that serves as Wanetta’s tea table, I found in a little shop in Singapore whilst I was holiday there. They are beautifully carved from cherrywood.

 

The Queen Anne settee made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, JBM with great attention to detail.

 

The black japanned cocktail cabinet with its gilded handles was made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq.

 

All the glass comport on the mantlepiece has been blown and decorated and tinted by hand by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. The white and gold Georgian Revival clock next to it is a 1:12 artisan miniature made by Hall’s Miniature Clocks, supplied through Doreen Jeffries Small Wonders Miniatures in England. The ginger jar to the right of the clock is hand painted. It is an item that I bought from a high street doll house stockist when I was a teenager.

 

The yellow celadon vase with gold bamboo painted on it, I bought as part of a job lot of small oriental vases from an auction many years ago. The soapstone lidded jar in the foreground came from the same auction house, but from a different job lot of oriental miniature pieces.

 

Lettice’s black straw hat with yellow trimming and a yellow rose, which sits on the settee is made by Mrs. Denton of Muffin Lodge. It is an artisan miniature made just like a real hat! 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. Lettice’s lemon yellow purse is also an artisan piece and is made of kid leather which is so soft. It is trimmed with very fine braid and the purse has a clasp made from a piece of earring. It come from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Lettice’s furled Art Deco umbrella is also a 1:12 artisan piece made of silk, acquired through an online stockist on E-Bay.

 

The vases of flowers on the mantle piece and side table are beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium.

 

The stylised Art Deco fire screen is made using thinly laser cut wood, made by Pat’s Miniatures in England.

 

The black Bakelite and silver telephone is a 1:12 miniature of a model introduced around 1919. It is two centimetres wide and two centimetres high. The receiver can be removed from the cradle, and the curling chord does stretch out.

 

Wanetta’s paintings, including the yellow portrait, were made in America by Amber’s Miniatures.

 

The miniature Oriental rug on the floor was made by hand by Mackay and Gerrish in Sydney

 

The Georgian style fireplace I have had since I was a teenager and is made from moulded plaster.

 

The striking wallpaper is an art deco design that was very popular during the 1920s.

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 and his wife Arabella. Lettice is visiting her family home over the Christmastide and New Year period. She motored down to Wiltshire with her old childhood chum, Gerald, also a member of the aristocracy who has tried to gain some independence from his family by designing gowns from a shop in Grosvenor Street. His family, the Brutons, are neighbours to the Cheywynds with their properties sharing boundaries. That is how Gerald and Lettice came to be such good friends. However, whilst both families are landed gentry with lineage going back centuries, unlike Lettice’s family, Gerald’s live in a much smaller baronial manor house and are in much more straitened circumstances.

 

It is mid-morning and Lettice pads as quietly as possible across the cavernous Adam style entrance hall of Glynes, the louis heels of her shoes echoing around the space. Anxiously she looks over her shoulder down the corridor that passes the morning room, her mother’s domain where she knows Lady Sadie is right now, and where she does not wish to be drawn into. She turns to her right and walks up to a pair of beautiful walnut double doors and knocks loudly.

 

“Come!” comes a muffled male voice from inside.

 

Lettice opens the doors and walks through into the light filled library where she is greeted by the comforting smell of old books and woodsmoke. Although as masculine as the morning room is feminine, Lettice feels far more at home in her father’s library, partially because it is his domain and also because he and she both know that, with her reading extending not much further than The Lady*, Horse and Hound** or a sedate Regency romance, Lady Sadie is unlikely to disturb either of them as long as they remain within the library’s four walls. The walls of the long room are lined with floor to ceiling shelves, all full of books: thousands of volumes on so many subjects. Weak wintery sunlight drifts through the tall windows facing out to the front of the house, burnishing the polished parquetry floors in a ghostly way. The fire, another constant in the library, crackles contentedly. And there, sitting at his Chippendale desk, sits Viscount Wrexham, dealing with estate business.

 

“Ah! My darling girl!” the Viscount puts aside his pen, pushes his chair back over the richly woven carpet and stands.

 

Lettice walks down the length of the room carrying a tapestry carpet bag in shades of red wine and moss green – a piece of luggage that she used to convey her Christmas presents for the family down to Wiltshire, and the only piece that does not match any of her other elegant deep blue leather Vuitton*** luggage that accompanied her from London in Gerald’s motorcar.

 

“Have you a moment to spare for me, Pappa!” Lettice asks as she reaches her father’s desk.

 

“Yes,” the Viscount says a little wearily. “Only if it isn’t too long. Shall I ring for tea?”

 

When Lettice nods eagerly, the Viscount pulls the handle of the servants call bell. The Chetwynd’s faithful butler, Bramley’s, familiar footfall outside the library door precedes his knock, and he is quickly dispatched with an order for tea to be served indulgently in the Viscount’s favourite blue and white gilt Art Nouveau tea set.

 

Sitting opposite her father at his desk, Lettice ponders her father’s face, which looks wan, and she notices the dark circles in the sagging flesh under his eyes. “You look and sound tired, Pappa.” she states matter-of-factly. “Are you all right?”

 

“Oh, your brother and I have to deal with some not too pleasant business at Mile End Farm. It’s been keeping me awake at night, and I didn’t want to deal with it before Christmas.”

 

“What business, Pappa?”

 

“Estate business.” The Viscount brushes his daughter off with a dismissive wave. “Nothing you need to worry your pretty head about.”

 

“If it is causing you to have sleepless nights, and as the estate is our family’s, I think it is very much my business, Pappa.” Lettice presses. “Even if Leslie is to inherit it, and not me. Have you difficulties with old Farmer Cooper again?”

 

“Well,” the Viscount admits. “Since you insist, yes. Ever since his son died in Ypres, and his wife of influenza, he’s taken to drinking heavily, and all but given up on Mile End Farm, and I can’t have such fertile soil untilled. If Cooper doesn’t start working the farm again, Leslie and I will have no choice but to break his leasehold in favour of another farmer.”

 

“But Coopers have been farming Mile End Farm for generations.” Lettice protests.

 

“The estate is getting expensive to maintain. Taxes have increased to help pay for the war that the Kaiser dragged us into, yet the Weimar Republic won’t pay for****,” The Viscount sighs heavily. “And I can’t afford to run a charity any more, not even for the likes of Cooper, however long his family have worked our estate.”

 

“Charity?”

 

“He’s not paid his rent.”

 

“How in arrears is he?”

 

“Three months.”

 

“Oh my!” Lettice’s hand goes to her mouth.

 

“Now you see why I didn’t want to deal with this before Christmas.” The Viscount sighs sadly again. “For all his latter faults, Cooper doesn’t deserve to be given an ultimatum on Christmas Eve. But, I can’t wait any longer. I have at least three farmers I know of who would give their eye teeth to be given Mile End Farm to work, and as the future owner of the estate, Leslie needs to know how it works.”

 

“That’s sad, Pappa.”

 

“This is the new post-war world, Lettice. You know as much as anyone that the world has changed, inexorably so. If Cooper chooses to drink his life away, I can’t stop him.”

 

Their conversation is interrupted by the gentle knocking at the door.

 

“Come!” Viscount Wrexham calls commandingly again.

 

Bramley enters carrying a silver tray laden with the blue and white gild Art Nouveau tea things, just as requested. “Tea, My Lord.”

 

“Very good, Bramley.” the Viscount acknowledges the butler. “We’ll have it here, I think.” He looks to his daughter. “Yes?” To which she nods in reply.

 

With the tea things set up on the gilt tooled brown leather surface of the Viscount’s Chippendale desk, and Bramley discreetly retreated beyond the library doors this Viscount says, “Now, before Leslie and I pay a call on Cooper, what is it you wanted to see me about, my girl?”

 

“Well Pappa,” Lettice replies. “I need your advice on these.”

 

Lettice withdraws the four silhouettes in black ebonised frames that she bought from Mrs. Trevithick’s Treasures when working on Margot and Dickie’s house in Cornwall and places them on her father’s desk.

 

“And what have we here?” he asks, cocking an eyebrow as he admires the two Regency gentlemen and the Georgian lady and gentleman in black on white within the thin black frames. “Hhhmmm.” He scratches his cleanly shaven chin and ruminates quietly. “These look a little bit like something your mother has in the morning room. Wouldn’t you be better asking her?”

 

“Oh no, Pappa!” Lettice exclaims awkwardly and with a little too much protesting to be polite. “Mamma would only tell me what I already know about them.”

 

“And what do you know about them, my girl? What does your interior designer eye tell you?”

 

“They are silhouettes and two are Regency, or early Victorian and two are Georgian. The two gentlemen appear to be cut paper, and the Georgian couple possibly painted.”

 

“Where did you acquire these from, Lettice?”

 

“From a little curiosity shop in Cornwall when I was doing preliminary works on the redecoration of Dickie and Margot Channon’s house. I thought you might have a book on the subject?” Lettice asks hopefully.

 

The Viscount settles back in his seat and sips tea from his gilt edged cup, the blue and gilding glowing in the electric light of the chandelier overhead. He gazes around the shelves about them. Lettice holds her breath in anticipation of her father’s answer, not daring to speak for fear of breaking his considered concentration. Only the gentle ticking of the clock on the mantle and the quiet cracking of the fire breaking the silence.

 

“I think I do have a book on silhouettes here somewhere.”

 

He heaves himself out of his seat with a groan and dragging his library steps along the parquet floor to a section of shelves near the fireplace, he climbs up to one of the upper shelves. “I’m sure I had something up here, possibly ordered by your mother when she had a mania for collecting silhouettes that ended up in here when she grew tired of it.” He begins running his fingers along the dark vellum volumes with gilt letting and others with brightly coloured dustjackets. “Ah! Here we are!” He pulls out a blue coloured volume with gilt lettering. “The history of Silhouettes by E. Nevill Jackson*****!”

 

Taking the volume over to the desk, the pair begin to look through the photographic plates in the book, scanning image after image, sipping their tea as companionably they look at silhouette after beautiful silhouette.

 

“I’d say, looking at this,” Lettice points to an image of a gentleman in a top hat. “That the two gentlemen may be Swiss or German. See the similarity in the cut of the frock coats.”

 

“Very good, Lettice.” her father replies approvingly. “Well spotted, my girl. And they are thin card like these.” He indicates to the notes about how the image was created. “This would make them Biedermeier, then.”

 

They continue to look.

 

“Ahh, now this is interesting,” the Viscount announces as they reach a page featuring five very fine silhouettes. “Your Georgian couple, unlike the Biedermeier pair, appear to be Indian ink painted on paper, and look like the work of Francis Torond*******.”

 

“Who was Francis Torond?” Lettice asks excitedly.

 

“Let’s consult Ms Jackson’s biography section.” The Viscount flicks through the book. “Here we are. Francis Torond was French, but emigrated to England around 1796.” He scans the biography. “He only worked as a silhouette artist for about ten years. He painted in Indian ink on fine paper using a quill pen for fine detail. His works are usually in framed in oval turned ebonized wood or oval giltwood frames.” Lettice gasps. “And his works are often identified through trade labels. Let’s see.” The Viscount turns the picture of the Georgian lady over and using his silver letter opener, carefully prises the backing from its frame, and the pair see a very dirty paper label pasted across the back of the portrait. “There we are! Torond, number thirteen Wells Street, London. This is a Frances Torond! And I’ll wager the pair is then too!”

 

Outside in the entrance hall, the distant trill of the telephone can be heard ringing out anxiously.

 

“How much did you pay for them?” the Viscount asks, continuing to look at the portraits before him.

 

“Fifteen shillings each.”

 

“Quite the bargain then, I’d say.” the Viscount says proudly with an approving nod. “Canny girl.”

 

Their conversation is interrupted yet again by the gentle knocking at the library door.

 

“Come!” Viscount Wrexham calls commandingly again.

 

Bramley pokes his head around the door. “Sorry to disturb, My Lord.”

 

“Good heavens Bramley! Is Leslie here already?” the Viscount asks anxiously. “I’m afraid Lettice and I have quite lost track of the time. We’ve been quite engrossed in successfully solving a little mystery.”

 

“Ahh… no My Lord. It’s the telephone. My Lord.”

 

“Who is it then, Bramley?”

 

“It’s actually for Miss Lettice, My Lord.” the butler replies coolly in his friendly baritone voice.

 

“For me?” Lettice raises her hand to the pearls at her throat and toys with them.

 

“Yes, My Lady. It’s Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon******** ringing from St. Paul's, Walden Bury.”

 

“Oh well, I’ll take the telephone call in here then, Bramley.” Lettice says, walking over to the small round three legged Georgian pedestal table the old fashioned black candlestick telephone stands on. ‘That is if you don’t mind, Father.”

 

“Not at all.” the Viscount acquiesces.

 

Lettice picks up the telephone and picks up the receiver in her left hand, placing it to her ear, and speaks clearly into the round mouthpiece of the candlestick base that she holds in her right hand. “Hullo Elizabeth darling!” she exclaims happily. “What an unexpected surprise! Merry Christmas and happy New Year.” A distant female voice speaks down the line. “Oh yes! Yes, it was marvellous. Mamma wasn’t too painful. Lally, Charles and the children came up, and so did Aunt Egg, of course. And Pappa,” She glances over at her father who has resumed looking at the silhouette portraits in an effort to be discreet and not overhear his daughter’s conversation. “Gave me a wonderful book on Egyptian art. He thinks that the discovery like the boy king’s tomb by Mr. Carter********* in Egypt is going to start a new wave of Egyptomania**********.” She smirks. “How was yours?” She listens to Elizabeth’s voice. “Is he?” The voice at the other end grows more excited. “Did he really? Again?” The voice answers animatedly. “And what did you say?” Even the Viscount, however discreet with his back turned, cannot help but pick up his ears to his daughter’s conversation. “You did? Oh congratulations, Elizabeth darling!” Lettice beams with delight. “No misgivings this time, I hope?” She listens again. “Well, that is a relief! How absolutely thrilling!” She listens again. “Oh, thank you Elizabeth darling! Oh yes I’d love to!” The voice at the other end of the telephone grows more serious. “Well of course I will! How could I refuse? Well, I’ll be back in London the day after tomorrow. Gerald’s motoring us both back to town. You must come over for tea, or cocktails and tell me all about it.” The voice speaks again. “Yes, alright Elizabeth darling. Yes… yes, I shall see you then. And congratulations again! Alright. Goodbye for now!”

 

Lettice hangs up the receiver and squeals with delight.

 

“Well!” Lettice gasps with excitement. “You’ll never guess who that was, Pappa!”

 

“I was led to believe by Bramley that it was your friend, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon.” her father says dourly.

 

“She won’t be Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon much longer! The Duke of York proposed for a third time, and this time she said yes!” Lettice squeals again, jumping up and down on the spot. “She’s going to become the Duchess of York!”

 

“Well, that is jolly news!” the Viscount replies. “I can’t wait to tell your mother! She’ll be beside herself with joy that she entertained the future Duchess of York here at the Hunt Ball last year! I might even get a few days without any quibbles from her thanks to the news. Here’s hoping, anyway.” He crosses his fingers. “I say,” he adds dourly at the end. “I do hope she knows what she’s doing, getting married to the Windsors. I can’t say I’d fancy the King and Queen as my in-laws, Queen Mary especially!”

 

“I suppose since this is the third time the Duke of York proposed, that she realises. She says that she has no misgivings this time. I’ll have to get Gerald to design me a new dress and get Harriet to make me a hat for the wedding.”

 

“When will the wedding take place?”

 

“Elizabeth doesn’t know yet, but I don’t imagine it will be too far away.”

 

“Yes, no doubt the Windsors want to secure her for the Duke and marry them quickly before she changes her mind, if this is the third proposal.”

 

*The Lady is one of Britain's longest-running women's magazines. It has been in continuous publication since 1885 and is based in London. It is particularly notable for its classified advertisements for domestic service and child care; it also has extensive listings of holiday properties.

 

**Horse and Hound is the oldest equestrian weekly magazine of the United Kingdom. Its first edition was published in 1884. The magazine contains horse industry news, reports from equestrian events, veterinary advice about caring for horses, and horses for sale.

 

***Louis Vuitton Malletier, commonly known as Louis Vuitton, is a French luxury fashion house and company founded in 1854 by Louis Vuitton. The label's LV monogram appears on most of its products, ranging from luxury bags and leather goods to ready-to-wear, shoes, watches, jewellery, accessories, sunglasses and books. The Louis Vuitton label was founded by Vuitton in 1854 on Rue Neuve des Capucines in Paris. Louis Vuitton started at $10,567 as a sales price. Louis Vuitton had observed that the HJ Cave Osilite trunk could be easily stacked. In 1858, Vuitton introduced his flat-topped trunks with Trianon canvas, making them lightweight and airtight. Before the introduction of Vuitton's trunks, rounded-top trunks were used, generally to promote water runoff, and thus could not be stacked. It was Vuitton's grey Trianon canvas flat trunk that allowed the ability to stack them on top of another with ease for voyages. Many other luggage makers later imitated Vuitton's style and design, but Vuitton was the choice of luggage for the rich and influential.

 

****In order to repay the expenditures made by the British during the Great War, like had been occurring since the Napoleonic Wars, the government increased Income Tax. The standard rate of income tax, which was six per cent in 1914, stood at thirty per cent in 1918. Following the ratification of article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles at the conclusion of the Great War, the Central Powers were made to give war reparations to the Allied Powers. Each of the defeated powers was required to make payments in either cash or kind. Because of the financial situation in Austria, Hungary, and Turkey after the war, few to no reparations were paid and the requirements for reparations were cancelled. Bulgaria, having paid only a fraction of what was required, saw its reparation figure reduced and then cancelled. Due to the lack of reparation payments by Germany, France occupied the Ruhr in 1923 to enforce payments, causing an international crisis and hyperinflation in Germany. As a result of all of this, income tax rates amongst the wealthy were maintained at a high level, far in excess of those charged in the years before the war, making the management of estates very difficult if they were not productive.

 

*****“The History of Silhouettes” by Emily Neville Jackson was published by The Connoisseur, in London in 1911. The first edition has blue cloth boards with gilt lettering on the cover. It has one hundred and twenty one pages of text and bibliography with an additional seventy two plates of photographs of silhouettes. Emily Jackson was a noted collector and authority on silhouettes, especially the work of Auguste Amant Constant Fidèle Edouart, who was a French-born portrait artist who worked in England, Scotland and the United States in the Nineteenth Century who specialised in silhouette portraits.

 

*******Francis Torond was an accomplished and successful silhouette artist of the late Georgian and Regency periods in England. He experienced financial difficulty and decided it was not a profitable career, so sadly only worked as a profilist for a decade. He is renowned today for his exquisite conversation pieces, and also for his clare-obscur style – the technique of using light and shade in a pictorial piece of art. Born around 1743, he emigrated withhis family from France to England around 1776, settling in Westminster in London. Francis Torond painted entirely in Indian ink on fine laid paper, using a quill pen to depict detail. He was incredibly skilled in highlighting the details of clothing and the background in which his sitters were painted. China, furniture and lighting were all beautifully painted. He did not use any mechanical means to produce his silhouettes, and he advertised that he could copy any silhouette onto furniture or jewellery. He died at his St Giles home in 1812.

 

********Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, as she was known at the beginning of 1923 when this story is set, went on to become Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions from 1936 to 1952 as the wife of King George VI. Whilst still Duke of York, Prince Albert initially proposed to Elizabeth in 1921, but she turned him down, being "afraid never, never again to be free to think, speak and act as I feel I really ought to". He proposed again in 1922 after Elizabeth was part of his sister, Mary the Princess Royal’s, wedding party, but she refused him again. On Saturday, January 13th, 1923, Prince Albert went for a walk with Elizabeth at the Bowes-Lyon home at St Paul’s, Walden Bury and proposed for a third and final time. This time she said yes. The wedding took place on April 26, 1923 at Westminster Abbey.

 

*********On the 4th of November 1922, English archaeologist Howard Carter and his men discovered the entrance to the boy king, Pharaoh Tutankhamun's tomb in the Valley of the Kings. He unseals the entrance on the 16th of February 1923, discovering the most intact Egyptian burial chamber ever unearthed. It sparks a worldwide interest in all things Egyptian. The craze he started became known as Tutmania, and it inspired everything from the architecture of public building and private houses alike to interior design and fashion. Famously at the time, socialite Dolores Denis Denison applied one of the earliest examples of getting the media of the day to pay attention to her because of her dress by arriving at the prestigious private view of the King Tut Exhibition in London, dressed as an Egyptian mummy complete in a golden sarcophagus and had to be carried inside by her driver and a hired man. Although it started before the discovery of the tomb, the Art Deco movement was greatly influenced by Egyptian style. Many of the iconic decorative symbols we associate with the movement today came about because of Howard Carter’s discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in the Valley of the Kings.

 

**********Egyptomania refers to a period of renewed interest in the culture of ancient Egypt sparked by Napoleon's Egyptian Campaign in the 19th century. Napoleon was accompanied by many scientists and scholars during this Campaign, which led to a large interest after the documentation of ancient monuments in Egypt. The ancient remains had never been so thoroughly documented before and so the interest in ancient Egypt increased significantly. Jean-François Champollion deciphered the ancient hieroglyphs in 1822 by using the Rosetta Stone that was recovered by French troops in 1799 which began the study of scientific Egyptology.

 

Cluttered with books and art, Viscount Wrexham’s library with its Georgian furnishings is different from what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The majority of the books that you see lining the shelves of the Viscount’s library are 1:12 size miniatures made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. So too are all the books you see both open and closed on the Viscount’s Chippendale desk. Most of the books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. Therefore, it is a pleasure to give you a glimpse inside one of the books he has made. “The History of Silhouettes” by Emily Nevill Jackson was published by The Connoisseur, in London in 1911. To give you an idea of the work that has gone into this volume and the others, the book contains thirty double sided pages of silhouette images and script and measures thirty-three millimetres in height and thirty millimetres in width and is only five millimetres thick. What might amaze you even more is that all Ken Blythe’s opening books are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter. I hope that you enjoy this peek at just one of hundreds of his books that I own, and that it makes you smile with its sheer whimsy!

 

The miniature silhouettes that Lettice bought in Cornwall were made by Lady Mile Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The Art Nouveau tea set I acquired from an online specialist of miniatures in E-Bay.

 

Also on the desk to the left stands a stuffed white owl on a branch beneath a glass cloche. A vintage miniature piece, the foliage are real dried flowers and grasses, whilst the owl is cut from white soapstone. The base is stained wood and the cloche is real glass. This I acquired along with two others featuring shells (one of which can be seen in the background) from Kathleen Knight’s Dollhouse Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

On the desk are some 1:12 artisan miniature ink bottles and a blotter on a silver salver all made by the Little Green Workshop in England who specialise in high end, high quality miniatures. The ink bottles are made from tiny faceted crystal beads and have sterling silver bottoms and lids. The ink blotter is sterling silver too and has a blotter made of real black felt, cut meticulously to size to fit snugly inside the frame.

 

The Chippendale desk itself is made by Bespaq, and it has a mahogany stain and the design is taken from a real Chippendale desk. Its surface is covered in red dioxide red dioxide leather with a gilt trim. Bespaq is a high-end miniature furniture maker with high attention to detail and quality.

 

In the background you can see the book lined shelves of Viscount Wrexham’s as well as a Victorian painting of cattle in a gold frame from Amber’s Miniatures in America, and a hand painted ginger jar from Thailand which stands on a Bespaq plant stand.

 

The Persian rug you can just glimpse in the bottom left-hand corer of the photo was hand woven by Pike, Pike and Company in the United Kingdom.

 

The gold flocked Edwardian wallpaper is beautiful hand impressed paper given to me by a friend, which inspired the whole “Cavendish Mews – Lettice Chetwynd” series.

The believers are only those who, when Allâh is mentioned, feel a fear in their hearts and when His Verses (this Qur’ân) are recited unto them, they (i.e. the Verses) increase their Faith; and they put their trust in their Lord (Alone);

  

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Who perform As-Salât (Iqâmat­as­Salât) and spend out of that We have provided them.

  

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It is they who are the believers in truth. For them are grades of dignity with their Lord, and Forgiveness and a generous provision (Paradise).

Surah Al-Anfal

Photographed from Lenin Square, this building has the address 1/14 Serzhanta Lazarieva Street, Pripyat'. I presume it was a government building given the Soviet State Seal on top.

 

Pripyat’ (Ukrainian: Прип’ять) is a ghost city which was built to house the workers of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, just 3 kilometres away. Named after the nearby river Pripyat, the city was founded on 4 February 1970, as the ninth nuclear city or “atomgrad” in the USSR. It was officially proclaimed a city in 1979 and had grown to a population of 49,360 by the time it was evacuated on the afternoon of 27 April 1986, the day after the Chernobyl disaster.

 

The Soviet authorities wanted to attract the best workers to the strategically and economically critical megaproject, so Pripyat’ had a notably high standard of living compared with most Soviet cities, with generously sized apartments, well-stocked supermarkets and hotels, and even its own amusement park.

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 southeast of Lettice’s flat at the Savoy Hotel*, where a lavish wedding breakfast** is being held for two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things who have just been married at St. Mark’s Church, North Audley Street***: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and the newly minted Margot Channon, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre.

 

“Cheers to you, dear Gerald.” Lettice remarks, raising her glass of glittering golden champagne to her friend.

 

“To me?” Gerald almost chokes on his last mouthful of cheese as he dabs at his mouth daintily with a fine damask napkin. “Whatever for, Lettuce…” He pauses mid nickname as he remembers they are not alone. As if pretending to clear his throat of water cracker biscuit crumbs he coughs. “Ahem… Lettice. Why me? Why not the bride and groom? This is,” He waves his hand about expansively. “After all, for them.”

 

“Oh, there will be plenty of that shortly with the dreaded speeches.” Lettice smiles, grateful that Gerald didn’t call her by her abhorred nickname within public earshot. “No, this is your moment too, as well as theirs.”

 

“I don’t see how you’ve come to that conclusion my dear. This isn’t my wedding.”

 

“Well no, it isn’t Gerald, not in name,” she indicates languidly over to Margot sitting at the bridal table next to Dickie, beaming with such happiness and looking radiant. “But it is your wedding gown that is on show today. And Margot is the perfect mannequin to show it off.”

 

“Do you really like it, Lettice?” Gerald barely dares to ask in a whisper, leaning forward his eyes sparkling with hope. “You aren’t just saying that because you’re my oldest and dearest chum?”

 

“Like it, Gerald?” Lettice stares at Gerald in amazement. “That daring asymmetrical hemline of satin and tulle, the cap sleeves, the boat neckline and that divine embroidery I’ve seen you work on for months: I absolutely love it! Margot will be the bride of the Season.”

 

“Do you really think so, darling?”

 

“You mark my words, Gerald. Just look at all the photographers outside St. Mark’s, waiting for a chance to capture the bride on the steps!” She thinks back to the last hour where the burst of flashbulbs that went off as Dickie and Margot stepped out of the chapel doors was blinding. “She’ll be in every society page up and down the country, in your dress, darling! A Gerald Bruton original.”

 

“Gosh! That is a rather thrilling thought.” Gerald smiles proudly as he tugs awkwardly at his collar.

 

A Savoy waiter discreetly reaches forth with white gloved hands and clears away the white gilt cheese plates and cheese and fruit knives.

 

“Thrilling? I’ll say Gerald! This will truly be the making of you, my clever darling. Cheers!”

 

Lettice raises her glass towards Gerald again, who this time lifts his own in return, the clink drowned out by the sounds of a string quartet playing salon music, vociferous chatter, and the scrape of silver against crockery as the wedding guests around them finish their cheese and fruit before desserts are served.

 

“Just think of all the future young brides here who will each want a frock equally as exquisite as Margot’s.” Lettice remarks before taking a sip of champagne. “Designed by you, of course darling.”

 

“Of course, darling!”

 

Sipping his own champagne, Gerald looks around the private dining room of the Savoy with its gold flocked wallpaper, gilt mirrors and Edwardian style Rococo inspired furnishings. Around the tables decorated with champagne and gold roses in crystal vases, several clusters of young women chat conspiratorially with heads as closely together as their picture hats will allow. He notices one group at a nearby table where a girl, caught pointing by his gaze, is indicating to him. She smiles shyly and quickly lowers her hand. He smiles broadly in return and raises his glass to her in acknowledgement. She takes up her own glass in return.

 

“See,” Lettice remarks proudly as she places a comforting hand upon her friend’s forearm. “You will have blushing brides-to-be and their mothers flocking to you before the fortnight is out.”

 

“Just the same, I don’t think the Marchioness of Taunton approved.” Gerald adds. “She did look rather grim throughout the ceremony as she watched Dickie and Margot get married.”

 

“Oh, pooh the Marchioness!” Lettice counters, looking to Margot’s mother-in-law who sits stiffly by her husband’s side wearing an old fashioned looking picture hat adorned with large silk flowers that perfectly match the powder blue shade of her very conservative and rather dowdy dress, a look of general distain on her sharp features as she looks down her nose at the happy wedding guests in her view. “I think she would look grim no matter what. Before the war, it was Harry who was heir apparent, not Dickie. I’m sure she imagined the heir to the Taunton title marrying someone more fitting than the daughter of a trade bought title like Lord de Virre. However, the dowery that that he brings to the marriage will be welcome in the Taunton coffers, I’m sure.”

 

“Lettice!” Gerald looks around him nervously, hoping that none of the other guests heard his friend speak so candidly about something that is commonly known, but seldom raised, especially somewhere so public.

 

“Lord de Virre told me so himself.” Lettice admits.

 

“Lady de Virre confided in me too,” Gerald adds quickly in an effort to change the subject. “That Vogue have asked for copies of the studio wedding photographs.”

 

“Well, that is exciting, Gerald! Your first appearance in Vogue!” Lettice enthuses. “The first of many, I’m sure. And today is Tuesday, so some of Margot and Dickie’s wealth is bound to rub off on you.”

 

“Whatever do you mean?”

 

“Well, you know the old rhyme, ‘marry on Monday for health, Tuesday for wealth’**** and so on.”

 

“I didn’t take you for believing in such superstitious nonsense, Lettice.” Gerald cocks an eyebrow in surprise at her.

 

“Oh I don’t,” she flaps the thought away as if it were cigarette smoke with her elegantly bejewelled hand. “But it was always a rhyme I remember Nanny Webb singing to me, no doubt under the Mater’s influence.”

 

Lettice looks over to the table where her parents sit. Lady Sadie is engrossed in a conversation over an arrangement of golden yellow roses with a grey haired old dowager wearing several strings of pearls about her neck and a haughty look of distain on her face as she catches Lettice’s eye. Lettice cringes.

 

“Is Sadie playing matchmaker with Lady Faversham?” Gerald asks discreetly, looking in the same direction as Lettice.

 

“Scheming more like.” Lettice mutters. “Do you know she has asked Sir John Nettleford-Hughes to the Hunt Ball after Christmas as a potential suitor for me?” Lettice screws up her nose.

 

“Sir John Nettleford-Hughes! Isn’t he in his mid-fifties?”

 

“More like his sixties!”

 

“Well, he’ll be in good company with Lady Faversham’s unmarried eldest son.”

 

“She doesn’t have an unmarried son too, does she?” Lettice’s eyes grow wide and her face pales at the thought, until she sees the cheeky smile on Gerald’s face as he raises his napkin to his lips attempting to hide it. “Oh you!” she hisses, slapping his wrist playfully and smiling.

 

“At least I made you smile.” Gerald says kindly.

 

“You will come to the Hunt Ball, won’t you darling?” Lettice’s squeeze of her friend’s left wrist highlighting the desperation of her plea.

 

“If we’re invited. The Brutons of leaky roofed Bruton Hall don’t have the panache of Sir John Nettleford-Hughes, not to mention the bank balance.”

 

“Of course you’ll be invited!” Lettice replies in outrage. “It’s traditional. Why you’re practically family being our neighbours. I’ll invite you all if Mater doesn’t: you, your mother, your brother and your father! You must come and rescue me from all the horrors Mater is planning to invite.”

 

“As a penniless spare to the heir, who earns his living making frocks for his financial betters: I’m hardly a suitable match for you to dance with at the ball, Lettice.” He smiles assuringly at his friend across the table and then places his own right hand over hers as it rests across his left wrist. “Who else am I protecting you from the attentions of?”

 

“Jonty Hastings.”

 

“Good god! Howling Hastings! I haven’t seen him since we were in the nursery. Didn’t we used to lock him in the airing cupboard at Bruton Hall?” Gerald asks mischievously.

 

“I’d forgotten that!” Lettice muffles her laughs with her napkin. ‘I think that’s why we gave him that nickname.”

 

“I think that might be the reason why we haven’t seen him since we were children.” Gerald chuckles. “Who else is Sadie pulling out of mothballs for you?”

 

The discreet gloved hands of the Savoy waiter places a blackberry tart topped with clotted cream, garnished with thinly sliced citrus in front of Lettice and Gerald.

 

“Tarquin Howard, Edward Lambley, Selwyn Spencely.” Lettice elucidates after the waiter withdraws.

 

“At least they are more our age,” Gerald says hopefully. “And Selwyn is dishy to boot.”

 

“Oh, you’re as bad as Mater!” Lettice flicks her napkin at him as she prepares to take a mouthful of her tart. “Can you believe she actually offered to show me his photograph in one of her magazines?”

 

“Well, I shouldn’t have minded that.” Gerald replies, uttering a satisfied sigh as he tastes the delicious dessert before him.

 

“Better you than me, Gerald. Do you know what else Mater said to me?”

 

Gerald looks questioningly to her, waiting for Lettice to continue.

 

“She said that Dickie and Margot only asked me to decorate their country house because they are my friends.”

 

“Well, they are, Lettice.”

 

“Yes, but she implied that my decorating isn’t good enough for anyone to put up with unless they are my friends.”

 

“She only said that to make you pack it all in so she can marry you off more easily, like she did your sister. But you and I know better.” Gerald says comfortingly. He picks up his champagne glass again and points it towards Lettice’s. “Pick up your glass, darling.”

 

Lettice looks questioningly at her friend as she wraps her fingers around the stem of her glass.

 

“Here’s to your success.” Gerald says, clinking her glass. “To the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd, successful society interior designer, and the best friend I could ever ask for!”

 

Lettice laughs, awarding Gerald with her beautiful smile.

 

*The Savoy Hotel is a luxury hotel located in the Strand in the City of Westminster in central London, England. 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 luxury hotel in Britain, introducing 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.

 

**A wedding breakfast is a feast given to the newlyweds and guests after the wedding, making it equivalent to a wedding reception that serves a meal. The phrase is still used in British English, as opposed to the description of reception, which is American in derivation. Before the beginning of the Twentieth Century they were traditionally held in the morning, but this fashion began to change after the Great War when they became a luncheon. Regardless of when it was, a wedding breakfast in no way looked like a typical breakfast, with fine savoury food and sweet cakes being served. Wedding breakfasts were at their most lavish in the Edwardian era through to the Second World War.

 

***St. Mark’s Church Mayfair, is a Grade I listed building, in the heart of London's Mayfair district, on North Audley Street. St Mark's was built between 1825 and 1828 as a response to the shortage of churches in the area. The population in Mayfair had grown with the demand for town houses by the aristocracy and the wealthy, as they moved in from the country. The building was constructed in the Greek revival style to the designs of John Peter Gandy. In 1878 the architect Arthur Blomfield made significant changes to the church, adding a timber roof, and introducing Gothic style features. The thirty-four feet (ten metre) façade, together with the elegant porch, is known as one of the finest in London. Being in Mayfair, it was a popular place for the weddings of aristocratic families. It was deconsecrated in 1974, and today it is used as a mixed use venue.

 

****In the first few decades of the Twentieth Century, up until the Second World War, it was customary to hold weddings on weekdays. An old folk rhyme that many of the people at that time would have known went: “Marry on Monday for health, Tuesday for wealth, Wednesday the best day of all, Thursday for crosses, Friday for losses, and Saturday for no luck at all”. It would have been considered bad luck to get married on a Saturday, and bad form to marry on a Sunday.

 

This upper-class gustatory scene, with fare such as you could expect from the Savoy, is not what you may first imagine, for it 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 tableaux 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 an Edwardian dinner, using cutlery, crockery and glassware from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in the United Kingdom. Each glass is hand blown using real glass. The plates have been gilded by hand and the cutlery set is made of polished metal. The napkin rings were made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom, as was the champagne flute that is filled with glittering golden yellow champagne. The silver cruet set, which peeps from behind the yellow roses, 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 gold candelabra on the table is also a 1:12 artisan piece that I was given as a teenager. The gold roses are hand-made, and the bowl they sit in is made of hand blown and decorated glass. They also come from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures, as do the blackberry tarts which look real and good enough to eat!

 

The sugar castor on the table is 1 ½ centimetres in height and half a centimetre in diameter. Its finial actually comes apart like its life size equivalent. The finial unscrews from the body so it can be filled. I am told that icing sugar can pass through the holes in the finial, but I have chosen not to try this party trick myself. A sugar castor was used in Edwardian times to shake sugar onto fruits and desserts.

a child staring at the sunset...

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 have left the hustle and bustle of London, travelling southwest to a stretch of windswept coastline just a short drive the pretty Cornish town of Penzance. Here, friends of Lettice, newlyweds Margot and Dickie Channon, have been gifted a Recency country “cottage residence” called ‘Chi an Treth’ (Cornish for ‘beach house’) as a wedding gift by the groom’s father, the Marquess of Taunton. Margot, encouraged by her father Lord de Virre who will foot the bill, has commissioned Lettice to redecorate a few of the principal rooms of ‘Chi an Treth’. In the lead up to the wedding, Lord de Virre has spent a great deal of money making the Regency house habitable after many years of sitting empty and bringing it up to the Twentieth Century standards his daughter expects, paying for electrification, replumbing, and a connection to the Penzance telephone exchange. Now, with their honeymoon over, Dickie and Margot have finally taken possession of their country house gift and have invited Lettice to come and spend a Friday to Monday with them so that she might view the rooms Margot wants redecorating for herself and perhaps start formulating some ideas as to how modernise their old fashioned décor. As Lettice is unable to drive and therefore does not own a car, Margot and Dickie have extended the weekend invitation to one of their other Embassy Club coterie, Lettice’s old childhood chum, Gerald, also a member of the aristocracy who has tried to gain some independence from his family by designing gowns from a shop in Grosvenor Street. Gerald owns a Morris*, so he can motor both Lettice and himself down from London on Friday and back again on Monday.

 

After the retirement of the housekeeper, Mrs. Trevethan, from the main house to the gatekeeper’s cottage, the quartet of Bright Young Things** find themselves alone in the sprawling double storey Regency residence of white stucco with ample time on their hands owing to a lack of distractions beyond what parlour games from the Nineteenth Century they found mouldering in the games room cupboard. Encouraged by the consumption of several bottles of French champagne before, during and after dinner, Lettice, Margot, Dickie and Gerald have embarked upon a game of sardines*** after Lettice suggested them playing it earlier in the day. An old house, new to them all, full of wonderful nooks and crannies is too much of a temptation not to play the game. So far Gerald has been found hiding behind an old oriental screen in one of the disused bedrooms and Margot inside the capacious, if slightly musty, interior of an empty wardrobe. Lettice was the last of them to find Margot, so it is her turn to hide and await the other three sardines to seek her out.

 

Abandoning the ideas of the disused bedrooms upstairs, Lettice has returned to the ground floor of ‘Chi an Treth’ in search of a much better hiding place. Seeking out the service entrance, she quietly pushes open the green baize door studded with dull brass tacks. Like all the other doors and windows of ‘Chi an Treth’, it groans on its hinges, but gives way easily, leading Lettice into the servants’ quarters of the house with its white painted walls and bare lightbulb utilitarian décor. She is about to go into the kitchen to seek out the pantry or a dry store cupboard when her eye catches a narrow wooden door standing partially ajar at the end of a rather short corridor with no other doors off it and only a small bench for furniture.

 

“Perfect!” she breathes with excitement, scuttling along the old, worn flagstone floor, her louis heels clicking loudly. “Shhhh!” she hisses at them in her slightly inebriated state. “You’re sure to give me away if I don’t hurry!”

 

Unusually, the door opens outwards, and unlike the green baize door, whilst it does creak, its groaning protests are far quieter than its counterparts. Slipping inside, Lettice finds the light pull cord and with eyes closed, yanks on it, hoping that this rather out-of-the-way store cupboard has been electrified. Her wishes are granted as with a click and the almost imperceptible buzz of electricity, the room is suddenly flooded in a soft golden light from a naked bulb above. A small flurry of dust motes disturbed into the air are illuminated in the glow.

 

“Oh bully for Lord de Virre!” Lettice exclaims, clasping her elegant hands in delight. “Thank goodness he insisted the service area of the house was electrified as well as the living areas.”

 

Happy with her choice of hiding place, Lettice settles to await for the others to find her out and sardine with her.

 

Figuring it will take a little while for her friends to find her and finding sitting in one spot doing nothing rather boring, Lettice decides to explore her cupboard hiding place more thoroughly. She works out quickly that it must be a storage room for things for the nearby dining room as there are stacks of neatly folded table linens on the lower shelves. There are also interesting odd pieces of various dinner sets including tureens without lids, jugs, bowls and stacks of mismatched plates.

 

“Hhhmmm. No longer usable, but evidently too good to throw away.” she remarks as she picks up a blue and white sugar bowl without a lid bearing a pretty floral pattern. She turns it over in her hands thoughtfully. “This must be Regency era. I wonder if the old captain himself used this.”

 

Putting it back, she continues to explore, finding incomplete canteens of cutlery, lacquered stands for vases and bowls and boxes of any amount of different cleaning agents from different eras of the house’s history. Lettice quietly wonders whether there are cupboards like this at Glynes**** and if so, what she might find in them.

 

“Perhaps my own family’s long lost portrait,” she remarks aloud, even though there is no one to hear her. Peering curiously into a Huntley and Palmer’s***** biscuit box full of age discoloured napkins she adds, “Not that we have one that I know of.”

 

Stepping back, she suddenly discovers that the pale blue satin front of her bodice has come away with dust from the Huntly and Palmer’s box.

 

“Oh no!” she exclaims, batting at the sooty looking smears with her hands. “Oh, Gerald will kill me if I ruin one of his dresses!”

 

Unwilling to pull out any of the neatly folded table linens on the lower shelves out and sully them for fear of Mrs. Trevethan’s wrath if she is in fact the regular user of them, Lettice begins to fossick for alternatives to dust down her gown and manage, if not eradicate, any marks on her bodice. Forgetting the box of old linen napkins in her panic, she searches the shelves high and low for a cloth of some kind.

 

It is then that she spots a muslin cloth which looks quite clean dangling from a stack on an upper shelf. Lettice stretches up, but isn’t quite tall enough to reach it, even when she stands on her toes. She jumps up but misses it. She jumps again and feels the fabric teasingly caress her fingertips like a light breeze. She jumps a third time, and this time catches the fabric between her right index and middle fingers. Locking them tightly, she lands on the ground again, but doesn’t realise that by doing so she is also bringing with her the rest of the pile as well as the cloth, and down it comes, colliding crashing, making such a din that Lettice screams in fright, adding to the discordant cacophony as wood splinters, newspaper crumples and china shatters over the unforgiving flagstone floor.

 

The little broom cupboard is plunged into a thick silence in the immediate wake of the accident. Standing with her back against a shelf, Lettice is momentarily shocked into stillness before her body starts to react to the near miss of the shower of objects that now lie smashed and broken across the ground, as opening her tightly clenched eyes she starts to tremble and then sob.

 

“Lettice! Lettice!” Dickie cries are heard getting closer and closer to her hiding place along with the thunder of his approaching footsteps as he bursts into the cupboard. His eyes widen at the carnage of splintered porcelain, pottery and glass across the floor along with shattered pieces of wood. As he takes it in, he looks over at his friend, dusty and sobbing, but apparently unharmed. “Lettice dear girl! Are you alright?”

 

It is like the floodgates open with his words and Lettice stumbles across the broken items into Dickie’s arms and cries, uttering great juddering sobs as she clings to him.

 

“There, there, old girl,” Dickie soothes reassuringly, running his hands over Lettice’s blonde hair as she buries herself into his chest. “It’s alright. You’re alright. No harm done. You’ve just had a bad fright is all.”

 

“Lettice!” Gerald’s voice calls anxiously as his running steps grow louder before finding Dickie and Lettice on the threshold of the store cupboard. “Lettice are you alright? Answer me.”

 

“Shh. Shh.” Dickie mutters. “It’s alright old girl.”

 

“Oh my god, Lettice!” Margot gasps, appearing at the door. “Dickie! Dickie, is she injured? Oh! I’ll never forgive myself if she’s been hurt.”

 

“It’s alright darling, it’s fine Gerald.” Dickie assures them. “Lettice just had a rather nasty fright and a near miss is all.” He sways gently, rocking Lettice slowly as she continues to cry, only with less force now as she starts to calm down. Looking over his shoulder at his wife’s face, looking even more pale than usual against her dark hair he says, “Go fetch the brandy from the drawing room would you, my love?”

 

“Of course! Of course!” Margot replies breathlessly as she turns to leave.

 

“And for god’s sake, don’t run Margot. Just walk.” he chides as she goes. “We don’t want you turning an ankle on the flags to top it all off.”

 

“What happened?” Gerald asks, looking at the mess lying across the ground and the swirl of dust motes dancing in the golden light cast by the naked lightbulb above as it gently circles above.

 

“I’d say a few boxes went for a tumble, dear boy.” Dickie observes. “But there’s been no harm done to Lettice here. Now has there?” He directs his last comment to the young lady in his arms.

 

“Which is more than I can say for the captain’s old dinner service.” Gerald remarks, bending down and picking up a chunk of white pottery by its brightly painted handle. “What a mess you’ve made Lettuce Leaf.”

 

Sniffing, Lettice releases herself from Dickie’s arms and wipes her eyes with the back of her now rather grubby hand, smearing kohl across her cheek. “Don’t… don’t call me that, Gerald,” she says in a breaking voice. “You know I don’t like it.”

 

Gerald smiles gratefully firstly at her and then at Dickie. “No,” he smirks. “No harm done to Lettice.”

 

“Here’s the brandy,” Margot calls, appearing at the door clutching the crystal decanter from the drawing room and a faceted glass tumbler.

 

“Capital, my love.” Dickie says gratefully.

 

Gerald takes them from Margot and pours several large slugs of brandy into the tumbler and hands it to Lettice, who takes it in both of her still slightly trembling hands and raises the glass to her quivering lips.

 

“I say old girl,” Dickie pipes up cheerfully in an effort to break the tension. “I always took you for being an expert at playing sardines!”

 

“Yes darling,” Gerald adds. “You know that you’re supposed to let us find you, not alert us of your hiding place by creating a ruckus.”

 

“Or a mess,” Lettice snuffles. Looking down at the broken pieces she notices what is left of an old pendulum wall clock amongst the debris, it’s glass face covering shattered and its hands telling the incorrect time of ten past ten, no doubt never to move again. “Oh, I am sorry Dickie.”

 

“Come, come!” Dickie replies, placing a caring arm around his friend’s shoulder. “It doesn’t matter about that. They’re just things. So long as you’re not hurt.” He smiles at her. “That’s what’s important.”

 

“Oh but Mrs. Trevethan!” Lettice protests. “She already has so much to do, looking after us and keeping the house tidy without this!” She extends a hand to the debris at her feet.

 

“Oh, pooh Mrs. Trevethan!” Margot replies, walking into the storeroom. “They don’t call this a broom cupboard for nothing!” She goes to a corner of the room which has remained undisturbed and pulls out a handmade birchwood broom and a metal bucket. “I’ll clean this up.” She looks over at Gerald, lolling languidly against the door frame holding the decanter of brandy. “And Gerald will help me, won’t you Gerald?”

 

“What? Me?” Gerald’s eyes grow wide as he looks back at Margot in shock as she withdraws a dustpan and brush. “But… but I’m a guest.”

 

“And such a helpful guest too,” Margot answers back in honeyed tones. “He designs frocks and sweeps floors.” She thrusts the dustpan and brush out to him forcefully. “What more could a hostess ask for?”

 

“But.. but what about Dickie?” he splutters.

 

“Dickie is playing nursemaid to Lettice,” she replies matter-of-factly. “So he’s got his hands full.”

 

“Evidently so have I.” Gerald replies glumly as he begrudgingly accepts the dustpan and brush from Margot.

 

Lettice giggles, but quickly smothers it with her hand as she receives a glare from her childhood friend.

 

“That’s better!” Dickie smiles. “Now, you just come out here, and we’ll leave Margot and Gerald to this.” He ushers Lettice out of the cupboard. “There’s a little seat out here in the hallway.”

 

The pair sit down on the small wooden bench in the hallway and watch in silence as Gerald and Margot start sorting things.

 

“Well, I don’t think this will ever go again.” Gerald chuckles as he picks up the wall clock and leans it against a corner of the shelves atop a stack of flour bags, its springs and cogs protesting metallically with its movement.

 

“If it even was going before, Gerald.” Margot replies. “I think our Mrs. Trevethan is a little bit of a hoarder, with so much space to store things and the run of the house her own until now.” She considers and assesses the mess on the floor with her left hand resting on her hip as she clutches the broom, looking a peculiar sight dressed in an elegant deep blue satin evening frock and high heels whilst holding it. “Now, any broken bits of wood can go into here.” She puts down a metal bucket. “And we’ll use it for firewood. And any broken glass and porcelain can go here.” She places a second bucket next to the first. “And I’ll get Mrs. Trevethan to deal with it in the morning.”

 

“I say,” Gerald remarks as he leans over a cracked square of wood and some discoloured tissue paper. “What’s this?”

 

“What’s what?” Margot asks as she starts sweeping broken pieces of pottery and shards of glass into a pile.

 

“This.” Gerald replies as he starts to move the splintered piece of wood.

 

“Gerald now isn’t a time for playing,” Margot says exasperatedly as she leans on the broom handle. “We’ll never get this cleaned up by breakfast time if you insist on fiddling with everything. Let’s just tidy this up. It won’t take long!”

 

“No!” protests Gerald, transfixed by what he has found. “I’m serious.”

 

“So am I, Gerald.” grumbles Margot.

 

Not hearing her querulous remark, he ignores her, and he moves closer to the pile of wood. “It looks like an old frame.” He shifts the wood aside. “A gilded frame.”

 

“Houses like this are full of old frames, Gerald,” Dickie calls from his seat on the bench next to Lettice where he cradles her with one arm, and the decanter of brandy in his other hand. “You know that. We English never like to throw away anything that might be of service at a later date.”

 

“No, this is different. It’s a beautiful frame. It must have been boxed up as it’s in splendid condition.”

 

Outside the store cupboard, Lettice and Dickie hear Margot’s broom cease its gentle swishing as the pair in the storeroom cease speaking.

 

“Margot? Gerald?” Dickie calls. “Are you alright?”

 

When no answer is forthcoming, both he and Lettice pick themselves up off the bench and walk to the door of the storeroom.

 

“I say you two,” Dickie continues. “What is going on here?” He looks at his wife and friend who are standing in the middle of the space, staring at the gilded frame as it gleams in the light, nestled comfortably amid a bed of crumpled tissue paper. His eyes widen.

 

“What is it, Gerald?” Lettice asks.

 

Gerald turns around and stares at Lettice, a look of amazement on his face. “See for yourself, darling.” he breathes.

 

Lettice looks at the painting inside the frame. Looking out from behind a thin layer of protective glass, a young lady with dark curls shaped into a stylish fashion by a host of red ribbons gazes over the bare shoulder. Two ropes of pearls hang about her elongated neck. However, it is her face, beautiful and radiant, with a knowing smile and soulful brown eyes that follow you about that catches her own eyes. She gasps.

 

“Lettice, dear girl,” breathes Dickie softly. “I think you may have inadvertently discovered the long lost Winterhatler****** of ‘Chi an Treth’.”

 

*Morris Motors Limited was a privately owned British motor vehicle manufacturing company established in 1919. With a reputation for producing high-quality cars and a policy of cutting prices, Morris's business continued to grow and increase its share of the British market. By 1926 its production represented forty-two per cent of British car manufacturing. Amongst their more popular range was the Morris Cowley which included a four-seat tourer which was first released in 1920.

 

**The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

 

***Sardines is an active game that is played like hide and go seek — only in reverse! One person hides, and everyone else searches for the hidden person. Whenever a person finds the hidden person, they quietly join them in their hiding spot. There is no winner of the game. The last person to join the sardines will be the hider in the next round. Sardines was a very popular game in the 1920s and 1930s played by houseguests in rambling old country houses where there were unusual, unknown and creative places to hide.

 

****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.

 

*****Huntley and Palmers is a British firm of biscuit makers originally based in Reading, Berkshire. The company created one of the world’s first global brands and ran what was once the world’s largest biscuit factory. Over the years, the company was also known as J. Huntley and Son and Huntley and Palmer. Huntley and Palmer were renown for their ‘superior reading biscuits’ which they promoted in different varieties for different occasions, including at breakfast time.

 

******Franz Xaver Winterhalter (1805 – 1873) was a German painter and lithographer, known for his flattering portraits of royalty and upper-class society in the mid-19th century. His name has become associated with fashionable court portraiture. Among his best known works are Empress Eugénie Surrounded by her Ladies in Waiting (1855) and the portraits he made of Empress Elisabeth of Austria (1865).

 

This cluttered storage space full of interesting remnants of times past may not be all that it first appears, for this scene is made up of items from my miniatures collection, including pieces that I have had since I was a child.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The lost Winterhalter painting of ‘Chi an Treth’ in its gilded frame is a 1:12 artisan piece made by V.H. Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The pendulum wall clock behind the frame I have had since I was a young child. It was either a Christmas or a birthday gift, but I cannot remember which.

 

The tin buckets, mop and birchwood broom are all artisan made miniatures that I have acquired in more recent years.

 

The feather duster on the top shelf I made myself using fledgling feathers (very spring) which I picked up off the lawn one day thinking they would come in handy in my miniatures collection sometime. I bound them with thread to the handle which is made from a fancy ended toothpick!

 

The table linens on the bottom right-hand shelves are all 1:12 size miniatures with beautiful tint stitching to finish each piece off. They were acquired from Michelle’s Miniatures in Sydney.

 

The porcelain jugs, bowls, tureens, plates and cups all come from different eBay online sellers.

 

The Huntly and Palmers’ box to the top right of the photograph comes from Jonesy’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Huntley and Palmers is a British firm of biscuit makers originally based in Reading, Berkshire. The company created one of the world’s first global brands and ran what was once the world’s largest biscuit factory. Over the years, the company was also known as J. Huntley and Son and Huntley and Palmer. Huntley and Palmer were renown for their ‘superior reading biscuits’ which they promoted in different varieties for different occasions, including at breakfast time.

 

In front bottom right hand corner of the photo is a can of Vim with stylised Art Deco packaging. It was made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering, as was the box of Sunlight soap in the small tin bucked to the right of the photograph. Vim was a common cleaning agent, used in any Edwardian household. Vim scouring powder was created by William Hesketh Lever (1st Viscount Leverhulme) and introduced to the market in 1904. It was produced at Port Sunlight in Wirrel, Merseyside, a model village built by Lever Brothers for the workers of their factories which produced the popular soap brands Lux, Lifebuoy and Sunlight. Kleeneze is a homeware company started in Hanham, Bristol. The company's founder, Harry Crook, had emigrated to the United States with his family several years earlier, and whilst there joined Fuller Brush as a sales representative. He returned to Bristol several years later, and started a business making brushes and floor polish which were sold door-to-door by salesmen. Technically Kleeneze didn’t start until 1923, which is two years after this story is set. I couldn’t resist including it, as I doubt I will ever be able to photograph it as a main part of any other tableaux. Thus, I hope you will forgive me for this indulgence.

 

On the shelf to the left of the photograph is some Zebo grate polish made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in the United Kingdom. Zebo (or originally Zebra) Grate Polish was a substance launched in 1890 by Reckitts to polish the grate to a gleam using a mixture that consisted of pure black graphite finely ground, carbon black, a binding agent and a solvent to keep it fluid for application with a cloth or more commonly newspaper.

 

The tin buckets, wooden apple box, basket, mop, brush, pan and birchwood broom are all artisan made miniatures that I have acquired in more recent years.

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 have followed Lettice southwest from her home, across St James’ Park to Hans Crescent in Belgravia, where the smart Edwardian four storey red brick and mock Tudor London home of the de Virre family stands. Two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things are getting married: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and Margot de Virre, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre. Lettice is visiting the home of the bride, which is a hive of activity in the lead up to the forthcoming nuptials.

 

Unusually, Lettice is ushered into the hall of the townhouse by a new maid rather than the de Virre’s butler, Mr. Geraldton. The maid is nervous and seems unsure of herself as she takes Lettice’s name and leads her up to the first floor to the gold drawing room where Lettice is informed the bride-to-be and her mother are.

 

“Miss Lettice Chetwynd, ma’am,” the maid mutters quickly before retreating back through the door and disappearing down the hallway.

 

“Lettice!” Margot gasps in delight, looking up from the cup of tea she holds in her lap.

 

“Oh Lettice!” Lady de Virre sighs. “Thank goodness! I might finally be able to speak to someone who has some sense.”

 

“What ever do you mean Lady de Virre?” Lettice asks, standing before her friend and her mother.

 

“I mean,” Lady de Virre suddenly falters as she sees Lettice clasping her green parasol with a black leather handle in her glove clad hand. “Oh. You aren’t stopping?” Her disappointment is palpable.

 

“Oh no, Lady de Virre! I mean, yes, Lady de Virre!” Lettice assures her hostess. “I came to see Margot, and of course you, although I can’t stay for too long. I have a potential client coming for afternoon tea.”

 

“Oh! That sounds exciting,” Margot enthuses. “Who?”

 

“Then if you are staying for tea: I assume you will stay for tea?” Lettice nods in assent to Lady de Virre’s question. “Why are you still holding your parasol?”

 

“Oh, the maid who answered the door didn’t take it, but really its…”

 

“Oh! That stupid, stupid girl!” mutters the older woman. “Can she never do anything right?” She picks herself up, out of the walnut salon chair she is comfortably sitting in and charges past Lettice to the door of the drawing room.

 

“Here Lettice, come sit by me,” Margot pats the gold brocade fabric next to her on the comfortable settee. “I could do with your support,” She giggles conspiratorially. “And your distraction.”

 

“Pegeen! Pegeen!” Lady de Virre calls shrilly down the hallway.

 

“Mummy, must you do that? You’re going to give me a headache,” Margot puts her cup on the low table before her and rubs her temples with her fingers. “Not that she hasn’t already.” she whispers to Lettice. “Mummy is really boring me to tears today. Who would ever have thought anyone could suck the joy and delight of organising a wedding? Lists of this, lists of that. Who will get offended sitting next to whom? And don’t get me started on my wedding dress.”

 

“I thought Gerald was designing it.”

 

“He is, but Mummy is trying to convince me that Lucile is a better choice.”

 

“Oh no, Margot. How dreadfully dull!”

 

Lady de Virre stalks back across the room, snatching Lettice’s parasol from where she has placed it leaning against the settee beside her and resumes her seat.

 

“Rather.” Margot replies to Lettice’s remark whilst glancing at her mother’s bristling figure.

 

A moment later the same nervous, mousy maid who let Lettice in appears through the door.

 

“You called, ma’am?”

 

“Pegeen, would you kindly take this,” Lady de Virre thrusts Lettice’s parasol towards the maid, the pointy end aimed dangerously at the young girl’s chest rather like a rifle in the titled lady’s hand. “And put it in the receptacle for which it was intended.”

 

“Ma’am?” The Irish maid looks alarmed, and glances awkwardly at Margot and Lettice installed comfortably on either end of the settee.

 

“She means, put it in the umbrella stand in the hallway, Pegeen.” Margot elucidates.

 

“Well why didn’t she say so?” Pegeen mutters as she grasps the offending end of the parasol which her mistress then releases from her steely grasp.

 

“And bring a third cup for Miss Chetwynd!” Lady de Virre bristles irritably.

 

The room falls silent until Pegeen closes the door behind her and her footsteps recede down the hallway.

 

“Oh it really is too tiresome!” huffs Margot’s mother.

 

“What is, Lady de Virre?” asks Lettice.

 

“Trying to find good staff in London. They all seem to be Irish halfwits these days, or girls who don’t know their place. I blame the war you know. Girls working in factories! Who would ever have thought?” Lettice and Margot glance at one another and try not to laugh. “Do you have the same problem, Lettice?”

 

“No, Lady de Virre.” Lettice smirks. “I have a very capable maid, and a charwoman, both of whom suit me very nicely.”

 

“Well, aren’t you the lucky one?” the older woman mutters sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

 

“I do have the card for the domestics agency in St James’ that I used to find my maid, if you’d like Lady de Virre.”

 

“Ah! You see Margot. Just as I was saying! Here is a girl who speaks sense and isn’t a flibbertigibbet like you.”

 

“Oh Mummy!”

 

“Ah, where is Mr. Geraldton, Lady de Virre?”

 

“He’s gone to Bournemouth.” Margot explains.

 

“His mother is quite unwell,” Lady de Virre chimes in. “Poor man! Now, perhaps you can talk some sense into my daughter, Lettice. I’m trying to get her to choose a wedding breakfast menu,” She picks up a sheath of papers from the small round tired table to her left and waves them in irritation at Margot. “Try as I might, she just won’t do it!”

 

“It’s not that I won’t, Mummy. I just want some time to look at them and think.” Margot looks at Lettice and rolls her eyes.

 

“Well we don’t have time Marguerite! The Savoy is always popular, as is Claridges.”

 

In the distance, a doorbell rings shrilly from somewhere below.

 

“Actually, Lady de Virre, that’s why I came here.”

 

“You’re going to throw a wedding breakfast for Marguerite and Richard?”

 

“Well, not exactly.” Lettice explains. “I actually came to see in Margot and Dickie would be interested in having a celebratory pre-wedding cocktail party at my flat. Would you Margot?”

 

“Oh really Lettice? Darling! You are a brick!” Margot enthuses. She embraces her friend and smiles broadly. “Of course we would!”

 

“Excellent, then I’ll,”

 

“S’cuse me ma’am,” Pegeen nudges open the door of the drawing room with the heel of her shoe, struggling under the weight of an enormous carboard box.

 

“Pegeen,” Lady de Virre gasps. “I thought I told you to bring a cup for Miss Chetwynd.”

 

“Can’t ma’am,” the maid replies. “Not when I’ve got this enormous box in ma hands.” She lowers it with a groan onto a vacant footstool where it lands with a thud. “Lord it ain’t half heavy ma’am.”

 

Lady de Virre crumples her nose in distaste as she peers at the box. “Well, what is it?”

 

“Don’t know ma’am. It’s for Miss de Virre.”

 

“Oh! It must be another wedding gift!” the older woman exclaims with an excited clap of her hands, her frustrations forgotten.

 

“I do hope it isn’t more linen. New parcels of it arrive every day! Gifts from unimaginative relatives!”

 

“It’s mighty heavy if it is linen, miss,”

 

“Ah! Another teacup, Pegeen!” Lady de Virre says commandingly. “Or have you already forgotten?”

 

“No ma’am,” Pegeen replies, looking curiously at the box. “I was just waitin’ for Miss de Virre to open her gift.”

 

“Out girl! And fetch a teacup for Miss Chetwynd! Now!”

 

The maid jumps at her mistress’ raised voice and retreats, closing the door behind her. Lettice and Margot cannot help themselves as they try to stifle giggles of mirth.

 

“You should be more appreciative of people’s generosity, Marguerite!” Lady de Virre wags a finger admonishingly at her daughter. “When you have your own household to manage, you’ll be grateful for every last stich of that linen.”

 

“Do you know, Lettice, we even received a mounted stag’s head as a gift from one of my Scottish cousins?” Margot laughs.

 

“No!” Lettice giggles.

 

“Yes! Goodness knows where we shall put it!”

 

“I could think of somewhere.” Lettice tries to control her peals of laughter.

 

“So could I!”

 

The pair tumble into fits of giggling.

 

“Oh, did you receive my gift Margo darling?” Lettice asks when she has finally composed herself enough to ask.

 

“Yes darling, I did, and I love it!”

 

“See Marguerite! I told you that you need to reply to all these cards that are mounting up!” Her mother waves her hand towards the top of the secretaire behind her, the surface of which is covered in wedding and congratulations cards.

 

“Oh good!” Lettice smiles.

 

“And we received your parent’s gift too, thank you Lettice.” Lady de Virre adds. “Marguerite will write a thank you card to them soon. Won’t you Marguerite?”

 

“Yes Mummy, I will! Such a beautifully modern tea set,” Margot says with a smile. “I never knew your parents knew my taste so intimately.” She winks conspiratorially at Lettice.

 

“Who is this gift from?” Lady de Virre asks.

 

Taking out a beautiful card of a young bride looking angelically at a cake, Margot scans the message inside. “Lady Ponting, whoever she is.”

 

“She’s the Marquess’ widowed younger sister.” Lady de Virre remarks knowingly. “You’ll need to brush up on your new family history before the wedding!”

 

“Yes Mummy! I know!” Margot acknowledges her mother’s sharp remark. Turning to her friend she continues, “Now that I’m marrying into the upper echelons of the aristocracy, Mummy has become a walking,” She sighs. “And talking, Debrett’s*.”

 

“Well, aren’t you going to open it?” Lady de Virre asks her daughter, looking at the box on the footstool with eyes glistening with excitement.

 

Margot removes the twine from around the box and opens it, a froth of white tissue paper spilling forth in soft whispers. Within the box she withdraws a delicate white china gravy boat decorated with roses with a gilt rim. Her mother reaches across the table with her bejewelled hand and seizes the piece from her. Turning it over she nods with approval.

 

“Hhhmm. Royal Doulton. An excellent choice.” she remarks.

 

“Come on Margot darling!” Lettice interrupts purposefully. “Let’s talk about your pre-wedding cocktail party before I have to go. Who would you like to invite? Gerald of course because he’s making your wedding dress.” She glances up at Lady de Virre to see whether she has heard and acknowledged her remark. “Celia, Peter, Leslie,”

 

At that moment, Pegeen returns with a teacup for Lettice. “Cor!” she says, eyeing the Royal Doulton china nestled amongst the cushions of white tissue paper. “If I’d known that box was full of china, I wouldn’t of bothered bringin’ another cup!”

 

*Debrett's is a British publisher and authority on etiquette and behaviour, founded in 1769 with the publication of the first edition of The New Peerage. The company takes its name from its founder, John Debrett.

 

Although perhaps a little cluttered and somewhat old fashioned by 1920s standards, the de Virre’s Edwardian style drawing room is very elegant and would have been typical of such a room in an established upper-class household during the inter-war period. The upper classes, whether titled or not, tended to enjoy their opulent and lavish interiors. Only the brave or modern thinker would have swept away the accumulation of antiques over the generations for the clean lined, stripped back Art Deco interiors fashionable in the new houses, flats and hotels being built around Britain and the world. This upper-class domestic scene is different from what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures, some of which come from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableaux include:

 

The gold satin upholstered settee and the Hepplewhite chair with the lemon satin upholstery were made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq. The coffee table in the foreground is made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Creal.

 

On the coffee table stands a silver serving tray on which are a silver coffee and tea set, a porcelain sugar bowl and milk jug and a glass bowl featuring a selection of biscuits. The galleried silver serving tray is engraved and was made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The tea and coffee pot are also made by them. The glass bowl of biscuits was made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering, who specialise in 1:12 size foods and glassware with amazing realism and attention to detail. The porcelain tea set, which has two matching cups and saucers, one on the coffee table and one on the two tier Regency table, were part of a job lot of over one hundred pieces of 1:12 chinaware I bought from a seller on E-Bay. The pieces are remarkably dainty and the patterns on them are so pretty. In front of the tea set stands a wedding card of an Edwardian bride looking at a wedding cake. It is a 1:12 size replica of a real Edwardian wedding card and was made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

Behind the settee stands a walnut grand piano covered in family photographs and bibelots. The piano I have had since I was around eleven years old. Like a real piano, its lid does prop open on an angle. It has a matching piano stool. The de Virre’s family photos are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are from various suppliers, but all are metal. The three prong candelabra behind the photograph frames is an artisan piece of sterling silver made in Berlin and is actually only 3 centimetres in height and 3 centimetres in width. The vase of red roses on the piano is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium.

 

The Georgian revival bureau to the left of the picture comes from Town Hall Miniatures. Made to very high standards, each drawer opens and closes. It is covered in Edwardian wedding cards made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. On the writing surface of the bureau sit some papers also made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures, and a miniature ink bottle and pen made by the Little Green Workshop in England who specialise in high end, high quality miniatures. The ink bottle is made from a tiny faceted crystal bead and features a sterling silver bottom and lid. The pen is also sterling silver and features a tiny pearl in its end.

 

The floral arrangement in the farthest corner of the room is made by hand by Falcon Miniatures in America who specialise in high end miniatures. The vase of orange roses on the tall Bespaq stand to the right of the photo is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium.

 

The paintings around the wall are all made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States, except the small gilt painting of a sailing boat in the upper left-hand corner of the photo. It was made by Marie Makes Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The Royal Doulton style dinner set featuring roses in the carboard box came from a miniature dollhouse specialist on E-Bay.

 

The miniature Persian rug in the foreground of the photo was made by hand by Mackay and Gerrish in Sydney, whilst the one in the back beneath the piano was hand woven by Pike, Pike and Company in the United Kingdom.

 

The gold flocked Edwardian wallpaper is beautiful hand impressed paper given to me by a friend, which inspired 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 have followed Lettice southwest from her home, across St James’ Park to Hans Crescent in Belgravia, where the smart Edwardian four storey red brick and mock Tudor London home of the de Virre family stands. Two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things are getting married: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and Margot de Virre, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre. Lettice is visiting the home of the bride, which is a hive of activity in the lead up to the forthcoming nuptials.

 

Lettice has just been spending time with Margot and her mother in the house’s gold drawing room and is just leaving to return home to Cavendish Mews to meet a potential client. As she walks brusquely down the hall, past Lord de Virre’s study, her louis heels click loudly against the parquetry floor.

 

“Margot! Margot, is that you?” Lord de Virre’s voice calls out through the partially open door.

 

Lettice stops, turns and pops her head into the study. Decorated with dark mahogany furniture, gold embossed wallpaper, thick Persian rugs and trophies and souvenirs of Lord de Virre’s travels, it is a masculine room which exudes comfort and cosiness. The room is dominated by a great mahogany rolltop desk, at which Lord de Virre sits hunched over. The scratch of a pen against paper can be heard, and a thin silver trail of exotic smelling smoke arises from the silver ashtray sitting to his right.

 

“No Lord de Virre,” Lettice answers his call. “It’s only me.”

 

“Ah!” Lord de Virre turns around in his seat, beaming at his young guest. “Lettice! We don’t see you nearly enough these days!”

 

“London calls,” she replies gaily.

 

“Yes, with all its delicious temptations for the young.” He picks up a small glass of port and sips it, and it is then that Lettice notices the finely faceted decanter of deep golden liquid on the desk’s surface. “Have you been visiting the bride-to-be?”

 

“I have Lord de Virre.”

 

“Good girl! She needs some distraction from her mother and her endless lists of wedding to-dos.”

 

“Is that why you’re hiding in here, Lord de Virre?”

 

The older man colours at Lettice’s suggestion. “Oh, I’m no good with table settings, wedding dresses and that sort of thing,” he blusters, fiddling with the writing paper on the desk in front of him. “Anyway, I’ve just been scribbling down a few words whilst I think of them for my father-of-the-bride speech.”

 

Lettice blushes too, not wishing to cause embarrassment to a man whom she likes very much. Charles de Virre, unlike her own father, has been anything but distant, and always showed interest in anything she spoke about when she came to visit or stay with de Virres, even as a silly little girl or teenager before the war. As a businessman, rather than a gentleman like her father, Lord de Virre always encouraged Lettice’s desire to follow her dream of becoming an interior designer, and his support and sound business advice has been welcome since the inception of her enterprise.

 

“You know,” Lettice remarks to try and dispel the unease she has created as she slips through the door and into the male preserve. “I always found this room fascinating: intimidating but fascinating nonetheless.”

 

“Yes, well,” Lord de Virre replies, picking up his cigarette and drawing on it before blowing out a plume of greyish white smoke. “The secrets of industry are always interesting to a young entrepreneur ahead of her time.”

 

“That’s very kind of you to say, Lord de Virre.” Lettice colours at the compliment. She walks over to Lord de Virre. “Margot and I used to sneak in here sometimes whilst you were away during the war.”

 

“Did you now?” He cocks an eyebrow at his slender young companion as she sidles up to his big desk. “I didn’t know that. Cheeky girls. I hope that Lucie never caught you in here.”

 

“No.” Lettice smiles. “She never did. We were careful. Margot always said that she had a sense of you in this room. She said if she could catch a whiff of your eau de cologne, or your cigarettes,” She glances at the half smoked cigarette in his hand. “Then you were alright. You might be in danger, but you would be alright.” She titters in an embarrassed fashion. “It sounds so silly hearing myself say that, but I guess it was Margot’s and my game, or mantra perhaps as the war went on and we grew up.”

 

“Well,” Lord de Virre replies softly, touched by Lettice’s confession. “It must have worked, because here I am.”

 

“Yes,” Lettice chuckles. “Here you are.”

 

“Well, it was either yours and Margot’s mantra, or Lucie’s photo.” He indicates to a photo of his wife in a brass frame on the desktop next to one of Margot as a baby.

 

“It’s a very pretty photo of her,” Lettice observes.

 

“Yes, Lucie had it taken in 1916. I carried it inside my coat in the pocket next to my heart for the remaining two years of the war. She swears that’s what brought me home.”

 

“Well, it was one thing or the other. The main thing is, Lord de Virre, you did make it home.”

 

“But many others didn’t.” the older man speaks the unspoken ending to her sentence. “Yes. I dare say that Lucie wouldn’t have been so happy with her prospective son-in-law had Margot come home with the news in 1914 when young Harry was still heir apparent.”

 

“Would you have minded, Lord de Virre?”

 

“Me? Good heavens no!” He takes another sip of his port, and indicates to the bottle, the invitation to imbibe declined politely by Lettice with a gentle shake of her head. “Margot could have loved him before he was the heir apparent, and he was destined to a life of impecuniosity and obscurity.”

 

“Margot said that she would have married him even if he was titleless, penniless and you disapproved.”

 

“Did she? Well! Bully for her! Good to know she has some of my fighting spirit that Lucie hasn’t managed to tame.” He smiles to himself as he runs his fingers over the frame of his daughter as a baby. “No, I have enough money from my business arrangements to have kept Margot in stockings and fans for a good many years. I think I can comfortably extend that largess to support them both. Just between you and I, Lettice, I suspect that is why the Marquess is so keen on the match of his heir with the daughter of a man in trade with a bought title.”

 

“Surely, surely you aren’t suggesting the Marquess?” Lettice’s question trails off.

 

“Unlike your father, perhaps under the wise influence of his eldest son, the Marquess hasn’t modernised, and unlike me, he didn’t have a good war. No, I’m afraid to say that he may be property rich, but,” He huffs awkwardly. “It appears that that’s where it ends.”

 

“But he’s giving Margot and Dickie a house in Cornwall!”

 

“And who do you think is bankrolling the renovations to have it electrified, connected to the Penzance telephone exchange, plumbed for goodness sake?”

 

“Oh, I had no idea!” Lettice rests her hand on the edge of the desk to steady herself at the news.

 

“Well,” Lord de Virre points the glowing end of his cigarette at Lettice. “Just don’t you say anything.” He taps the side of his nose knowingly. “At least Lucie is happy. She can’t do enough to please young Dickie. She finally gets her wish.”

 

“Margot’s happiness.” Lettice smiles

 

“Well yes, that too,” Lord de Virre remarks. “But first and foremost a real title in the family.” He chuckles cheekily to himself.

 

“Oh Lord de Virre!” Lettice scoffs. “You are awful!”

 

“Now, thinking of business, Lettice, I’m glad you’re here. I’d like to discuss a little bit of business with you.”

 

“With me, Lord de Virre?” she asks in surprise.

 

“Yes Lettice.” he replies matter-of-factly. “You are a successful young businesswoman, are you not?”

 

“Well, I don’t know if I’d go quite that far,” Lettice blushes again at the compliment. “Yet.”

 

“Nonsense! You’ve been listening to your parents too much, my girl! Now, I believe that once the honeymoon is over, the newlyweds are planning to invite you down to their new seaside residence in Penzance to show it off. When my darling daughter asks you to redecorate a few of the principal rooms,”

 

“That’s very presumptuous of you, Lord de Virre!”

 

“Not at all, Lettice. I know she will for a fact.”

 

“And how do you know?”

 

“Because I am the one who planted the seed in her mind.” He laughs good naturedly. “The house is really quite beautiful, but it’s not been lived in and neglected for far too long. The old retainers who caretake the place do as good a job as they are able, but it needs some modernisation and updating beyond electricity, a telephone and plumbed bathrooms. So, when she suggests that you do some redecoration for her, stand your ground and tell her that you won’t do it as a friendly favour. You’re a businesswoman Lettice, so she must pay.”

 

“But you just said that Dickie hasn’t a bean! How are they to pay?”

 

“Calm yourself, child,” Lord de Virre waves his hands in front of Lettice, trying to dampen her concerns. “Whatever she wants, whatever it costs, she can have. You just send your bills to me. Alright?”

 

“Really Lord de Virre?”

 

“Yes, Lettice. And just think what a feather that will be for your business hat. First the Duchess of Whitby, and then the daughter-in-law of the Marquess of Taunton!”

 

“Well, that would be something.” Lettice muses at the thought, a smile teasing the corners of her mouth upwards.

 

“Then we have an arrangement, Miss Chetwynd?” Lord de Virre extends his hand towards Lettice.

 

“I think we do, Lord de Virre.” Lettice takes his hand, and they shake in businesslike style to seal the arrangement.

 

Dark and masculine, this tiny corner of Lord de Virre’s study is different from what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures, some of which come from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableaux include:

 

The mahogany rolltop desk is a miniature that I have had since I was about eleven years old. The top does roll up and down, and the pigeon holes and writing area of the desk move forward, just like a real rolltop desk. I bought the desk along with a lot of other 1:12 miniatures from a High Street speciality dollhouse shop in England. The receipt with a few handwritten amendments is actually the scroll with the pinked edge in the far right pigeon hole of the desk! Much of the printing has faded, but as you an see the handwritten amendments can still be seen in black ink.

 

Lord de Virre’s family photos are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and are made of metal with glass in each.

 

On the desk are some 1:12 artisan miniature ink bottles, stamps, a blotter, a roller and letter rack, all made by the Little Green Workshop in England who specialise in high end, high quality miniatures. The ink bottles are made from tiny faceted crystal beads and have sterling silver bottoms and lids. The ink blotter is sterling silver too and has a blotter made of real black felt, cut meticulously to size to fit snugly inside the frame. The stamp is made of brass. The silver letter rack which contains some 1:12 size correspondence, also made by the Little Green Workshop. The silver pen with a pearl end and the letter opener with a cloisonné handle are also made by the Little Green Workshop. All the piles of correspondence, bills and documents atop the desk were made meticulously by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

Also made by the Little Green Workshop is the silver ashtray. Made from a metal piece used for jewellery making, it features faceted crystals inserted into it. It has ‘ash’ moulded inside it so it looks remarkably real. A single cigarette with a red burning tip rests against its lip. This is the smallest of my 1:12 miniature collection. The cigarette is a tiny five millimetres long and just one millimetre wide! Made of paper, I have to be so careful that it doesn’t get lost when I use it! Also on the desk is a box of Swan Vesta matches, which is a 1:12 miniature hand made by Jonesy’s Miniatures in England. Swan Vestas matches are manufactured under the House of Swan brand, which is also responsible for making other smoking accessories such as cigarette papers, flints and filter tips. The matches are manufactured by Swedish Match in Sweden using local, sustainably grown aspen. The Swan brand began in 1883 when the Collard and Kendall match company in Bootle on Merseyside near Liverpool introduced 'Swan wax matches'. These were superseded by later versions including 'Swan White Pine Vestas' from the Diamond Match Company. These were formed of a wooden splint soaked in wax. They were finally christened 'Swan Vestas' in 1906 when Diamond merged with Bryant and May and the company enthusiastically promoted the Swan brand. By the 1930s 'Swan Vestas' had become 'Britain's best-selling match'.

 

The bottle of port in its faceted glass bottle and the tiny port glass are both actually made of plastic and come from a miniature suppliers in Shanghai.

 

Atop the desk stands a photo in a frame. Like the other two photographs in the pictre, it too is a real photo, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames is also from Melody Jane’s Dollhouse Suppliers in the United Kingdom and is made of are metal with glass. The Edwardian mahogany clock next to the frame is a 1:12 artisan miniature made by Hall’s Miniature Clocks, supplied through Doreen Jeffries Small Wonders Miniatures in England. Next to it you can just see the base of an urn. The urn is only two and a half centimetres high and is an antique miniature and has been hand turned and polished. It has an African ebony body and a bubinga wood top and base. Next to the urn, on the right-hand side of the rolltop desk’s top stand three ledgers from Shepherd’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

In the background you can catch tantalising glimpses of other things in Lord de Virre’s study including a Regency painting of a horse in a gold frame from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering, and a hand painted ginger jar from Thailand which stands on a Bespaq plant stand. Bespaq is a high-end miniature furniture maker with high attention to detail and quality.

 

The Persian rug you can just glimpse in te bottom right-hand corer of the photo was hand woven by Pike, Pike and Company in the United Kingdom.

 

The gold flocked Edwardian wallpaper is beautiful hand impressed paper given to me by a friend, which inspired 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 we are in the very modern and up-to-date 1920s kitchen of Lettice’s flat: usually Edith her maid’s preserve. However, this morning it has been invaded by two deliverymen from nearby Harrods department store. Two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things are getting married: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and Margot de Virre, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre. Lettice is hosting an exclusive buffet supper party in their honour this evening, which is turning out to be one of the events of the 1921 London Season. Over the last few days the flat has been in upheaval as Edith and Lettice’s charwoman* Mrs. Boothby have been cleaning the flat thoroughly in preparation for the occasion. Today they will move some of the furnishings to make space for the guests to dance and mingle and roll up the carpets so Mrs. Boothby can give the parquet floors a good waxing before the first guest arrives. Lettice has fled her flat for the day to avoid all the upheaval and keep out of the way of her servants. The florist is expected at midday and the caterers from Harrods at four o’clock, but for now, all the alcohol for the party has arrived.

 

“Cor! Would yer look at all that!” Mrs. Boothby gasps as she slips into the kitchen via the door that leads from the flat’s entrance hall and stares at the kitchen table. “I was hopin’ for a nice reviving cup of Rosie-Lee** before I starts polishin’ the dinin’ room floor.”

 

“Not a chance I’m afraid, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith sighs. “Not until these gentlemen are finished. As you see, my table has been taken over by deliveries.”

 

“’Scuse me, Miss,” a green liveried deliveryman mutters as he tries to slip unobtrusively past Edith, a large wooden crate of champagne bottles in his broad, muscular arms.

 

“Sorry.” Edith slips a little closer to the stove and watches as the box is deposited onto the table with a soft thud and the rattle of bottles.

 

“Cor! ‘Ow many people is Miss Lettice expectin’ tonight, dearie?”

 

“About one hundred and twenty guests I think, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Gawd knows where they’s gonna fit.” Mrs. Boothby casts her eyes to ceiling. She picks out a bottle from the crate. Looking at the label is starts to read aloud, “Da Rock… da Rockegree.”

 

“De Rochegré,” Edith corrects her appalling French pronunciation.

 

“You certainly know French champagne!” The deliveryman cocks his eyebrow in obvious surprise, but gives her a happy smile, revealing a neat set of white teeth as his blue eyes sparkle.

 

“I work for a flapper,” Edith replies, blushing at the compliment, but daring to return his smile with a shy one of her own. “It pays to know.”

 

“Right you are, Miss!” the deliveryman exclaims, tapping his finger to his cap. “’Scuse me, but there’s more where these come from.” And he walks towards the door that leads to the back service stairs of Cavendish Mews, slipping aside to let another Harrods deliveryman, older than him wearing glasses carrying a bottle of gin and a bottle of Cinzano, pass.

 

“Humph!” Mrs. Boothby mutters in a disgruntled fashion, screwing up her nose and depositing the bottle back into the crate in a rather offhand way. “French!” she sniffs as it clatters back into the crate.

 

“What’s wrong with French champagne, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks, thinking to herself that it’s unlikely the old Cockney woman from Poplar has ever had so much as a taste of French champagne in her life.

 

“Well, it’s fancy ain’t it?” She crews up her nose. “And it’s foreign!” She glares at the offending bottle as its glass gleams in the morning sunshine pouring through the kitchen window. “I don’t like foreign. Give me a good pint of British beer at the ‘Appy Go Lucky** any day of the week.”

 

“Well, if Miss Lettice and her friends drink it, it can’t be all bad, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

The old woman gives her a doubtful look. “Well, nuffink’s as good as a nice reviving cup of Rosie-Lee is it?” she asked pointedly.

 

“Oh, alright then. I’ll make you a cup,” Edith gives in. “But you’ll have to have it over here by the stove. There isn’t any room on the table, what with the champagne buckets, glasses and bottles in the way.”

 

“Ta very much, dearie.” the Cockney woman says with a smug and satisfied grin.

 

Edith busies herself using the small shelf on the right-hand side of the stove to make a pot of tea for herself and the charwoman.

 

“Fetch me two cups, and the sugar bowl from the dresser, will you Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Right you are, dearie!” she replies cheerfully, pulling down two Deftware teacups and the sugar bowl.

 

“You’ll have to settle for milk directly from the bottle this morning,” Edith mutters as she walks over to the food safe and withdraws a pint bottle of milk. “As I shan’t have the time, or it looks like the space, to wash a milk jug.”

 

“I don’t mind, dearie! As long as I get my Rosie-Lee. I’m about parched, and I can’t be polishin’ the dinin’ room floor wiv a dry mouth.”

 

Edith pours hot water over the tealeaves in the pot and stirs it vigorously before hitting the rim of the pot three times with her spoon. Turning back to the table, she sighs. “Where is all this going to go?”

 

“Down the gullets of them rich fancy guests what’s comin’ tonight, I shouldn’t wonder!” The wiry thin Cockney woman bursts out laughing at her own joke, which turns into one of her bouts of fruity coughing.

 

“Well said!” the first and younger of the Harrods deliverymen pipes up as he steps across the threshold of the kitchen through the service entrance. “You are a card, aren’t you mother?”

 

“Mother!” Mrs. Boothby flaps her hand at him. “I ain’t your mother. Cheeky blighter!”

 

The deliveryman deposits another rattling crate of bottles onto the kitchen table. “A dozen Deutz and Geldermann.” he remarks, looking to Edith with another broad smile.

 

“Thank you.” she replies, daring to meet his eyes and smiling a little more broadly this time. Turning back momentarily to Mrs. Boothby she remarks, “More French champagne.”

 

The two women watch the handsome deliveryman leave again, his broad shouldered bulk filling the doorframe. They remain silent for a few moments.

 

“Well, you are a dark ‘orse, dearie!” Mrs. Boothby remarks, sizing up her companion with a wide eyed gaze.

 

“What on earth do you mean, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Well, look at you, all sweetness and innocence in your blue and white cotton print morning uniform, flirtin’ wiv the deliveryman!”

 

“I wasn’t flirting!” Edith splutters. She spins around and starts pouring the tea, trying to hide the flush of colour rising up her neck and flooding her cheeks. “I was only talking, that’s all.”

 

“You was talkin’, and smilin’, and flirtin’ my girl! Don’t you deny it!” The older woman leans on the shelf of the stove and peers from her vantage point up into Edith’s face, trying unsuccessfully to catch her eye, but clearly seeing her blush.

 

“Oh, you do create something from nothing.”

 

“And ‘ere I was, thinkin’ you was sweet the grocer’s delivery boy.” the older woman continues to tease, smiling cheekily as Edith squirms under her gaze.

 

“Frank Leadbetter? Mrs. Boothby, you do talk a lot of rot!” She looks up, her face now quite scarlet. “I’m just being friendly is all!”

 

“Aahh… friendly,” the older woman remarks with a cocked eyebrow and a knowing look as she picks up her cup of tea. “I see.”

 

“Mrs. Boothby!”

 

“Ahem!” The older of the deliverymen clears his throat, interrupting the two ladies.

 

Turning around in surprise, Edith and Mrs. Boothby stare across at the skinny middle aged man who returns their gaze critically over the top of his glasses. Clearly embarrassed at inadvertently catching them in the middle of a very personal conversation, he smiles awkwardly at them.

 

“Yes?” Edith asks, wiping her hands down her apron, but trying to hold his gaze with confidence she doesn’t now have.

 

“Aahh, that’s the last of the delivery, Miss. If you could just sign here, Miss?”

 

He hands her his clipboard and pen. Edith takes it from him and signs the form agreeing that the delivery is complete, without even glancing at the inventory. Anxious that he leaves so that she can recover her dignity, she thrusts the clipboard back to him. “Very good.”

 

Taking it back, he tips his hat and mutters, “Good day, ladies.”

 

Scuttling out the service door, Edith follows him, closes it behind him and snibs it. She stands with her back to the room for a moment whilst she regains her composure, taking a few deep and calming breaths, all the while feeling Mrs. Boothby’s eyes upon her.

 

Finally turning back, Edith mutters, “Oh you are awful sometimes, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

The Cockney charwoman smiles as she leans against the stove, her saucer in one hand and her cup raised to her lips. Lowering it to reveal a smile as mirth filled as her eyes, she says, “And youse a flirt, dearie.” She pauses, once again considering the young maid in a new light. “Still, I don’t blame you. Youse a pretty little fing, ‘though I suspect you don’t know quite how pretty you is. And,” She takes a deep sigh. “If I was firty years younger, I’d flirt wiv ‘im too.” She shakes her head and narrows her eyes as she glances towards the closed door. “‘E was a good looking fella, ‘e was.”

 

Anxious to change the subject and salvage some dignity, Edith walks across the room. “Come on Mrs. Boothby, help me move these bottles off the table and onto the bench. I need to clean all these glasses and sort the crockery and the silverware before the caterers arrive this afternoon. I’ll never be able to do it without my table to work on.”

 

“Is it worf a ‘Untley and Palmer’s to go wiv me Rosie-Lee?”

 

“You can have two Huntley and Palmers of your choice from the special box I ordered from Harrods for tonight’s party if you do.”

 

“Oh!” Mrs. Boothby beams in delight. “Ta!”

 

The two women begin moving the bottles, Edith’s embarrassment gone, and Mrs. Boothby’s mischief abated, as they focus on the job at hand.

 

*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.

 

**Rosie-Lee is Cockney slang for tea, and it is one of the most well-known of all Cockney rhyming slang.

 

This busy domestic kitchen scene is a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

On Edith’s deal table is a panoply of bottles for the party. The Harrod’s crate, which I purchased from an EBay seller in the United Kingdom, is full of bottles of Deutz and Geldermann and De Rochegré champagne. All are artisan miniatures and made of glass and some have real foil wrapped around their necks. They and the various bottles of wine and mixers in the background are made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The bottle of Gordon’s Dry Gin, the bottle of Crème de Menthe, Cinzano, Campari and Martini are also 1:12 artisan miniatures, made of real glass, and came from a specialist stockist in Sydney. Gordon's London Dry Gin was developed by Alexander Gordon, a Londoner of Scots descent. He opened a distillery in the Southwark area in 1769, later moving in 1786 to Clerkenwell. The Special London Dry Gin he developed proved successful, and its recipe remains unchanged to this day. The top markets for Gordon's are (in descending order) the United Kingdom, the United States and Greece. Gordon's has been the United Kingdom’s number one gin since the late Nineteenth century. It is the world's best-selling London dry gin. Crème de menthe (French for "mint cream") is a sweet, mint-flavored alcoholic beverage. Crème de menthe is an ingredient in several cocktails popular in the 1920s, such as the Grasshopper and the Stinger. It is also served as a digestif. Cinzano vermouths date back to 1757 and the Turin herbal shop of two brothers, Giovanni Giacomo and Carlo Stefano Cinzano, who created a new "vermouth rosso" (red vermouth) using "aromatic plants from the Italian Alps in a recipe which is still secret to this day. Campari is an Italian alcoholic liqueur, considered an apéritif. It is obtained from the infusion of herbs and fruit (including chinotto and cascarilla) in alcohol and water. It is a bitters, characterised by its dark red colour.

 

The champagne glasses are 1:12 artisan miniatures. Made of glass, they have been blown individually by hand by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering and are so fragile and delicate that even I with my dainty fingers have broken the stem of one. They stand on an ornate silver tray that I have had since I was around eight years old. The silver cocktail shaker is also made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures. The silver wine cooler in the foreground is made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.

 

On the first shelf of dresser that can be seen just to the right of shot stands the Deftware kitchen tea set. Each piece features the traditional painting of a windmill.

 

To the left of the dresser, a spice cabinet with six marked drawers hangs from the wall. Also hanging on the wall are three copper frypans with black metal handles which, along with the copper kettle on the stove came from a specialist dollhouse supplier.

 

Edith’s Windsor chair, just visible beyond the bottles, is a hand-turned 1:12 artisan miniature which came from America. Unfortunately, the artist did not carve their name under the seat, but it is definitely an unmarked artisan piece.

 

In the background you can see a very modern and up-to-date 1920s gas stove. It would have been expensive to instal at the time, and it would have been the cook’s or maid’s pleasure to cook on and in. It would have included a thermostat for perfect cooking and without the need of coal, it was much cleaner to feed, use and easier to clean. It is not unlike those made by the Roper Stove Company in the 1920s. The Roper Stove Company previously named the Florence-Wehrle Company among other names, was founded in 1883. Located in Newark, Ohio, the company was once the largest stove producer in the world. Today, the Roper Stove Company is a brand of Whirlpool.

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.

 

However today we are not in Lettice’s flat, rather we have followed her south from London into Sussex to the home of Lettice’s newest potential client, Mrs. Hatchett.

 

As requested, when the steam of the train carrying Lettice from London to Rotherfield and Mark Cross cleared, there stood Mrs. Hatchett’s chauffer, dressed in a smart black uniform. As the Worsley turned into the gates above which the name of the house was emblazoned in wrought iron curlicues, she prepared for the worst, but was pleasantly surprised to find that ‘The Gables’ was in fact a rather lovely Arts and Crafts country house with prominent gabling, from which it obviously took its name, sitting amidst a sympathetic and charming informal English garden.

 

Now sitting in Mrs. Hatchett’s old fashioned and overstuffed drawing room awaiting tea with her hostess, Lettice tries very hard not to pass judgement on her as she looks about her at all the heavy Victorian furnishings and clutter.

 

“I did warn you, Miss Chetwynd,” Mrs. Hatchett begins, her apologetic tones bursting the silence only broken by the soft tick of the French barrel clock on the mantlepiece. “It is a bit of a mausoleum.”

 

Lettice has already counted five vases and just as many photograph frames that needlessly clutter the stylish Georgian style mantle. “No, no,” she interjects diplomatically with a defensive wave of her hands. “Victoriana can be quite charming Mrs. Hatchett. I know the Mater and Pater have plenty of it in our family home.”

 

“You are kind Miss Chetwynd, but I would imagine that your family home is much grander than ‘The Gables’ and therefore far more able to manage Victorian furnishings elegantly. Please let us not pretend that it is anything more than clutter here.” Mrs. Hatchett looks about her in dismay.

 

“Well…” Lettice begins, shifting awkwardly on the red velvet button back upholstered armchair.

 

“I didn’t invite you here today to approve of what you see, Miss Chetwynd,” Mrs. Hatchett interrupts her guest. “But rather for you to reimagine what it could be, if you stripped all this old fashioned tatt out.”

 

A stifled gasp and a sniff interrupt her as a parlour maid appears at the door with a silver tray laden with tea things and a selection of biscuits.

 

“Oh! Thank you, Augusta. You may put the tea things here.” Mrs. Hatchett indicates to the oval table between the two women.

 

“My mistress barely five minutes in her grave,” the maid mutters.

 

“Thank you, Augusta!” Mrs. Hatchett snaps. “Miss Chetwynd doesn’t care to hear your opinion about the drawing room furnishings.”

 

Berated, the parlour maid silently sets out the tea things and retreats, but just as she reaches the door she says defiantly, “It’s not ‘tatt’, Madam!” And leaves.

 

“I’m so sorry Miss Chetwynd, like almost everything in this house, Augusta is the former Mrs. Hatchett’s legacy.” Picking up a photo in an ornate frame on the pedestal table next to her, she continues in a wistful voice, “It wasn’t what I imagined.”

 

“What wasn’t, Mrs. Hatchett?”

 

“My marriage.” She hands the portrait of herself and her handsome husband to Lettice. “You don’t imagine when you marry a dashing man in uniform,”

 

“He was a captain, wasn’t he?” Lettice looks at the stylish wartime couple in the wedding portrait.

 

“Yes, Charlie was a captain in the air force. He was handsome and smart, and so self-possessed in his stance that he radiated confidence.”

 

“And you…”

 

“I was a pretty chorus girl in ‘Chu Chin Chow’*, and he swept me off my feet. We were married after a whirlwind romance.” She smiles. “Well, it was wartime, wasn’t it? There was no time for a lengthy pre-war courtship. And then his leave was over, and I found myself married and rather than living in exciting London like I was used to, I found myself buried here in the country and living under my mother-in-law’s roof with Charlie flying over into France.”

 

“I see.” Lettice replies.

 

“Oh, I’m sure you don’t, Miss Chetwynd. You see, I didn’t realise until after the war, what a mummy’s boy I’d married. Handsome, yes, Charlie is handsome, but as soon as the uniform came off, he lost all his self-possession and went straight back to being under his domineering mother’s thumb and following her wishes. We stayed living here rather than have a home of our own, and he just let her undermine me and overrule me as his wife. I was nothing here. She never approved of the ‘chorus girl’. What would I know? No, the respectable Victorian widow knew how to hire and manage staff, plan meals and parties for her son, and was strict about ‘not redecorating’. I couldn’t change anything in the room we were given, which I’m sure was a guest bedroom. I’m surprised I was even allowed to hang my clothes in the wardrobe. Nasty old trout she was: so anxious to fling me out like yesterday’s newspaper!”

 

“So that’s why you want to throw all this,” Lettice waves her hands about her. “Out.”

 

“It’s not just that Miss Chetwynd, although I must confess I’d be happy to erase every last trace of my mother-in-law from this earth. Look, I know you don’t need me as one of your clients when you have duchesses and other titled ladies wanting you to decorate for them. I know that to you, like everyone in your class, that I am just a brash social climber with too much money: the chorus girl who found herself a rich banker. I don’t have the right pedigree, have the right manners or the right clothes. I try too hard to fit in, and the harder I try the more obvious I become.” She reaches out and grasps Lettice’s hand tightly. “But I need you, Miss Chetwynd. Not to try and ape the houses of peers with your taste, but to help support me to support my husband, and the only way I can do that, is to shine out from the tarnished shadow of his mother. Now that she is dead, Charlie has some of that confidence I fell in love with back and is finally embarking on doing something that he wants to do.”

 

“And what is that?”

 

“He wants to enter politics. When the war ended, the government announced that the men would come home to ‘homes fit for heroes’, but here we are, two years on since the armistice and there are men who fought for the empire, living in a disused prison in Worcestershire**. Can you imagine how they feel? The intention of the government is there, but where is the will? Charlie wants to represent these men, and that’s why I need you to decorate this house. I want to be able to entertain here to further Charlie’s political intentions, and I can’t do it when it looks like this. Contrary to my dead mother-in-law’s opinion, although I’m sure she knew better, I have confidence. I can entertain the influential and shine brilliantly as a hostess, but in order for me to do that, I need a house that represents Charlie and me.” She looks down at the tea table. “Oh damn that woman!”

 

“Who?” Lettice queries. “The former Mrs. Hatchett?”

 

“No, that wretched Augusta, although it may just as well be my scheming mother-in-law commanding from her grave! She has intentionally forgotten the teaspoons in order to show me up in front of you and make you think I’m an uncivilised chorus girl!” She pushes the servant’s bell by the fireplace. “Well, the sooner she is replaced, the better! Oh blast! I forgot the bell in here is out of service awaiting the repair man. I’ll be back in a moment, Miss Chetwynd.” Mrs. Hatchett scuttles away, her receding heels clicking on the polished wooden floor of the corridor outside.

 

Lettice sits back uncomfortably in her chair and feels terribly guilty. A few minutes later, Mrs Hatchett returns with the missing teaspoons. She puts them down and smiles with satisfaction.

 

“Mrs Hatchett,” Lettice says, looking squarely at her hostess. “I owe you an apology.”

 

“Me, Miss Chetwynd? Goodness! What could you possibly need to apologise to me for?”

 

“For my snobbery, Mrs. Hatchett.”

 

Mrs. Hatchett waits for Lettice to continue.

 

“You’re right Mrs. Hatchett. We all read or heard the story about the ‘chorus girl who married the pilot who owned a bank’. None of us bothered… wanted, to know you. We all sit in judgement and laugh as you try with us and fail. So, don’t! Forget society and embrace politics. I really admire what you and your husband are trying to achieve now that I know about it. You may not be the kind of client my family, or even my friends want me to have, but I’m not always one to stick with social conventions. I’ll decorate your home for you, if you would like me to.”

 

“Yes, Miss Chetwynd,” Mrs. Hatchett smiles gratefully. “I would like you to, very much!”

 

*‘Chu Chin Chow’ is a musical comedy written, produced and directed by Oscar Asche, with music by Frederic Norton, based on the story of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. It was the most popular show in London’s West End during the Great War. It premiered at His Majesty’s Theatre in London on the 3rd of August 1916 and ran for 2,238 performances, a record number that stood for nearly forty years!

 

** After the Great War, the plan was for house building programs for returned soldiers, dubbed ‘homes fit for heroes’. However, in 1921 European economic crisis saw the withdrawal of these programs. In Britain families were housed in many disused spaces available including a defunct prison in Worcestershire, with a single cell allotted per family!

 

This overstuffed and cluttered Victorian drawing room would have looked very old fashioned by 1920, and certainly to a young and modern flapper such as Lettice, or even a middle-aged woman like Mrs. Hatchett. This upper-middle-class domestic scene is different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures, some of which come from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableaux include:

 

The family photos on the mantlepiece and Mrs. Hatchett’s wedding photo on the pedestal table at the right of the picture are all real photos, produced to high standards in 1:12 size on photographic paper by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The frames are from various suppliers, but all are metal. The one on the pedestal table and the matching one on the far left of the fireplace I have had since I acquired them from a specialist dolls’ house supplier when I was a teenager.

 

The marble French barrel clock on the mantlepiece is a 1:12 artisan miniature made by Hall’s Miniature Clocks, supplied through Doreen Jeffries Small Wonders Miniatures in England. Made of resin with a marble effect, it has had the gilding picked out by hand and contains a beautifully detailed face beneath a miniature glass cover.

 

The vase of flowers on the left-hand side of the fireplace is made beautifully by hand to extraordinary and realistic standards by Falcon Miniatures in England. This vase contains red roses, bearded blue Dutch irises and white lilies.

 

The walnut sideboard on the right-hand side of the fireplace is made by Babette’s Miniatures, who have been making miniature dolls’ furnishings since the late eighteenth century. The sideboard features ornate carvings, finials and a mirrored back. On it stand three miniature grading jugs, a hand painted fruit bowl that I also bought as a teenager and two cranberry glass vases that have been hand blown and made from real glass by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. Beautifully Handmade miniatures also made the cranberry glass comport in the foreground and the tea set and plate of biscuits set out for Lettice and Mrs. Hatchett. On the sideboard’s upper shelf stands a bust of Queen Victoria made of pewter by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland which has been hand painted by me. The horse trophy on the mantlepiece at the back is also a Warwick Miniatures 1:12 miniature made of pewter.

 

The Art Nouveau jardiniere and the squat vase next to the wedding photo on the pedestal table were supplied by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in England.

 

The Victorian red velvet button back suite of gentleman’s and lady’s armchairs, settee, central pedestal table and occasional tables I bought from a high street dolls’ house supplier when I was twelve. Sets like this are still made in their millions today for doll houses around the world, but I have noticed that the quality in detail and finishing has diminished over the ensuing years.

 

The miniature Persian rug on the floor is made by hand by Mackay and Gerrish in Sydney.

 

The two Georgian silhouettes of the gentleman and the lady are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Lady Mile Miniatures in England. The other two paintings of horses are also 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States. The wallpaper is William Morris’ ‘Compton’ pattern, featuring stylised Art Nouveau poppies. William Morris papers and fabrics were popular in the late Victorian and early Edwardian period before the Great War.

 

The wooden Georgian fire surround is made by Town Hall Miniatures, supplied through Melody Jane Dolls’ House Suppliers in England.

Now I know I shouldn't have tried this dress on but I was bored while in town today and it was the last one in my size and so it had to be done.

 

Needless to say I love it. something about a proper full skirted maxi dress that does it for me sadly at £70 in the sale its way out of my budget. Yeah I know 7 charity shop dresses at a tenner each or this. I will take the 7 charity shops ones mainly because I like the money going to a good cause.

 

Anyway it was lovely but sadly not to be

This is Zyanya Remembers for the theme “be generous” in the Blythe a Day group on Flickr. I really got to thinking about giving and being generous when I was editing this picture…so much so that I decided to give my local animal shelter some items from their Amazon wish list! It was so easy, I just added the items to my cart and had them sent straight to the shelter. We have adopted six cats there over the years, so I am happy to help them out a little bit.

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.

 

Two of Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie of bright young things are getting married: Dickie Channon, eldest surviving son of the Marquess of Taunton, and Margot de Virre, only daughter of Lord Charles and Lady Lucie de Virre. Lettice is hosting an exclusive buffet supper party in their honour this evening, which is turning out to be one of the events of the 1921 London Season. Over the last few days, Lettice’s flat has been in upheaval as Edith. Lettice’s maid, and Lettice’s charwoman* Mrs. Boothby have been cleaning the flat thoroughly in preparation for the occasion. Earlier today with the help of a few hired men they moved some of the furnishings in Lettice’s drawing room into the spare bedroom to make space for the hired dance band and for the guests to dance and mingle. Edith’s preserve of the kitchen has been overrun by delivery men, florists and caterers. Yet it has finally all fallen into place perfectly just as a red and white striped marquee is erected by Gunter and Company** over the entrance and the pavement outside.

 

Now we find ourselves in Lettice’s dining room, which has become the focal point for half the party guests as her dining table is given over to a magnificent buffet created by Harrods catering, whilst Dickie stands at one corner, thoroughly enjoying playing the part of barman as he makes cocktails for all his friends.

 

Lettice sighs with satisfaction as she looks around the drawing room and dining room of her flat. Both rooms have a golden glow about them created by a mixture of electric light and candlelight and the fug of cigarette smoke. The rooms are populated with London society’s glittering young people, nicknamed “bright young things” by the newspapers. Men in white tie and tails with a smattering of daring souls wearing dinner jackets chatter animatedly and dance with ladies in beautifully coloured evening gowns with loose bodices, sashes and irregular and handkerchief hems. Jewels wink at throats, on fingers, dangling from ears and in carefully coiffed and finger waved hair, illuminated by the brilliant lighting. Bugle beads glitter as gowns gently wash about the figures of their wearers as they move. Everywhere gay chatter about the Season and the upcoming wedding of Margot and Dickie fills the air, the joyous sound mixing with the lively jazz quartet who play syncopated tunes lustily in a corner of Lettice’s drawing room.

 

“Dubonnet and gin?” Dickie asks Lettice as she stands by the buffet and picks up a biscuit lightly smeared with salmon mousse.

 

“Oh you are a brick, Dickie!” Lettice enthuses, popping the dainty morsel into her mouth. Accepting the reddish gold cocktail from him she adds, “But really, this is your party. You should be out there, socialising with Margot, not standing here making cocktails for everyone.”

 

“Why should I bother going out there to socialise,” he waves his hand across the crowded room to the edge of the makeshift dancefloor where his fiancée stands in a beautiful ankle length silver georgette gown studded in silver sequins, surrounded by a small clutch of equally elegant young guests. “When they all have to come to me for drinks.”

 

“Ahhh,” Lettice titters as she sips her cocktail. “So there is method in your madness, Dickie.”

 

“Isn’t there always, Lettice?” he laughs. “Now, you are technically hostess of this bash. Go out there and dazzle everyone.” Then he stops and adds, “Well, not quite everyone.” And he blows a kiss to his fiancée whose eye he has caught from across the crowded room.

 

“Alright Dickie,” Lettice laughs and she saunters off into the crowd, pausing to smile and say hullo and accept the compliments of her many guests.

 

Suddenly she spots a beautiful woman in a pale pink beaded gown with dark finger waved hair framing her peaches and cream complexion standing docilely by the dancefloor watching the stream of passing couples dancing past in each other’s arms. She seems distant and remote, even a little sad, and far removed from the frenetic energy and jolly bonhomie about her. Excusing herself from the couple who are addressing her, Lettice slips over to her.

 

“Hullo Elizabeth***!” Lettice embraces her warmly. “I wasn’t sure if you were going to come along tonight considering everything that’s happened.”

 

“I wasn’t sure myself, Lettice.” Elizabeth replies, a warm smile revealing a slightly crooked set of teeth. “But I couldn’t let Dickie and Margot down.” Then she adds quickly as an afterthought, “Or you, darling Lettice.”

 

“Well, I’m glad you’ve come. How are you feeling?”

 

“A little battered and bruised emotionally.” Elizabeth admits with a lilt of sadness. “But one mustn’t complain.”

 

“I still don’t understand why you said no to his marriage proposal. I thought you loved Bertie****.”

 

“I did.” Elizabeth remarks before correcting herself. “I do! But I’m afraid that if I said yes to him, I’d never, never again be able to be free to think, speak and act as I feel I really ought to. Besides,” she adds conspiratorially, glancing about her before continuing. “His mother terrifies me.”

 

“She terrifies all of us,” Lettice laughs lighty as she waves her hand gaily about the room. “Now, what you need to pick you up and forget your heartache is one of these.” She points to the glass in her hand.

 

“What is it?” Elizabeth asks, eyeing Lettice’s glass and sniffing its contents with suspicion.

 

“A Dubonnet and gin. Dickie will make you one. Go and ask him.” Lettice grasps Elizabeth by the shoulder and sends her toddling across to Dickie as he stands behind a line of bottles and a beautiful arrangement of roses.

 

“Lettice!” Margot suddenly calls from across the room, beckoning her over enthusiastically. “Lettice, darling!”

 

Squeezing between small clusters of well-dressed guests drinking and eating or leaving the dance floor, Lettice makes her way over to her friend.

 

“Hullo Margot, darling! Are you having a fabulous time?”

 

“Fabulous isn’t enough of a word to describe it, darling!” she replies with eyes shimmering with excitement and joy. “Such a thrilling bash! I can’t thank you enough!”

 

“Yes Lettice,” a deep male voice adds from behind her. “You certainly do know how to throw a party!”

 

“Lord de Virre!” Lettice exclaims, spinning around. “Oh! I didn’t know you’d arrived. Now, who can I introduce you to?”

 

“No-one my dear. My beautiful daughter has been doing an ample job of introducing me to so many people that already this old man cannot remember who is whom.”

 

“Never old!” Lettice scolds, hitting his arm playfully as she curls her own through the crook in his. “Then if I can’t introduce to anyone, perhaps I can entreat you into eating something.”

 

“Now that I won’t refuse, Lettice.”

 

Lettice and Margot guide Lord de Virre across the crowded dining room to the buffet table weighed down with delicious savoury petit fours, vol-au-vents, caviar, dips, cheese and pâte and pasties. Glasses full, partially drained and empty are scattered amidst the silver trays and china plates.

 

“Champagne, Sir?” Dickie calls out.

 

“Good show Dickie!” laughs Lord de Virre over the noise of the party. “Playing barman tonight, are we?”

 

“It’s the best role to play at a party, Sir.” He passes Lord de Virre a flute of sparkling champagne poured from the bottle wedged into a silver ice bucket.

 

Behind him Lettice spies Elizabeth with a Dubonnet and gin in her glove clad hand. Lettice catches her eye and discreetly raises her glass, which Elizabeth returns with a gentle smile.

 

“Now Lettice, darling,” Margot enthuses as she selects a dainty petit four. “Daddy has just reminded me of an idea we had a few weeks ago, which I meant to ask you about, but between all Gerald’s dress fittings and other arrangements for the wedding,” She flaps her hand about, the diamonds in her engagement ring sparkling in the light. “Well, I completely forgot.”

 

Lettice tries not to smile as she feels the gentlest of squeezes from Lord de Virre’s arm and remembers the conversation that she and he had some weeks ago in his study. “What is it?” She glances between Margot and her father, pretending not to know what is coming.

 

“Well, Daddy suggested… I mean… I was wondering…”

 

“Yes, Margot darling?”

 

“Well, you know how the Marquess is giving us that house in Cornwall?”

 

“Yes! Chi an… an…?”

 

“Chi an Treth!” Dickie calls out helpfully.

 

“Yes!” Margot concurs. “Beach House! Well, it hasn’t been lived in for ever such a long time, and it’s a bit old fashioned. Daddy is kindly organising for it to be electrified, re-plumbed and have it connected to the Penzance telephone exchange for us.” Margot pauses. “And… well he and… we… that is to say that I thought…”

 

“Yes?” Lettice coaxes with lowered lids as she takes a gentle sip of her Dubonnet and gin.

 

“Well, we… Dickie and I that is… well we rather hoped that you might consider fixing up a couple of rooms for us. Would you? I would just so dearly love a room or two decorated by you! Dickie even thinks that his father can pull some strings and get you an article in Country Life if you do?”

 

“Oh Margot!” Lettice exclaims, releasing her grip on Lord de Virre and depositing her glass on the table she flings her arms about her friend’s neck. “I’d love to!”

 

Lettice suddenly feels a gentle poking of fingers into the small of her back. Letting go of Margot, she stands back and looks at her, remembering the lines Lord de Virre asked her to come up with and rehearse upon agreeing to Margot’s request.

 

“Of course, I can’t do it straight away, you understand. You know I’m currently mid-way through Miss Ward’s flat in Pimlico.”

 

“Oh that’s alright,” Margot beams. “The modernisation isn’t finished yet, so we won’t even be going down there to inspect the place until after our honeymoon.”

 

Lettice feels Lord de Virre’s prodding in her back again.

 

“And I won’t do it for free, Margot. I have already given you a wedding gift. I’m a businesswoman now.”

 

“Oh, well that’s just the thing,” Margot exclaims, clasping her hands in delight. “Daddy has kindly agreed to pay for it all.”

 

Lettice looks up at Lord de Virre. He looks back at her seriously, but she can see a smile tweaking the edges of his mouth, trying to create a cheeky smile. She tries to keep up the pretence that she didn’t already know that Margot was going to ask her to redecorate for her and Dickie as she says, “Really Lord de Virre? All of it? That’s very generous of you.”

 

“Not a bit of it, Lettice. This is a good, sound business transaction. You may send your quotes to me for consideration,” He ennunciates the last word carefully to stress its importance, more for Margot’s sake than Lettice’s. “Once you have seen the rooms as they are now.”

 

“Thank you Lord de Virre,” Lettice replies. “Well Margot, I suppose that settles it then!”

 

“Oh Dickie!” Margot exclaims, scuttling over to her fiancée. “She said yes!”

 

“Who did, darling?” Dickie asks as he adds crème de menthe to colour his Fallen Angel cocktail a pale green.

 

“What do you mean, who?” Margot hits his arm jokingly as she sways excitedly from side to side. “Lettice of course!” She looks back over to her friend standing alongside her father. “She’s agreed to decorate for us.”

 

“Oh, jolly good show!” Dickie smiles. “Thanks awfully Lettice, darling! Now you’re the brick!”

 

“Always Dickie!” Lettice laughs back.

 

“Listen Dickie!” Margot gasps. “The band is playing ‘Dancing Time’*****! Come away from the bar and dance with me.”

 

“You’d best not refuse her, my boy!” teases Lord de Virre. “It’s madness if you try. I never could!”

 

The happily engaged couple hurry across the room, hand in hand, slipping between clusters of guests before disappearing into the crowd on the dancefloor as the music from the band soars above the burble of the crowd and the clink of glasses.

 

“So, we finally have an official arrangement, Miss Chetwynd?” Lord de Virre says discreetly as he raises his glass towards Lettice.

 

“I think we do, Lord de Virre.” Lettice smiles and clinks her glass with his as they toast their arrangement formally. “Your offer is simply too good to refuse.”

 

*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.

 

**Gunter and Company were London caterers and ball furnishers with shops in Berkley Square, Sloane Street, Lowndes Street and New Bond Street. They began as Gunter’s Tea Shop at 7 and 8 Berley Square 1757 where it remained until 1956 as the business grew and opened different premises. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries Gunter's became a fashionable light eatery in Mayfair, notable for its ices and sorbets. Gunter's was considered to be the wedding cake makers du jour and in 1889, made the bride cake for the marriage of Queen Victoria’s granddaughter, Princess Louise of Wales. Even after the tea shop finally closed, the catering business carried on until the mid 1970s.

 

***Elizabeth Bowes Lyon as she was known in 1921 went on to become Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions from 1936 to 1952 as the wife of King George VI. Whilst still Duke of York, Prince Albert initially proposed to Elizabeth in 1921, but she turned him down, being "afraid never, never again to be free to think, speak and act as I feel I really ought to"

 

****Prince Albert, Duke of York, known by the diminutive “Bertie” to the family and close friends, was the second son of George V. Not only did Bertie propose to Elizabeth in 1921, but also in March 1922 after she was a bridesmaid at the wedding of Albert’s sister, Princess Mary to Viscount Lascelles. Elizabeth refused him a second time, yet undaunted Bertie pursued the girl who had stolen his heart. Finally, in January 1923 she agreed to marry him in spite of her misgivings about royal life.

 

*****’Dancing Time’ was a popular song in Britain in 1921 with words by George Grossmith Jr. and music by Jerome Kern.

 

This rather splendid buffet of delicious savoury treats might look real to you, but in fact the whole scene is made up on 1:12 scale miniatures from my miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

On Lettice’s black japanned dining table delicious canapés are ready to be consumed by party guests. The plate of sandwiches, the silver tray of biscuits and the bowls of dips, most of the savoury petite fours on the silver tray furthest from the camera and the silver tray of Cornish pasties were 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 cheese selection on the tray closest to the camera were made by hand by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering, as are the empty champagne glasses all of which are made of hand blown glass. The bowl of caviar was made by Karen Lady Bug Miniatures in England.

 

The tray that the caviar is sitting on and the champagne bucket are made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. The bottle of Deutz and Geldermann champagne. It is an artisan miniatures and made of glass and has real foil wrapped around its neck. It was made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. Several of the other bottles of mixers in the foreground are also made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The bottle of Gordon’s Dry Gin, the bottle of Crème de Menthe, Cinzano, Campari and Martini are also 1:12 artisan miniatures, made of real glass, and came from a specialist stockist in Sydney. Gordon's London Dry Gin was developed by Alexander Gordon, a Londoner of Scots descent. He opened a distillery in the Southwark area in 1769, later moving in 1786 to Clerkenwell. The Special London Dry Gin he developed proved successful, and its recipe remains unchanged to this day. The top markets for Gordon's are (in descending order) the United Kingdom, the United States and Greece. Gordon's has been the United Kingdom’s number one gin since the late Nineteenth century. It is the world's best-selling London dry gin. Crème de menthe (French for "mint cream") is a sweet, mint-flavored alcoholic beverage. Crème de menthe is an ingredient in several cocktails popular in the 1920s, such as the Grasshopper and the Stinger. It is also served as a digestif. Cinzano vermouths date back to 1757 and the Turin herbal shop of two brothers, Giovanni Giacomo and Carlo Stefano Cinzano, who created a new "vermouth rosso" (red vermouth) using "aromatic plants from the Italian Alps in a recipe which is still secret to this day. Campari is an Italian alcoholic liqueur, considered an apéritif. It is obtained from the infusion of herbs and fruit (including chinotto and cascarilla) in alcohol and water. It is a bitters, characterised by its dark red colour.

 

The vase of red roses on the dining table and the vase of yellow lilies on the Art Deco console are beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium. Also on the console table stand some of Lettice’s precious artisan purchases from the Portland Gallery in Soho. The pair of candelabra at either end of the sideboard are sterling silver artisan miniatures from Karen Ladybug Miniatures in England. The silver drinks set, 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 and the Art Deco cocktail cabinet (the edge of which just visible on the far right-hand side of the photo) which were made by J.B.M. Miniatures.

 

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.

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 have headed north-west from Cavendish Mews, across Marylebone, past Regent’s Park, the London Zoo and Lords Cricket Ground to the affluent and leafy residential streets of nearby St. John’s Wood. It is here that Lettice’s Embassy Club coterie friends Minnie Palmerston and her husband Charles reside in a neatly painted two storey early Victorian townhouse on Acacia Road that formerly belonged to Charles Palmerston’s maternal grandparents, Lord and Lady Arundel.

 

Having taken her future sister-in-law, Arabella Tyrwhitt, to her old childhood chum and best friend Gerald Bruton’s couturier in Grosvenor Street Soho for her initial wedding dress consultation, Lettice has left the two together to discuss designs whilst she visits Minnie in St John’s Wood. Minnie, a highly strung socialite, has redecorated her dining room in a style not to her husband’s taste, or so she was told by Minnie over a luncheon Lettice hosted for Arabella last week. Known for her melodrama, Lettice quietly ponders whether it really is as awful as Minnie implies as she pays the taxi driver the fare from Soho to St John’s Wood and alights the blue vehicle onto the street.

 

The day is bright and sunny, and the street is quiet with only the occasional bark of a dog and the distant rumble of traffic from busy Finchley Road in the distance as Lettice strides across the road and walks up the eight steps that lead up to Minnie’s black painted front door. She depresses the doorbell which echoes through the long hallway inside and waits. Moments later, there is the thud of Minnie’s hurried footsteps as she flings open the door dramatically.

 

“Lettice darling!” she cries, standing in the doorway in a beautiful may green day dress which compliments her red hair and green eyes, with cascades of green and black bugle beads tumbling down the front. “Come in! Come in!” she beckons her friend with enthusiastic waves which make the green, black and gold bangles on her wrist jangle noisily.

 

“Minnie.” Lettice leans in for a whispery kiss on the cheek as she steps across the threshold and follows Minnie’s indications and steps into a drawing room off the hallway, the room filled with diffused light from a large twelve pane window that looks out onto the street. Looking around her, she quickly takes in the overstuffed cream satin settees, nests of occasional tables, clusters of pictures in gilt frames in every conceivable space on the William Morris style papered walls and the potted parlour palms. “Oh yes,” she remarks as she removes her green gloves. “I do see what you mean. Very Edwardian.”

 

“Isn’t it ghastly, Lettice darling?” Minnie asks as she steps into the drawing room. “Here let me take your, umbrella, coat and hat.” She helps her friend shrug off her forest green coat and takes her rather artistic beret with its long tassel. “I think Lady Arundel could walk in here and not find a thing out of place!”

 

“It could be worse,” Lettice remarks, looking up at the crystal chandelier suspended from the ceiling high above. “It could be decorated in high Victorian style and lit with gasoliers*.”

 

“True darling.” Minnie calls from the hallway where she hangs up Lettice’s things on a heavy Victorian coatrack. “But you have yet to see my dining room faux pas.”

 

“Now Minnie, no matter what I say, I want no histrionics today like we had over luncheon last week,” Lettice chides her friend with a wagging finger. “Poor Bella didn’t know where to look.”

 

“Oh I am sorry.” Minnie apologises. “Coming from the country, she probably isn’t used to our London ways.”

 

“Your emotional outbursts have nothing whatsoever to do with London ways, so don’t go foisting it off.” Lettice replies, cocking one of her delicately plucked eyebrows at her friend.

 

“You sound just like Gladys.” Minnie says.

 

“Well, I hope I’m not as shrill sounding as her,” Lettice replies with a chuckle.

 

“And how is the beautiful bride-to-be?”

 

“Happily ensconced with Gerald in his Soho atelier, no doubt talking about all the finer details of the dream wedding frock I have already heard about from dear Bella.”

 

“She seems quite lovely, Lettice darling.”

 

“Oh, I adore Bella.” Lettice agrees with a wave of her hand. “Given we grew up running in and out of each other’s houses, living on neighbouring properties, it was inevitable that she would marry one of my brothers, or Lally or I marry one of Bella’s brothers. I’m just glad that it wasn’t the latter. All Bella’s brothers, whilst charming, take after their grandfather, and he was not a handsome man. Bella has her mother’s delicate and pretty genes and she and Leslie are well suited. They both love the country, and as you know from luncheon last week, Bella likes the county social round. As Pater says, Bella will one day make a wonderful chatelaine of Glynes**, supporting Leslie as a dutiful wife, hosting important county social functions like the Hunt Ball, opening fetes and awarding prizes at cattle shows.”

 

“How does Lady Sadie feel about her usurper?”

 

“Oh Mater loves Bella as much as we all do.” Lettice replies breezily. “Of course, Pater doesn’t dare express his appreciation quite so volubly in front of Mater, but I’m sure she is silently thinking the same thing, not that she would ever share that with any of us. No, the problem will be if Pater decides to pop his mortal clogs before she does. I don’t know how happy she will be to hand over the mantle of lady of the manor to her daughter-in-law, even if she does love her.”

 

“Well, let’s hope we don’t have to worry about that for a good while yet.” Minnie says soothingly.

 

“Indeed yes!” agrees Lettice. “Now, show me this dread dining room of yours, Minnie darling. I’m famished, and I’m intrigued to see just how much of a faux pas it really is.”

 

“Come right this way, interior decorator to all the great and good of this great country of ours,” Minnie says rather grandly as she walks towards a door that leads from the drawing room to the next room. Suddenly she pauses, clasping the brass doorknob in her hand and turns back to Lettice who has trailed behind her. “Prepare yourself my dear for l’horreur!” And she flings the door open.

 

Minnie and Lettice walk into the townhouse’s dining room, which like the adjoining drawing room has a high ceiling. Lettice is surprised that after the grandeur of the drawing room, it’s a much smaller room, perhaps more suited for intimate dining rather than a large banquet. She glances around and quickly takes in the mixture of old and new. An Edwardian dining setting in Queen Anne style fills the majority of the space, whilst a late Victorian sideboard and spare carver chairs press against the wall. To either side of the new Art Deco gas fireplace stand two modern stands on which sit rather old fashioned urns. Modernist paintings in bold colours hang on the walls, but Lettice can barely see them for the bold wallpaper of red poppies against a black background with green and white geometric patterns.

 

“Oh I see.” Lettice remarks, neither enthusiastically nor critically, but in a rather neutral way.

 

Lettice walks around the dining table on which stands a Georgian Revival tea set with steam snaking from the spot of the pot, a small carafe of water and glassware, crockery and cutlery for two at the head of the table. She stands before the Streamline Moderne fireplace surround and runs an elegant hand over one of the bold red blooms, feeling the slightly raised pattern. She sighs as she contemplates what she sees.

 

“Do you think it looks like something out of Maida Vale, Lettice darling?” Minnie asks hesitantly.

 

For a moment, Lettice doesn’t answer as she traces one of the green lines towards the gilt edge of a frame holding a painting of a tiger. “Tyger Tyger burning bright***,” she murmurs the beginning of the William Blake poem.

 

“Yes,” Minnie acknowledges her friend with a sigh of pleasure. “He’s rather glorious, isn’t he?”

 

“He is,” Lettice agrees. “However his gloriousness is diminished somewhat by the wallpaper which draws away attention from him, and the red fox.” She points to a larger canvas hanging over the sideboard.

 

“So you do think it’s middle-class Maida Vale then.” Minnie pronounces in a downhearted fashion.

 

“No, I don’t.” Lettice clarifies, turning around and placing a comforting hand on the slumped left shoulder of her friend. “And I think it was very unkind of Charles to say so. The wallpaper is beautiful, Minnie. It just doesn’t suit this room.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Well, this is quite an intimate room: taller with these high ceilings, rather than wide. This wallpaper would suit a longer room with low ceilings, where expanses of this pattern could be exposed uninterrupted.”

 

“Like a mansion flat?”

 

“Exactly, Minnie! I did something similar for the moving picture actress, Wanetta Ward last year. She had a long, exposed wall and the bold pattern I used worked beautifully. And this wallpaer does nothing to show off yours and Charles’ beautiful paintings. It detracts rather than enhances. The paintings and the wallpaper vie for attention. Think about the National Gallery, or the Tate Gallery****. When you see pictures hanging on the wall, what do you notice about the surrounding to the painting?”

 

Minnie thinks for a moment, screwing up her pert nose with its dusting of freckles. “Well, I can’t say I’ve ever actually noticed the walls, Lettice darling.”

 

“Correct again, Minnie. No-one thinks about the walls because you’re not meant to. Your focus is meant to be on the paintings.”

 

“So you think I should strip the walls and paint them? Is that what you’re saying?”

 

“Well, you could, Minnie.” Lettice replies. “Or you could paint the walls and decorate the upper edge with a nice frieze paper.”

 

“Then it really would look like Maida Vale.” Minnie argues. “Only people who can’t afford wallpaper get friezes hung.”

 

Lettice considers her friend’s remark for a moment. “Mmm… yes, you’re quite right Minnie. Well, Jeffrey and Company***** do stock a range of beautiful papers in vibrant colours with pattern embossed into them. They look very luxurious.”

 

“Oh!” Minnie clasps her hands in delight. “I do like the sound of that! What colour would suit this room do you think?”

 

“Oh I should imagine a nice warm red or orange to go with this.” Lettice taps the top of the tiled fireplace surround. “And that colour range would also compliment your polished floors.”

 

“And I could get black japanned furniture like you, Lettice darling! I do like your chairs.”

 

“Oh no.” Lettice shakes her head. “Black japanned furniture is fine, but not my chairs. They are far too low for this room. You need an equivalent high backed chair.” She reaches out and pats one of the dining chairs. “Lady Arundel chose these well as they echo the height of the room. Perhaps if you had something high backed padded with a complimentary fabric to the paper: say red or orange.”

 

“Oh Lettice you are so clever!” enthuses Minnie. “When can you start.”

 

“Don’t you want to ask Charles before you go spending his money on redecorating, Minnie?” Lettice laughs. “Surely he’ll want a say.”

 

“Oh Charles told me today when I reminded him that you were coming for luncheon before he left for the office, that he’ll happily pay for anything you recommend, or better yet your services. So you don’t need to worry on that account.”

 

“Well, I would have to finish Dickie and Margot’s.” Lettice tempers.

 

“Oh, of course.” Minnie agrees.

 

“Well, I don’t have another redecorating assignment after them, so let me contemplate it.”

 

“I’ll go and get luncheon whilst you contemplate.” Minnie exclaims with a clap of her hands before scuttling away through a second door to the left of the fireplace.

 

With her exuberant friend gone, Lettice looks around the dining room, contemplating what she has suggested, picturing what embossed wallpaper in a rich red or vibrant orange would look like as a backdrop for the paintings. “Pity.” she muses as she again runs her hands over the stylised poppies in the pattern on the wall. Turning around she looks across the room. “Sorry Lady Arundel,” she remarks, tapping the top of the nearest dining chair again. “But it looks like your granddaughter-in-law wants to modernise.

 

“I’m afraid it’s Cook’s afternoon off today,” Minnie says apologetically as she walks back through the door through which she went, carrying a tray of tomato, ham and cucumber sandwiches. “So we’ll have to settle for these.” Looking down at the plate of appetising sandwich triangles as she places them on the dining table’s surface she adds. “I do hope she remembered not to make tongue****** ones. She should remember that I can’t stand cold tongue.”

 

Lettice peers at the fillings of bright red tomato, vivid green cucumber, and pink ham. “I think we’ll be safe.”

 

“Well, there’s half a trifle left over for dessert just in case they aren’t nice.” Minnie adds hopefully.

 

Lettice is suddenly struck by something. “Minnie?” she asks. “Minnie, why are you carrying the tray? And come to think of it, why did you answer the door? Where is Gladys?”

 

Minnie blushes, her pale skin and smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose reddening. “She handed in her immediate notice the week before last.”

 

“Oh no! Not another one Minnie?”

 

“She said she couldn’t work for a woman who had such histrionics as I do, and she’s gone back to Manchester.”

 

“Oh Minnie!” Lettice shakes her head dolefully.

 

“See! I told you, you sounded like Gladys, Lettice. I’ve been getting by with the tweeny*******, but Cook grumbles, so I can’t keep pinching her. That’s why I’m so grateful you gave me that telephone number for that domestic employment agency in Westminster. I’ve a new maid starting next week. Her name’s Siobhan, so I figured that she can’t complain about my histrionics as she’d be used to them, being Irish.”

 

“Well, let’s hope so Minnie.” Lettice chuckles as she pulls out her dining chair and takes her seat. “I can’t keep up with the revolving door of maids that come in and out of this house. How long have you been here for now?”

 

“Seven months or thereabout.” Minnie replies vaguely as she takes her own seat in the chair at the head of the dining table.

 

“And how many maids have you had in that time?”

 

“Nine.” Minnie replies with a guilty gulp.

 

“No wonder Charles feels his club is better suited to entertain prospective business associates.” Lettice shakes her head disapprovingly. “A tweeny waiting table.”

 

“Well hopefully, with Siobhan starting next week, and you agreeing to redecorate my dining room faux pas,” She looks around the room with glittering, excited eyes, as she imagines the possibilities. “Charles will be happy to start entertaining here.” She pauses and thinks for a moment. “You will won’t you?”

 

“Will I what, Minnie?”

 

“You will redecorate my dining room, won’t you?”

 

Lettice reaches around Minnie’s teacup and squeezes her friend’s hand comfortingly. “Of course I will. I’ll come up with some ideas of what I think might suit this room and then I’ll show you and Charles. Charles has to have some input, even if he has told you that you that I have carte blanche when it comes to redecorating.”

 

*A gasolier is a chandelier with gas burners rather than light bulbs or candles.

 

**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.

 

***”The Tyger” is a poem by English poet William Blake, published in 1794 as part of his “Songs of Experience” collection and rising to prominence in the romantic period of the mid Nineteenth Century. The poem explores and questions Christian religious paradigms prevalent in late 18th century and early 19th century England, discussing God's intention and motivation for creating both the tiger and the lamb. Tiger is written as Tyger in the poem as William Blake favoured old English spellings.

  

****In 1892 the site of a former prison, the Millbank Penitentiary, was chosen for the new National Gallery of British Art, which would be under the Directorship of the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square. The prison, used as the departure point for sending convicts to Australia, had been demolished in 1890. Sidney R.J. Smith was chosen as the architect for the new gallery. His design is the core building that we see today, a grand porticoed entranceway and central dome which resembles a temple. The statue of Britannia with a lion and a unicorn on top of the pediment at the Millbank entrance emphasised its function as a gallery of British art. The gallery opened its doors to the public in 1897, displaying 245 works in eight rooms from British artists dating back to 1790. In 1932, the gallery officially adopted the name Tate Gallery, by which it had popularly been known as since its opening. In 1937, the new Duveen Sculpture Galleries opened. Funded by Lord Duveen and designed by John Russell Pope, Romaine-Walker and Gilbert Jenkins, these two 300 feet long barrel-vaulted galleries were the first public galleries in England designed specifically for the display of sculpture. By this point, electric lighting had also been installed in all the rooms enabling the gallery to stay open until 5pm whatever the weather. In 1955, Tate Gallery became wholly independent from the National Gallery.

  

*****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.

  

******Beef tongue (also known as neat's tongue or ox tongue) is a cut of beef made of the tongue of a cow. It can be boiled, pickled, roasted or braised in sauce. It is found in many national cuisines, and is used for taco fillings in Mexico and for open-faced sandwiches in the United States.

 

*******A tweeny is a between maid, who works in the kitchen as well as above stairs, assisting at least two other members of a domestic staff.

 

This rather bright dining room is perhaps a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of pieces from my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection, some pieces from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The Queen Anne dining table, chairs and sideboard were all given to me as birthday and Christmas presents when I was a child.

 

The three prong Art Deco style candelabra in the sideboard is an artisan piece made of sterling silver. Although unsigned, the piece was made in England by an unknown artist. The vase of flowers to the left of the candelabra is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium. The carafe to the right of the candelabra is another artisan piece made of hand spun glass. I acquired it as a teenager from a high street dollhouse stockist.

 

The ornately hand painted ginger jar is one of a pair and comes from Melody Jane Dollhouse Suppliers in Britain. The tall stand on which the ginger jar stands was made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq.

 

The paintings on the walls are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States. The stylised floral and geometric shape Art Deco wallpaper is a real Art Deco design which I have sourced and had printed in high quality onto A3 sheets of paper.

 

On the dining table the tray of sandwiches are made of polymer clay. Made in England by hand by former chef turned miniature artisan, Frances Knight they are very realistic with even the bread slices having a bread like consistency look. 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 water carafe came from the same high street stockist as the carafe on the sideboard. The Art Deco dinner set is part of a much larger set I acquired from a dollhouse suppliers in Shanghai. The Georgian Revival silver tea set on its tray I acquired from Smallskale Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The Streamline Moderne pottery tile fireplace surround I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Dollhouse Shop in the United Kingdom.

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.

 

After a busy morning working at her desk, writing a list of some final tweaks to her friend Margot Channon’s interior designs for her Regency country house ‘Chi an Treth’, Lettice prepares to curl up in one of her armchairs and enjoy her latest library book from Boots*, a new romance, when the telephone rings noisily on the occasional table beside her.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Edith, Lettice’s maid, is putting glassware back into the cocktail cabinet in the adjoining dining room and looks up anxiously. “That infernal contraption!” she mutters to herself. Edith hates answering the telephone. It’s one of the few jobs in her position that she wishes she didn’t have to do. Whenever she has to answer it, which is quite often considering how frequently her mistress is out and about, there is usually some uppity caller at the other end of the phone, whose toffee-nosed accent only seems to sharpen when they realise they are speaking to ‘the hired help’ as they abruptly demand Lettice’s whereabouts.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“Oh pooh!” Lettice cries. “And just as I was getting comfortable.”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“This had better not be Mr. Fulton telling me that the lorry of furnishings and hangings and papers bound for ‘Chi an Treth’ has broken down between London and Penzance.” she grumbles.

 

The silver and Bakelite telephone continues to trill loudly as Lettice brushes herself down and picks up the receiver.

 

“Mayfair 432,” she answers without the slightest trace of irritation in her very best telephone voice.

 

The line crackles for a moment before a clipped, upper-class male voice drifts down the line to the receiver at Lettice’s ear. “May I speak to Miss Chetwynd, please.”

 

“Yes, this is Miss Chetwynd speaking,” Lettice replies.

 

“Darling!” the unfamiliar male voice exclaims.

 

Lettice reddens at the familiarity of the term and nearly drops the receiver in shock. “May I ask who is calling, please?”

 

“Darling Lettice, it’s me,” the stranger on the end of the line says with a chuckle. When there is silence in response, he adds, “It’s Selwyn.”

 

“Oh Selwyn!” Lettice gasps in sudden recognition, and sits up abruptly in her seat, her face going from trepidation to a beaming smile, her eyes sparking with happiness.

 

Edith in the dining room, having put the glasses back into the cocktail cabinet makes to go, but Lettice waves her free left hand excitedly and beckons her maid over. Edith sighs but walks over reluctantly. As soon as she is within reach, Lettice reaches out and clasps her hand, encouraging her to stay, and refusing to let her go. She sighs again. Looking around the room she feels awkward as she overhears whisps of the conversation. She would much rather return to the kitchen and start cleaning the lidded serving dishes with Silvo silver paste, which is what she would be doing if her mistress hadn’t grabbed her as if her life depended on it.

 

“Darling Lettice, I’m going to be up in London for a few days.” Selwyn announces cheerily.

 

“When, Selwyn?” Lettice asks, almost too afraid to breathe.

 

“Next week,” he elucidates. “Tuesday and Wednesday. I have the designs of a house I’ve been commissioned to build for an artist couple in Hampstead.”

 

“How thrilling, Selwyn!” Lettice’s grip tightens around both the telephone receiver and Edith’s hand.

 

“Yes.” he says with a light laugh. “They’re quite progressive with their desires for designs on a new home. I was rather chuffed when they asked me to design it for them. So, I thought I’d also run a few errands whilst I’m in town. I’ll be staying at the Saville Club** whilst I’m up from the country.”

 

“Oh, so you’ll be quite close by then!” Lettice looks excitedly up at Edith, who awkwardly tries to evade her mistress’ eyes.

 

“Indeed yes. Just around the corner, really. I didn’t want Mummy and Daddy to open the London house just for a few days”

 

“No, I suppose that is wise.”

 

“And I was thinking that whilst I was in town, we might fulfil those plans that we made at the Hunt Ball.

 

“Plans Selwyn?” Lettice queries, a smile teasing up Lettice’s pale and full pink lips.

 

Edith cannot help herself and turns her head back and stares, open mouthed, in astonishment at her mistress’ obvious attempt to be coy. Ever since she returned from Wiltshire after the Hunt Ball Lettice has done nothing but talk about the handsome young Selwyn Spencely, son of the Duke of Walmsford, who was an old childhood friend whom she hadn’t seen in years. The way she spoke, the man danced like a dream and swept her off her feet that evening. Edith narrows her eyes and shakes her head at Lettice.

 

“Don’t you remember, darling girl, or had you had too much champagne?” His light-hearted chuckle emanates from his end of the line. “We planned to catch up when I was next in town if you were free.” He pauses for a moment and aside from a faint crackle down the line there is a palpable silence tinged with excitement and anticipation. “That is, assuming you’d still like to, of course, Lettice darling.”

 

Lettice pauses for a moment, giving her maid’s hand another squeeze before swallowing. “Oh yes, I should like that very much, Selwyn.” She winks at her maid cheekily. “What days did you say you would be in town again?”

 

“Tuesday and Wednesday. I was hoping you might be free for luncheon, or perhaps a cocktail?”

 

Lettice takes a deep breath before replying, “Well, I’ll just have to consult my diary. I’ve just sent some furniture down to Penzance for the house down there I’ve ben commissioned to redecorate.”

 

“Oh yes, I remember: your friends, the Channons.”

 

“You do have a good memory, Selwyn.”

 

“Well,” he pauses and chuckles, only this time a little awkwardly. “There are quite a few things I remember about you at the Hunt Ball.”

 

Lettice smile broadens on her lips as she feels a flush fill her cheeks and redden her neck. “And we still have so much to catch up on about what we’ve been doing over the last fifteen years since we were children together.”

 

“Yes,” Selwyn replies. “So, are you free on Tuesday or Wednesday, my dear Lettice?”

 

“Well, let me just check my diary, Selwyn.”

 

Lettice deposits the receiver on the surface of the black japanned table next to her novel and her cooling cup of tea. She reaches out and snatched as Edith’s other hand handing limply by her side and squeezes it as tightly as the other. She cannot help herself and let’s a quick little squeak escape her lips as she smiles up at her maid, who for all her attempts to be discreet cannot help but smile back. Lettice waits for a few more moments. Finally, when she thinks enough time has passed, she releases Edith’s left hand. The maid flicks her fingers back and forth, making sure the circulation her mistress cut off is restored to her digits.

 

Picking up the receiver Lettice says, “You happen to be in luck, Mr. Spencely. I am free for luncheon on Wednesday.”

 

“Oh hoorah!” Selwyn exclaims in delight. “Marvellous! I thought we might go to the Hotel Cecil*** for luncheon.”

 

“Oh no!” Lettice protests in return. “Everyone I know will be there!”

 

“You’d rather go to the Lyons Corner House**** on Tottenham Court Road?” Selwyn laughs good naturedly. “I’m sure no-one would know us there.”

 

Lettice sighs. “It’s not that I don’t want to be seen with you, Selwyn.”

 

“Then what?”

 

“I’m sure you’ll think me mad, but I can assure you that Mater has spies in her friends and their friends and acquaintances, who are only too happy to report what her youngest wayward daughter and her flatter friends are up to. I know I wouldn’t enjoy luncheon with you if I was forever wondering whether someone was watching us and planning on reporting every thing we do and every word we utter back to her before the day is out.”

 

This time when Selwyn laughs, it is a big, jolly guffaw.

 

“Don’t laugh at me, Selwyn, please! I know I sound quite mad, but it’s true.”

 

“Oh I’m sorry, Lettice darling. I know you aren’t mad. My mother does exactly the same and keeps tabs on all her children, so I know what it’s like. Now, if you told me that the potted palms in the Cecil reported back to your mother, well then, I would have to question your mental state.”

 

This time the pair of them laugh together, Lettice’s filled with relief.

 

“So, if the Cecil isn’t suitable this time, where do you suggest, my dear?”

 

Lettice thinks for a moment. “What about the Metropole*****?”

 

“I can’t say I’ve been there since the war.”

 

“Oh it’s very luxurious and the food is divine. I went there not long ago with a client of mine.”

 

“And it’s safe from your Mother’s spies?”

 

“Well,” Lettice admits. “Nowhere is that impenetrable, however we are less likely to find ladies dining there as we would at the Cecil, and those that are, are probably more inclined to be interested in politics and affairs of state rather than who is dining around them.”

 

“I’ll see if I can book us a discreet table, then, my darling girl.”

 

“If you would, Selwyn.”

 

“Shall we say one o’clock then, my angel?”

 

“Yes.” Lettice agrees. “Your angel…” she ruminates.

 

“I’m sorry Lettice. I didn’t mean to be so intimate,” Selwyn stutters hurriedly. “I apologise.”

 

“Oh please don’t, Selwyn!” Lettice assures him. “I was just thinking how lovely that sounds: to be your angel.”

 

“So, shall we say one then on Wednesday,” he pauses. “My angel?”

 

“Yes, one o’clock in the foyer of the Metropole Hotel. I shall see you then.”

 

“And I shall be counting the minutes until then, my angel.”

 

“Goodbye, dear Selwyn. Until then.”

 

“Goodbye my angel, until then.”

 

Lettice replaces the Bakelite receiver into the chrome cradle of the telephone.

 

“Well!” Lettice gasps with excitement. “You’ll never guess who that was, Edith!”

 

“I’m quite sure I couldn’t say, Miss.” Edith says with a downwards, disapproving look, hating having to be subjected to her mistress’ private telephone call.

 

“It was Selwyn Spencely! You’ll never guess what’s he’s gone and done, Edith!”

 

“I’m positive I’d never guess, Miss.” Edith replies, casting her eyes to the white painted ceiling.

 

“He’s taking me to luncheon at the Metropole on Wednesday!”

 

Lettice screams and jumps up and down, her long string of glass bugle beads jangling about in front of her as she wraps her arms dramatically around Edith’s neck and starts spinning her around. Edith stumbles and breaks away from her giddy mistress.

 

“Miss! Miss!” she chides. “Calm yourself and stop that jumping, or I’ll have Mrs. Clifford’s maid from downstairs up here in a trice, complaining about the light fixtures shaking, or plaster dust ending up in old Mrs. Clifford’s lunch.”

 

“Oh pooh old Mrs. Clifford and her luncheon!” Lettice laughs as she reaches out for her maid and starts dancing around with her again. “I’m gong to have luncheon on Wednesday with dreamy Selwyn Spencely, the most eligible and handsome young man in London!”

 

*Boots the chemist was established in 1849, by John Boot. After his father's death in 1860, Jesse Boot, aged 10, helped his mother run the family's herbal medicine shop in Nottingham, which was incorporated as Boot and Co. Ltd in 1883, becoming Boots Pure Drug Company Ltd in 1888. In 1920, Jesse Boot sold the company to the American United Drug Company. However, because of deteriorating economic circumstances in North America Boots was sold back into British hands in 1933. The grandson of the founder, John Boot, who inherited the title Baron Trent from his father, headed the company. The Boots Pure Drug Company name was changed to The Boots Company Limited in 1971. Between 1898 and 1966, many branches of Boots incorporated a lending library department, known as Boots Book-Lovers' Library.

 

**The Savile Club is a traditional London gentlemen's club founded in 1868, many of whose members have a common interest in the arts. Located in fashionable and historically significant Mayfair, its membership, past and present, include many prominent names.

 

***The Hotel Cecil was a grand hotel built 1890–96 between the Thames Embankment and the Strand in London, England. It was named after Cecil House, a mansion belonging to the Cecil family, which occupied the site in the Seventeenth Century. The hotel was the largest in Europe when it opened, with more than eight hundred rooms. The proprietor, Jabez Balfour, later went bankrupt and was sentenced to 14 years in prison. The Royal Air Force was formed and had its first headquarters here in the former Hotel Cecil in 1918. During the 1920s, it was one of the most fashionable hotels in London and was filled with flappers and young men, representing the spirit of the Jazz Age. The hotel was largely demolished in 1930, and Shell Mex House now stands on its site.

 

****Built by the Salmons and Glucksteins, a German-Jewish immigrant family based in London, J. Lyons and Company opened their first teashop in Piccadilly in 1894. From 1909 they developed this into a chain of teashops. The waitresses that worked in them were commonly known as Nippies as they were forever on their feet, nipping in and out of serving tables. The company also ran high class restaurants, founding the Trocadero in 1895, and hotels including the Strand Palace, opened in 1909, the Regent Palace, opened in 1915, and the Cumberland Hotel, opened in 1933, all in London. The last Lyon’s Corner House, in the Strand closed in 1977.

 

*****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.

 

This 1920s upper-class drawing room is different to what you may think at first glance, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures including items from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The black Bakelite and silver telephone is a 1:12 miniature of a model introduced around 1919. It is two centimetres wide and two centimetres high. The receiver can be removed from the cradle, and the curling chord does stretch out.

 

The vase of yellow roses and lilies on the Art Deco occasional table is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium.

 

Lettice’s tea cup and saucer is part of a beautiful artisan set featuring a rather avant-garde Art Deco Royal Doulton design from the Edwardian era.

 

Lettice’s romantic novel is a 1:12 size miniature made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Most of the books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection, but so little of his real artistry is seen because the books that he specialised in making are usually closed, sitting on shelves or closed on desks and table surfaces. This novel is one of the rarer exceptions and it has been designed not to be opened. Nevertheless, the cover is beautifully illustrated. What might amaze you even more is that all Ken Blythe’s books are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. To create something so authentic to the original in such detail and so clearly, really does make this a miniature artisan piece. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, as well as through his estate via his daughter and son-in-law. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter. I hope that you enjoy this peek at just one of hundreds of his books that I own, and that it makes you smile with its sheer whimsy!

 

Lettice’s drawing room is furnished with beautiful J.B.M. miniatures. To the left of the photograph is a Chippendale cabinet which has been hand decorated with chinoiserie designs. It also features very ornate metalwork hinges and locks. The Art Deco tub chair upholstered in white embossed fabric is made of black japanned wood and has a removable cushion, just like its life sized equivalent.

 

The Chinese folding screen in the background I bought at an antiques and junk market when I was about ten. I was with my grandparents and a friend of the family and their three children, who were around my age. They all bought toys to bring home and play with, and I bought a Chinese folding screen to add to my miniatures collection in my curio cabinet at home! It shows you what a unique child I was.

 

In front of the screen on a pedestal table stands a miniature cloisonné vase from the early Twentieth Century which I also bought when I was a child. It came from a curios shop. Cloisonné is an ancient technique for decorating metalwork objects. In recent centuries, vitreous enamel has been used, and inlays of cut gemstones, glass and other materials were also used during older periods. The resulting objects can also be called cloisonné. The decoration is formed by first adding compartments (cloisons in French) to the metal object by soldering or affixing silver or gold wires or thin strips placed on their edges. These remain visible in the finished piece, separating the different compartments of the enamel or inlays, which are often of several colours. Cloisonné enamel objects are worked on with enamel powder made into a paste, which then needs to be fired in a kiln. The Japanese produced large quantities from the mid Nineteenth Century, of very high technical quality cloisonné. In Japan cloisonné enamels are known as shippō-yaki (七宝焼). Early centres of cloisonné were Nagoya during the Owari Domain. Companies of renown were the Ando Cloisonné Company. Later centres of renown were Edo and Kyoto. In Kyoto Namikawa became one of the leading companies of Japanese cloisonné.

We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.

Sir Winston Churchill

British politician (1874 - 1965)

  

Fox Lake, Wisconsin

070813

  

© Copyright 2013 MEA Images, Merle E. Arbeen, All Rights Reserved. If you would like to copy this, please feel free to contact me through my FlickrMail, Facebook, or Yahoo email account. Thank you.

 

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This photograph has achieved the following highest awards:

 

Super Six, The Academy

 

InfiniteXposure, Level 7 VIOLET, (19)

 

Frame It! Level 5 (5)

 

Challenge Club Champion

 

DSLR Autofocus, Hall of Fame (5)

 

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 including a rather fine Chippendale cabinet.

 

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.

 

Now luncheon is over, and the ladies have adjourned to Lettice’s drawing room where they carry on their high spirited conversations over digestives, and raucous laughter echoes across into the dining room where Edith, Lettice’s maid, is putting some of the glassware and fine china used at luncheon back into the Chippendale cabinet where they belong after having washed them. A consummate maid, Edith is very discreet and unlike other domestics she isn’t particularly interested in gossip, so she doesn’t pay attention to the conversations being had in the drawing room as she quietly stacks the gilded Art Deco patterned dinner plates onto the second shelf of the cabinet. She hums ‘Toot Toot Tootsie’* to herself as she does so. She smiles as she does, thinking of how she and her beau Frank Leadbetter danced cheek to cheek at the Hammersmith Palais** to the tune on her day off last Sunday, so she doesn’t notice the approach of a pair of footsteps.

 

“Excuse me, Edith,” Margot begins.

 

Edith releases a startled gasp as she leaps into the air in fright, almost dropping the silver gravy boat in her hands as she does. “Oh Miss de Virre, err, I mean, Mrs. Channon.” Edith is still adjusting, like most everyone else, to Margot’s newly married status. She grasps at her chest as she breathes heavily. “You didn’t half scare me!”

 

“Oh, I’m sorry Edith. I didn’t mean to startle you.” Margot says kindly, stepping back slightly on her gold louis heel.

 

Edith looks at her mistress’ best lady friend. She is very beautiful with dark eyes and dark hair framing her pale face. Her hair is swept into a smart chignon at the nape of her neck where it is held in place by an ornate tortoiseshell comb. She is dressed in an afternoon frock of burnt orange silk de chiné with a boat neckline and a handkerchief hemline that swishes softly around her figure when she moves. Edith wonders if it was made by their friend Gerald Bruton the couturier. Edith remembers he made Margot’s wedding dress and several other pieces of her trousseau. The colour of the gown is enhanced by her dark hair and by a long bright green bugle bead necklace that cascades down the front of it and her matching chandelier earrings that swing and tremble from her dainty lobes.

 

“Can I help you, Mrs. Channon?” Edith asks. “Was everything at luncheon to your satisfaction?”

 

“Oh quite! Quite, Edith. Your roast was delicious, as were the tarts for dessert.” Margot falls silent but doesn’t turn or attempt to walk away.

 

“Is there something you need?” Edith queries.

 

“Actually, there is, Edith.” Margot says after a moment. She turns and looks over her left shoulder, down the length of the dining room into the drawing room where Lettice and Minnie are entertaining Bella with an amusing story about their escapades as they sip their digestives. She turns back to the maid. “May I ask for your discretion?”

 

“Of course, Mrs. Channon.”

 

“Good. Because I don’t want Minnie to hear us, so I’ll be quick.” Margot pronounces lowering her voice.

 

“Very good Mrs. Channon.” She moves the right-hand door of the Chippendale cabinet so that it obscures the view of Lettice, Minnie and Bella, and affords the two ladies a modicum of privacy behind it. “That’s better.” she says. “Now, how can I help?”

 

“You know how Dickie… err, Mr. Channon and I have moved around the corner from here and taken a flat in Hill Street.”

 

“Yes Mrs. Channon.”

 

“Well, you see, I need a competent maid to come and manage my household. It’s all in a bit of a muddle. I’ve borrowed one of Mummy’s maids, Pegeen, but she really isn’t suitable.” Margot shakes her head sadly as she toys with the rings on her fingers abstractedly.

 

Edith’s eyes grow wide, and her mouth starts to gape with incredulity as she takes a sharp intake of breath after hearing Margot’s words.

 

“Oh no! No, Edith!” Margot hisses. “You misunderstand me.” She shakes her head, making the chandelier earrings swing about, catching and reflecting the light from the pendant light overhead prettily. “I’d never try and poach you from Lettice.” She raises her elegantly manicured hands in defence. “Lettice is one of my oldest and dearest friends. I’d never be so beastly as to steal you away from her.”

 

Edith lets out a sigh of relief as she cradles the silver gravy boat in her arms.

 

“No,” Margot continues in an assuring tone. “I just thought, well, that you might know of someone looking for a position. Lettice told me that you weren’t very happy in your last position, and I wondered whether perhaps there might have been others you’ve worked with who might be dissatisfied with their current employer.”

 

Edith turns away from Margot and places the gleaming gravy boat on the second shelf of the Chippendale cabinet next to a salt shaker. She runs her finger along its foot thoughtfully and smiles to herself before turning back around again to see Margot’s expectant face.

 

“As it happens, I do know of someone, Mrs. Channon.” the maid replies confidently. “Who is currently looking for a new position in these parts.”

 

“Oh hoorah!” Margot clasps her hands. “Well, I don’t really know how this is done, Edith. Can you give me her details? Or perhaps if I give you mine? You could pass them on for me?”

 

“Now just wait a moment, Mrs. Channon.” Edith cautions her, holding up her careworn palms. “Not quite so fast, if you please. This is my very good friend, Hilda. I’ll not recommend anything to her until you’ve given me a few more specifics.”

 

“Of course, Edith.” Margot sighs. “What would you like to know?”

 

“Firstly, this is a live-in position, isn’t it?”

 

“Oh yes Edith. The flat has a lovely little maid’s bedroom off the kitchen, just like here.”

 

“And your flat is how big?” Edith asks.

 

“Well, it’s a trifle bigger than here, as there are two of us.”

 

“Yes?”

 

“There is a drawing room and dining room, obviously. It has two bedrooms like here, but the second one is a guest bedroom so she wouldn’t have to clean it every week, just air and clean it before we have house guests.”

 

“And how often is that?”

 

“Well, I don’t really know.” Margot considers. “We haven’t been there all that long, but I don’t suppose it will all that often. There are two dressing rooms, oh, and there’s Mr. Channon’s study as well.”

 

“And would my friend be required to cook for you, like I do for Miss Lettice?”

 

“Well, Mr. Channon and I dine out quite a lot. We’re barely home really. We also have our little house in Cornwall where we will spend some time once Lettice has finished redecorating, so breakfasts for both of us when we are home, the occasional luncheon and dinner.”

 

“What about sewing?”

 

“Sewing, Edith?” Margot gazes at Edith, a look of confusion on her face. “I need a maid, not a lady’s maid.”

 

“Will my friend be required to do any mending of linens, embroidery or the like.” Edith clarifies.

 

Margot looks perplexed. “I shouldn’t think so, Edith. If anything like that needs doing, I’ll get one of Dickie… er, Mr. Cannon’s parent’s maids to do it.”

 

“That’s good because Hilda doesn’t sew. Her mother didn’t like sewing, so she never learnt like I did. I tried to teach her a few basic skills, but she’s got no real aptitude for it.”

 

“I have the laundry sent out, like you do here, and I’ve engaged Mrs. Boothby to come twice a week to do the harder jobs.”

 

“Very good Mrs. Channon.” Edith acknowledges coolly, not giving away her thrill that this might be the perfect job for her friend Hilda to get her away from the mean Mrs. Plaistow.

 

“And I’ll happily pay a wage commensurate to your own, Edith.”

 

“Miss Lettice doesn’t pay me board wages*** when she goes away for weekends in the country, only at Christmas time.”

 

“Oh, I don’t even know what board wages are, Edith.” Margot assures the maid with a shrug of her shoulders.

 

Edith ruminates for a moment, her gaze drifting around the dining room: anywhere but Margot’s anxious face.

 

“If you don’t mind me asking, Mrs. Channon, if this is such a splendid position, and if you’re such a good mistress, why isn’t this Pegeen you’ve got working for you currently, suitable?” Edith glances at the inside of the black japanned door of the Chippendale cabinet, as if she can see Lettice, Minnie and Bella through it. She lowers her voice to even more of a whisper. “And why don’t you want Mrs. Palmerston knowing you’re looking for a new maid?”

 

“Well, you saw Minnie at luncheon today.” Margot replies. “She is rather,” She chews the inside of her cheek as she considers what adjective to use to describe Minnie Palmerston. “Highly strung shall we say.”

 

“Yes, I did notice that, Mrs. Channon.” Edith replies with a quick nod of acknowledgement.

 

“Well, her histrionics mean that she has some difficulty keeping maids for any length of time. I don’t want her to pilfer and squander any potential candidates you might send my way. After all, you really are such a brick, Edith.” Margot reaches out and places a hand on Edith’s forearm, which the maid finds overfamiliar and rather discomforting. “I’m sure anyone whom you recommend to me would be a brick too.”

 

“Thank you, Mrs. Channon.” Edith smiles proudly, blushing at the compliment and lowering her gaze demurely. “And why is Pegeen not a suitable candidate?”

 

“Well, for a start she is my mother’s maid, and I only have Pegeen under a grace-and-favour arrangement for a short time.” She pauses.

 

“And?” Edith presses her for her unfinished thoughts.

 

“And I caught her going through Mr. Channon’s desk drawers.’ Margot sighs. “I don’t want a prying maid. I also found her trying on my dresses twice and I caught a definite note of my La Jacinthe**** scent on her yesterday. I want a maid I can trust, like Lettice trusts you. Pegeen is definitely not to be trusted.”

 

Edith takes only a moment to decide whether this opportunity is good enough to pass on to Hilda.

 

“If you’d please supply me with your details, Mrs. Channon, I’ll be sure to pass them on to my friend Hilda. She can then choose if she wishes to pursue your offer of employment. That’s how it’s done.”

 

“Oh Edith!” Margot exclaims. “Lettice is right! You really are such a brick!”

 

“I don’t know what you mean, Mrs. Channon.” Edith demurs. “Now, hadn’t you best go back to the rest of the company before you are missed?”

 

“Oh yes, you’re right Edith.” Margot agrees, and so saying, she turns on her heel and walks away.

 

Edith carefully closes the beautifully decorated Chippendale cabinet with its ornate hinges and walks towards the green baize doors that lead back into the service area of the flat, barely able to contain her excitement. Only last week as they stood in Mrs. Minkin’s haberdashery shop, Hilda was complaining about how awful it was working under Mrs. Plaistow and how she was looking for a new position. Pushing open the doors and slipping through it she is thrilled that she may have the solution to her dear friend’s problems.

 

*Toot Toot Tootsie (Goobye) was one of the most popular songs of 1922, written by Gus Kahn, Ernie Erdman and Dan Russo, made popular by Al Jolson.

 

**The Hammersmith Palais de Danse, in its last years simply named Hammersmith Palais, was a dance hall and entertainment venue in Hammersmith, London, England that operated from 1919 until 2007. It was the first palais de danse to be built in Britain.

 

***Board wages were monies paid in lieu of meals and were paid in addition to a servant’s normal salary. Often servants were paid board wages when their employer went on holiday, or to London for the season, leaving them behind with no cook t prepare their meals. Some employers paid their servants fair board wages, however most didn’t, and servants often found themselves out of pocket fending for themselves, rather than having meals provided within the household.

 

****La Jacinthe is a scent created by French perfumier François Coty that was launched in 1914. With a fragrance of hyacinth as the name suggests, it was promoted as being "A tribute to stately radiant beauty that recalls the goddesses of Ancient Greece - the scent of classic hyacinths." It ceased production around 1933

 

This elegant domestic scene may not be all you consider it to be, for it is made up entirely with pieces from my 1:12 miniatures collection, including pieces from my teenage years.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Made by high-end miniature manufacturer, J.B.M. the black japanned Chippendale cabinet has been decorated with chinoiserie designs. It also features very ornate metalwork hinges and locks. The Chippendale black japanned chairs are also made by J. B. M.

 

The top shelf features white wine glasses all of which are artisan pieces, spun from real glass, that I acquired as a teenager from a high street shop that specialised in dolls and doll house miniatures. The red wine glasses on the right are also hand spun glass pieces from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. The Georgian water jug between the glasses comes from Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.

 

The middle shelf contains pieces of Lettice’s gilt edged dinner set featuring highly stylised blue Art Deco patterns. The gravy boat in the middle, like the water jug above, comes from Warwick Miniatures in Ireland.

 

The linen on the bottom shelf has been trimmed by hand with some dainty pieces of lace and was made for me by a miniature artisan sewer in Sydney.

 

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.

 

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 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 as her parents host their first Hunt Ball since 1914. Lady Sadie has been completely consumed over the last month by the planning and preparation of the occasion, determined that not only will it be the event of the 1922 county season, but also that it will be a successful entrée for her youngest daughter, still single at twenty-one years of age, to meet a number of eligible and marriageable men. Letters and invitations have flown from Lady Sadie’s bonheur de jour* to the families of eligible bachelors, some perhaps a little too old to be considered before the war, achieving more than modest success. Whilst Lettice enjoys dancing, parties and balls, she is less enthusiastic about the idea of the ball being used as a marriage market than her parents are.

 

The fancy dress Hunt Ball is now in full swing. The band hired by the Viscount plays waltzes, foxtrots, and polkas, as well as a smattering of novelty dances like the Grizzly Bear and the Bunny Hug to amuse the younger set of party-goers. Their sound carries over the general hubbub of voices chattering punctuated by laughter and the clinking of glasses. The Georgian style ballroom of Glynes with its golden yellow wallpaper and gilt Louis Quatorze furnishings is alive with colour and movement as pirates dance with nursery rhyme dames, maharajas foxtrot with princesses and clowns waltz with ladies in Georgian dress. Around the perimeter of the ballroom’s parquet dance floor, guest mill about, sharing county and London gossip, or admire and remark on the fancy dress attired couples taking to the floor. In their midst, Lettice, dressed as Cinderella in an Eighteenth Century gown and pomaded wig, dances, or rather tries to dance, a foxtrot with eligible bachelor and heir to several large estates, Jonty Hastings.

 

“Oh, do push off Howley, there’s a good chap!” Gerald says rudely as he tries to cut in and sweep Lettice away from Jonty’s rather stiff and awkward arms. “I don’t think Lettice’s feet can survive any more of your hopeless, uncoordinated trotting.”

 

“Don’t call me that, Gerald,” Jonty replies rather wetly, his face taking on the appearance of a petulant child as it reddens in embarrassment. “I’ve not been called that for years, thankfully, after you christened me with that awful nickname. You always were the mean one.” He glances at Lettice who is holding Gerald’s gaze imploringly. “Except to your favourites, of course.”

 

“I’m sorry Howley,” Gerald continues, deliberately ignoring Jonty’s request not to use the nickname given him. “But you can’t seriously expect me to stand back and watch you try unsuccessfully to sweep the most eligible and beautiful girl in the place into your arms. It’s simply too preposterous for words. Try one of the Miss Evanses instead.” Gerald nods in the direction of the two elderly spinster sisters who live in Holland House, a Seventeenth Century manor house in Glynes village. “They seem to be more to your standards, and they aren’t as picky as Lettice is.”

 

As Jonty pauses to look in the direction of the two elderly women, one dressed as Little Bo-Peep and the other as Miss Muffett, both looking like macabre versions of their nursery rhyme characters, Gerald seizes his chance and cuts firmly in, casting Jonty aside with an adept movement and sweeping Lettice quickly away.

 

“Oh you really are awful, Gerald!” Lettice says with a serious look, gazing at her friend dressed in a Tudor courtier’s outfit made from the brocades and laces left over from his clients’ commissioned frocks.

 

“Well, I’m the second son of an insignificant and impoverished family, so it’s my prerogative to despise someone like Howley Howling Hastings with all his wealth and good connections.”

 

“I don’t think it suits you to be so cruel, Gerald. You may not have Jonty’s family bank vault, but you have grace, charm and handsomeness that he doesn’t possess, and I think that makes you about even. Poor Jonty.”

 

“What?” Gerald replies. “Would you rather I left you with him, Lettice?”

 

“Well, no.“ Lettice admits with a downwards glance as her cheeks fill with an embarrassed flush.

 

“Exactly! We can’t have our Cinderella of the ball being monopolised by such a wet blanket as Howley! You’ll never marry him anyway.”

 

“I think Mater would like it if I did.” Lettice admits. “By your own admission, he’s very wealthy, and very eligible.”

 

“So is Nicholas Ayers,” Gerald counters. “In fact, he’s richer, but you aren’t going to marry him. I think if he has his way, he won’t marry anyone, and I stand a far better chance with him than you do. Doesn’t your mother know he is a lost cause?”

 

“No, she doesn’t,” she cautions Gerald. “And you mustn’t tell her, Gerald. She’d be horrified, parading him before me if she knew. Thinking of my mother, where is she?” Lettice asks, glancing around at the sweeping couples that glide about them.

 

Gerald cranes his neck to try and see over the top of the sea of bobbing wigs, turbans, pirate hats and clown cones. “She’s over there,” He glances with concern at Lettice.

 

“What is it Gerald?”

 

“She’s talking with Sir John Nettleford-Hughes, no doubt about you. Lucky I’ve saved you, my dear! Now, just follow my lead.”

 

And with that, Gerald begins to move Lettice around the floor, away from the watchful eyes of her mother and other party guests to the door leading out into the antechamber adjoining the ballroom. As they reach the edge of the floor, Gerald sweeps Lettice out, bows and offers her his arm as he escorts her off the floor and through the doors of the antechamber.

 

“Come. I think you’re in need of refreshments, Cinderella,” Gerald says with a smile. “After all your exertions on the dancefloor.”

 

Gerald escorts Lettice through the guests milling about in the antechamber, the pair smiling and imparting passing greetings with nods to friends and acquaintances they meet along the way.

 

“Where are you taking me?” Lettice asks.

 

Gerald doesn’t answer her, until finally they walk out into the great Adam style hall of Glynes. The sound of chatter from the room behind them takes on a ghostly air, as do the refrains of the band as they strike up a waltz.

 

“Oh dear. I should be dancing this with Nicholas Ayres.” Lettice remarks.

 

“Oh pooh, Nicholas!” Gerald scoffs. “He’ll be as grateful to be off the hook as you are, darling. Here!” He stops before one of the gilt Palladian console tables that flank the entrance to the ballroom antechamber and indicates to its surface next to an ostentatious floral arrangement of soft pink hot house roses, white asters and frothy Queen Anne’s lace. “I managed to steal a few petit-fours from the buffet being set up in the dining room, and get u a fresh glass of champagne each.” He picks up a glass of bubbling golden liquid and passes it to Lettice. “Cin cin, darling!”

 

“Oh Gerald!” Lettice gasps, happily accepting the glass which she clinks with his. “How did you manage to do it?”

 

“Well, as you said so yourself just moments ago, I have grace, charm and handsomeness: traits that come in useful from time to time.”

 

“How?”

 

“There was a rather gullible girl I remember from the village who is helping the caterers set up the dining room table. She was happy to fetch a couple of little deadlies for the young man from the Big House, especially when I begged and cast her a mock look of sadness and misty eyes.”

 

“Oh, you are wicked, Gerald. You do know how to make an evening more pleasurable.”

 

Gerald smiles proudly, his eyes glinting with mischief.

 

“I do hope you’re happy with the selection. I managed to get a caviar, a lettuce and egg and a tuna and cucumber.” He glances down at the gilt edged white plate on the console table’s surface standing next to a porcelain figurine of a girl playing a lute.

 

“Rather!” Lettice concurs, removing her right glove and taking up the caviar petit-four. She sighs as she takes a small bite from it. “Oh! I was so busy dancing with eligible bachelor after eligible bachelor that I hadn’t noticed how hungry I was.” She smiles and takes another bite and then a third, consuming the whole thing.

 

“Pleased to be of service, my lady!” Gerald makes a sweeping bow before her.

 

“You know I could get into terrible trouble being out here with you, you know.” Lettice giggles, taking another sip of cool champagne.

 

“How so?” Gerald asks. “You know you are perfectly safe with me.”

 

“Oh it’s not that. Mamma gave me a stern talking to before the commencement of this evening’s ceremonies. She warned me that your acerbic tongue is a bad influence on me.”

 

“Acerbic tongue?” Gerald cries, looking aghast, albeit not seriously, at Lettice. “Moi? Acerbic! The nerve of her saying that!”

 

“And she told me that it would be a waste of my time an energy spending time with you, when you are so frightfully unsuitable, being the spare, rather than the heir.”

 

“Not to mention my family’s somewhat questionable finances.”

 

“Well, “ Lettice blushes, casting her eyes down to the face of the statue of the lute player. “She did mention that too.”

 

“Did she also mention I’d rather take off with Leslie than you?” Gerald asks her in a whisper. When Lettice shakes her head, he sighs and then continues in a slightly higher volume, yet still not much more than a whisper. “Well at least some things about my life still remain private. I suppose our money troubles were bound to reach Lady Sadie’s ears at some stage. I just hope she doesn’t mention it to Mamma.”

 

“Surely if your father is in financial difficulties, your mother would know about it, Gerald.”

 

“I don’t think so. He has always done his best to protect Mamma from having to worry about such things. When she mentions going up to London for the Season, or buying a new hat, he always manages to placate her with some story or other. So, as far as I’m aware, she has no idea and lives in blissful ignorance.”

 

Suddenly, the door leading from the driveway clatters open and a gentleman in a long cloak and top hat appears in silhouette against the lights overhead. With all the guests having arrived some time before, the front door is no longer manned by the Chetwynd’s first footman, Marsden, who is now occupied with serving champagne in the ballroom, so the gentleman opens the glass vestibule door himself and walks in unannounced into the hall, which is empty except for a few couples trying to find a moment of privacy in the shadow of a pillar and Lettice and Gerald enjoying a few minutes of elicit peace.

 

“I say, can I help you?” Lettice asks, placing her glass on the marble tabletop and walking across the hall.

 

“Oh I say,” the gentleman remarks in a clipped, well-bred voice as he removes his cloak and shakes it out noisily. “I am sorry. I’m awfully late. Can you point me in the direction of one of…” He stops abruptly as he gazes down at Lettice’s face looking up at him.

 

“One of?” Lettice asks, looking up expectantly into a pair of rather striking deep brown eyes.

 

“Goodness! Can it?” the stranger stammers. “No! No, it… no it can’t be! Can it?”

 

Lettice continues to look up in bewilderment at the man as he now removes his hat, revealing a head of neatly coiffed brown hair that frames his handsome face. “I’m afraid you’ll have to finish your sentence if you wish me to help you, sir.” she remarks prettily.

 

“I’m so sorry,” the stranger apologises again. “But are you the Honourable Miss Lettice Chetwynd by any chance?”

 

Lettice shakes her head slightly in disbelief, her eyes squinting. “Yes, yes I am. Have we met, sir?”

 

“Oh not for many years. The last time I saw you was at Queen Charlotte’s Ball** in 1919, but I haven’t actually spoken to you since we were about six, yet I’d know your face anywhere.”

 

“Not since we were six?” Lettice giggles, her laugh echoing about the mostly deserted entrance hall. “You have a good memory for faces if you remember mine so well. Who are you?”

 

“I wouldn’t expect you to recognise me, dear Lettice, but I’m Selwyn: Selwyn Spencely.”

 

Lettice’s eyes widen in disbelief. “Good heavens! Selwyn!” Lettice laughs loudly. “I say, how do you do!”

 

“I’m sorry I’m so unconscionably late!” Selwyn apologises again. “My mother has been unwell with a rather nasty cold. I was reading to her, and I tarried later with her than I perhaps should have. I just wanted to be sure she had dozed off before I left.”

 

“That’s quite alright, Selwyn.” Lettice continues to look up in surprise to Selwyn’s patrician face. “The last time I can remember seeing you was when we were around six and you were covered in hedgerow mud, being pulled away by your mother into a waiting carriage.”

 

“Yes,” chuckled Selwyn. “I remember that occasion well. She was furious!”

 

“I remember thinking it was at odds to her name, being a beautiful flower. Violet isn’t it?”

 

“Zinnia, actually.”

 

“Oh yes! Lady Zinnia!” Lettice giggles self-consciously. Then, looking down she notices her newest guest’s hands are full. “Oh here, let me take your cape and hat, Selwyn.” She reaches out and takes them from him. “I’ll find Bromley or another servant to take them away.”

 

A gentle, yet deliberate clearing of his throat alerts both Selwyn and Lettice, who had forgotten all about him momentarily, to Gerald’s presence behind them, lolling against the console table. “Hullo Selwyn.” he greets the newcomer crisply.

 

“Gerald! How do you do, old chap!” Selwyn smiles over at Gerald.

 

“I didn’t know you two knew each other.” Lettice remarks.

 

“Oh yes,” Selwyn replies jovially. “Gerald and I are members of the same club. Aren’t we Gerald? I haven’t seen much of you lately.”

 

“Well, I’ve been too busy to spend much time at the club lately.” Gerald excuses himself offhandedly.

 

“Ahh.” Selwyn acknowledges non-committally, yet with an air of knowing something unspoken as he cocks an eyebrow. “Frocks, isn’t it?”

 

“Oh yes!” Lettice enthuses. “He’s made my wardrobe for more stylish and modish, haven’t you Gerald?”

 

Gerald blushes at the compliment, but says nothing.

 

“Well, come along Selwyn,” Lettice says with delight as she hooks her arm into his. “Let’s go find Mamma and Pappa. They’ll be pleased to see you here, even if your mother couldn’t be here.”

 

“Shall I take those?” Gerald asks helpfully, reaching out for Selwyn’s cape, hat and gloves. “You can’t very well go back into the ballroom holding them.”

 

“Oh would you, Gerald?” Lettice exclaims. “Oh that would be a wonderful help.”

 

“I’m practically a member of the family, so I’ll have no difficulty finding Bramley.” He takes the items in his hands. “Now, you two run along.” He flaps his hands at them. “Shoo.”

 

The pair give Gerald appreciative smiles, and then walk off slowly, arm in arm, back into the ballroom antechamber, Lettice’s giggling and their quite chatting quickly enveloped into the general burble of voices.

 

Gerald looks back at the two unfinished glasses of champagne and the canapes and sighs, suddenly acutely aware of how empty the cavernous hallway is without his beloved friend.

 

*A bonheur de jour is a type of lady's writing desk. It was introduced in Paris by one of the interior decorators and purveyors of fashionable novelties called marchands-merciers around 1760, and speedily became intensely fashionable. Decorated on all sides, it was designed to sit in the middle of a room so that it could be admired from any angle.

 

**The Queen Charlotte's Ball is an annual British debutante ball. The ball was founded in 1780 by George III as a birthday celebration in honour of his wife, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, for whom the ball is named. The Queen Charlotte's Ball originally served as a fundraiser for the Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital. The annual ball continued after Queen Charlotte's death in 1818, but was criticised by the British Royal Family in the 1950s and 1960s and folded in 1976. It was revived in the Twenty First Century by Jenny Hallam-Peel, a former debutante, who shifted its focus from entering high society to teaching business skills, networking, and etiquette, and fundraising for charities. Debutantes being presented curtsey to a large birthday cake in honour of Queen Charlotte.

 

This grand Georgian interior may appear like something out of a historical stately country house, but it is in fact part of my 1:12 miniatures collection and includes items from my childhood, as well as those I have collected as an adult.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The floral arrangement in urn on top of the console table consists of pink roses, white asters and white Queen Anne’s Lace. Although unmarked, it was made by an American miniature artisan with incredible attention to detail. The Seventeenth Century musical statue of the lady playing a lute to the right of the flower arrangement was made by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. It was hand painted by me. The floral arrangement and the statue are both one of a pair.

 

The savoury petite fours on the gilt white porcelain plate 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 selection includes egg and lettuce, Beluga caviar and salmon and cucumber. The two glasses of sparkling champagne are made of real glass and were made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in the United Kingdom.

 

The Palladian console table on which the items stand is one of a pair. With their golden caryatids and marble tops, they were commissioned by me from American miniature artisan Peter Cluff. Peter specialises in making authentic and very realistic high quality 1:12 miniatures that reflect his interest in Georgian interior design. His work is highly sought after by miniature collectors worldwide. This pair of tables are one-of-a-kind and very special to me.

 

The gilt Louis Quatorze chairs and the gilt swan pedestals in the background are made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq.

 

All the paintings around the Glynes ballroom antechamber in their gilded frames are 1:12 artisan pieces made by Amber’s Miniatures in the United States and the wallpaper of the ballroom antechamber is an authentic copy of hand-painted Georgian wallpaper from the 1770s.

 

The marquetry floor of the room is in fact a wooden chessboard. The chessboard was made by my Grandfather, a skilful and creative man in 1952. Two chess sets, a draughts set and three chess boards made by my Grandfather were bequeathed to me as part of his estate when he died a few years ago.

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 northwest of Lettice’s flat, in the working-class London suburb of Harlesden where Edith, Lettice’s maid, is paying an unexpected call on her parents whilst her mistress is away enjoying the distractions of the London Season. Edith’s father, George, works at the McVitie and Price biscuit factory in Harlesden, and her mother, Ada, takes in laundry at home. They live in a small, two storey brick terrace house which opens out directly onto the street, and is far removed from the grandeur of Lettice’s flat, but has always been a cosy and welcoming home for Edith. Even before she walks through the glossy black painted front door, Edith can smell the familiar scent of a mixture of Lifebuoy Soap, Borax and Robin’s Starch, which means her mother is washing the laundry of others wealthier than she in the terrace’s kitchen at the rear of the house.

 

“Mum!” Edith calls out cheerily as she opens the unlocked front door and walks in. “Mum, it’s me!”

 

“Edith!” Ada gasps in delighted surprise, glancing up to the door leading from the hallway into the kitchen. “I wasn’t expecting you. What a lovely surprise!”

 

Ada rises from her chair at the worn kitchen table and embraces her daughter lovingly. Holding her at arm’s length, she admires her three-quarter length black coat and purple rose and black feather decorated straw hat. “Look at you, my darling girl.” The older woman self-consciously pushes loose strands of her mousey brown hair back behind her ears. Chuckling awkwardly, she remarks with a downwards glance. “You’re far too fancy for the likes of us now, Edith.”

 

“Don’t talk nonsense, Mum!” Edith dismisses her mother’s comment with a flap of her hand. "My coat came from a Petticoat Lane* second-hand clothes stall. I picked it up dead cheap and remodelled it myself.”

 

“Taking after your old Mum then?” Ada remarks with a hint of pride.

 

“You taught me everything I know about sewing, Mum, and I’ll always be grateful for that.”

 

The joyful smile suddenly fades from Ada’s face as it clouds in concern. “But it’s Tuesday today. You don’t have Tuesdays off. Is everything alright, love?”

 

“It’s fine, Mum.” Edith assures her mother, placing a calming hand on her mother’s shoulder with one hand as she places her basket on the crowded kitchen table with the other. “Miss Lettice has gone to stay with friends on the Isle of Wight for Cowes Week**, so I thought I’d pop in and visit since I have a bit of free time whilst she’s away.”

 

“Oh! That’s alright then!” the older woman sighs with relief, fanning herself as she lowers herself back into her seat.

 

Feeling the stuffiness in the room from the lighted range and the moisture from the steaming tubs of washing, Edith takes off her coat and hangs it on a hook by the back door. She then places her hat on one of the carved knobs of the ladderback chair drawn up to the table next to her mother’s usual seat.

 

“Oh don’t put it there, love.” Ada chides. “It might get damaged. Such a pretty hat should sit on the table where it’s safe.”

 

“It’s nothing special, Mum. This came from Petticoat Lane too, and it’s not new. I decorated the hat with bits and bobs I picked up from a Whitechapel haberdasher Miss Lettice’s char***, Mrs. Boothby, told me about.”

 

“Well, homemade or not, it’s too pretty to hang there.”

 

“It’s my hat, Mum, and I promise you, it’ll be fine there.

 

“Well, suit yourself, love. Anyway, your timing is perfect. I just filled Brown Betty****. Grab yourself a cup and bring over the biscuit tin. Your Dad will be home for lunch soon. He’ll be glad to see you.”

 

Edith walks over to the big, dark Welsh dresser that dominates one side of the tiny kitchen and picks up a pretty floral teacup and saucer from among the mismatched crockery on its shelves: one of her mother’s many market finds that helped to bring elegance and beauty to Edith’s childhood home. She looks fondly at the battered McVitie and Price’s tin. “How’s Dad?”

 

“Oh, things are looking up for him.” Ada says proudly as she flips open her large sewing basket and fossicks through it looking for a spool of brightly coloured blue cotton thread.

 

“Oh?” Edith queries.

 

“Yes, there’s talk of him being made a line manager. Isn’t that a turn up for the books?”

 

“Oh Mum! That’s wonderful news.” The younger woman enthuses as she puts the empty teacup, saucer and biscuit tin on the table and sits down next to her mother. “You might be finally able to pack all this in.” She waves her hand about the kitchen at the tubs of washing, drying laundry and pressed linens.

 

“Oh I don’t know about that, Edith. Anyway, I have built up a good reputation over the years.”

 

“Yes,” Edith remarks scornfully. “For charging too little for the excellent work you do.” She looks over, past her mother, to a neat pile of lace edged linens. “What’s that you’re doing now, Mum?”

 

“Oh it’s just some work for Mrs. Hounslow. She wants her new sheets and pillowcases monogrammed.”

 

“And how much are you, not being paid, for that, Mum?” Edith emphasises.

 

“Oh Edith! Mrs. Hounslow’s a widow.”

 

“I know, Mum. I’ve grown up hearing about how Mrs. Hounslow’s husband died a hero in the siege of Mafeking in the Boer War. But I’ve never heard of her scraping for a penny for a scrap to eat. And where are those pretty lace trimmed sheets from?”

 

“Bishop’s in the High Street.”

 

“See! No second-hand sheets for old Widow Hounslow!”

 

“Now I won’t have a bad word said about her, Edith.” Ada wags her finger admonishingly at her daughter before selecting a needle from the red cotton lined lid of her basket and threads it. “She’s helped pay for many a meal in this house with her sixpences and shillings over the years. You should be grateful to her.”

 

“Pshaw!” Edith raises her eyes to the ceiling above. “I wish you’d let me help out more, Mum. I live in, so I don’t have the expenses of lodgings, and Miss Lettice pays me well.”

 

“Now, I won’t hear of it, Edith.” Ada raises her palms to her daughter, still clutching the threaded needle between her right index finger and thumb. “You earned that money with hard work at Miss Chetwynd’s. You pay enough to help keep us as it is.”

 

“But Mum,” Edith pours tea into her mother’s and then her own teacup. “If Dad does get this better job at McVitie’s, and I paid you a bit more of my wage, you probably really could give up washing, sewing and mending for the likes of Mrs. Hounslow.”

 

“And then what would I do, Edith?” The older woman adds a dash of milk to her tea.

 

“Well, you might like to put your feet up for a bit or buy a few nice new things for around here. Get rid of our battered old breadbin and those cannisters.” She points to the offending worn white enamel green trimmed pieces on the dresser.

 

“Oh, so we’re not grand enough then, Miss Edith?” Ada says in mock offence as she looks down her nose at her daughter and she raises herself and sits a little more erectly in her seat. “I love my breadbin thank you very much. That was a wedding gift from your Aunt Maude.”

 

“You know that’s not what I mean,” Edith replies, shaking her head exasperatedly. Adding milk and sugar to her own tea she continues, “I just want you to have nice things, Mum: things like those I have at Miss Lettice’s.”

 

“I’m so pleased you like it there, love.” Ada places a careworn hand lovingly on top of her daughter’s.

 

“Oh Mum, it’s so much better than Mrs. Plaistow’s was. It’s so much smaller than their townhouse, and I don’t have to traipse up and down stairs all day. There’s a gas stove, so I don’t have to fetch coal in or blacklead grates. Even if there were, Miss Lettice has Mrs. Boothby do all the hard graft I used to have to do at the Plaistow’s.”

 

“And Miss Chetwynd? She’s still being good to you?”

 

“Yes Mum.” Edith takes a sip of her tea. “I still haven’t broken her of the habit of just waltzing into the kitchen whenever she feels like it, rather than ringing the bell.”

 

“And her, a lord’s daughter.” Ada tuts, shaking her head.

 

“Well, a Viscount’s daughter at any rate.”

 

“You think she’d know better.”

 

“I’m sure she’s different when she goes home to Wiltshire. It does sound like a very grand house.”

 

“So much grander than here, Edith.”

 

“Now don’t start again, Mum. You know I didn’t mean anything by what I said before. Anyway. I have a something for you, but I shan’t give it to you if you’re going to be contrary!” Edith teases.

 

“Contrary indeed!” Ada snorts derisively.

 

Edith takes a bulky parcel wrapped in cream butcher’s paper tied up with brightly coloured string from her basket and places it carefully on the table before her mother.

 

“Well what is it?” Ada asks in surprise.

 

“Why don’t you open it, Mum, and find out.” Edith replies playfully in return.

 

With trembling fingers Ada tugs at the knot in the string. Loosening it causes the protective layer of paper to fall noisily away to reveal a beautiful, glazed teapot in the shape of a cottage with a thatched roof with the chimney as the lid.

 

“Oh Edith, love!” gasps Ada. “It’s beautiful!”

 

“Since you won’t let me give you more money, I may as well buy you some nice things Mum!”

 

“Oh this must have cost a fortune!” Ada appraises the paintwork on the pot. “For shame, Edith! You shouldn’t have spent your money on me.”

 

“Nonsense Mum! I bought this at the Caledonian Markets***** where it was so reasonably priced as it was on its own and didn’t have the milk jug and sugar bowl to match. Do you like it?”

 

“Like it, Edith? Oh, I love it!” Ada hugs her daughter, batting her eyelids as she attempts to keep back the tears of appreciation and joy.

 

“Good! Then we can have tea out of this, rather than old Brown Betty!”

 

“What?” Ada cries. “Oh no, I can’t well do that! This teapot is far too nice to use everyday! There’s nothing wrong with Brown Betty. Brown Betty was your Great Grandma’s!” She runs her hand lovingly over the handle of the pot. “No, I’ll keep this pot for good. I’ll take it up to the parlour and we’ll use it on Christmas Day, when you and your brother are home.”

 

“Oh Mum!” Edith sighs, shaking her head in loving despair at her mother who beams with delight at her new present.

 

*Petticoat Lane Market is a fashion and clothing market in Spitalfields, London. It consists of two adjacent street markets. Wentworth Street Market and Middlesex Street Market. Originally populated by Huguenots fleeing persecution in France, Spitalfields became a center for weaving, embroidery and dying. From 1882, a wave of Jewish immigrants fleeing persecution in eastern Europe settled in the area and Spitalfields then became the true heart of the clothing manufacturing district of London. 'The Lane' was always renowned for the 'patter' and showmanship of the market traders. It was also known for being a haven for the unsavoury characters of London’s underworld and was rife with prostitutes during the late Victorian era. Unpopular with the authorities, as it was largely unregulated and in some sense illegal, as recently as the 1930s, police cars and fire engines were driven down ‘The Lane’, with alarm bells ringing, to disrupt the market.

 

**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.

 

***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.

 

****A Brown Betty is a type of teapot, round and with a manganese brown glaze known as Rockingham glaze. In the Victorian era, when tea was at its peak of popularity, tea brewed in the Brown Betty was considered excellent. This was attributed to the design of the pot which allowed the tea leaves more freedom to swirl around as the water was poured into the pot, releasing more flavour with less bitterness.

 

***** The original Caledonian Market, renown for antiques, buried treasure and junk, was situated in in a wide cobblestoned area just off the Caledonian Road in Islington in 1921 when this story is set. Opened in 1855 by Prince Albert, and originally called the Metropolitan Meat Markets, it was supplementary to the Smithfield Meat Market. Arranged in a rectangle, the market was dominated by a forty six metre central clock tower. By the early Twentieth Century, with the diminishing trade in live animals, a bric-a-brac market developed and flourished there until after the Second World War when it moved to Bermondsey, south of the Thames, where it flourishes today. The Islington site was developed in 1967 into the Market Estate and an open green space called Caledonian Park. All that remains of the original Caledonian Markets is the wonderful Victorian clock tower.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful domestic scene is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection. Some pieces come from my own childhood. Other items I acquired as an adult through specialist online dealers and artists who specialise in 1:12 miniatures.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The central focus of our story, sitting on Ada’s table, is the cottage ware teapot. Made by French ceramicist and miniature artisan Valerie Casson, it has been decorated authentically and matches in perfect detail its life-size Price Washington ‘Ye Olde Cottage Teapot’ counterparts. The top part of the thatched rood and central chimney form the lid, just like the real thing. Valerie Casson is renown for her meticulously crafted and painted miniature ceramics.

 

Surrounding the cottage ware teapot are non-matching teacups, saucers, a milk jug and sugar bowl, all of which have come from different miniature stockists both in Australia and the United Kingdom. The Brown Betty teapot in the foreground came from The Dolls House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

Sitting atop a stack of neatly folded 1:12 size linens sits Ada’s wicker sewing basket. Sitting open it has needles stuck into the padded lid, whilst inside it are a tape measure, knitting needles, balls of wool, reels of cotton and a pair of shears. All the items and the basket, except for the shears, are hand made by Mrs. Denton of Muffin Lodge in the United Kingdom. The taupe knitting on the two long pins that serve as knitting needles is properly knitted and cast on. The shears with black handles in the basket open and close. Made of metal, they came from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniature Shop in the United Kingdom. The blue cotton reel and silver sewing scissors come from an E-Bay stockist of miniatures based in the United Kingdom.

 

Sitting on the table in the foreground is a McVitie and Price’s Small Petite Beurre Biscuits tin, containing a selection of different biscuits. The biscuits were made by hand of polymer 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. McVitie's (Originally McVitie and Price) is a British snack food brand owned by United Biscuits. The name derives from the original Scottish biscuit maker, McVitie and Price, Ltd., established in 1830 on Rose Street in Edinburgh, Scotland. The company moved to various sites in the city before completing the St. Andrews Biscuit Works factory on Robertson Avenue in the Gorgie district in 1888. The company also established one in Glasgow and two large manufacturing plants south of the border, in Heaton Chapel, Stockport, and Harlesden, London (where Edith’s father works). McVitie and Price's first major biscuit was the McVitie's Digestive, created in 1892 by a new young employee at the company named Alexander Grant, who later became the managing director of the company. The biscuit was given its name because it was thought that its high baking soda content served as an aid to food digestion. The McVitie's Chocolate Homewheat Digestive was created in 1925. Although not their core operation, McVitie's were commissioned in 1893 to create a wedding cake for the royal wedding between the Duke of York and Princess Mary, who subsequently became King George V and Queen Mary. This cake was over two metres high and cost one hundred and forty guineas. It was viewed by 14,000 and was a wonderful publicity for the company. They received many commissions for royal wedding cakes and christening cakes, including the wedding cake for Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip and Prince William and Catherine Middleton. Under United Biscuits McVitie's holds a Royal Warrant from Queen Elizabeth II.

 

Also on Ada’s table in the foreground there are several packets of Edwardian cleaning and laundry brands that were in common use in the early Twentieth Century in every household, rich or poor. These are Sunlight Soap, Robin’s Starch, Jumbo Blue and Imp Washer Soap. All these packets were made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

Sunlight Soap was first introduced in 1884 by William Hesketh Lever (1st Viscount Leverhulme) and introduced to the market in 1904. It was produced at Port Sunlight in Wirrel, Merseyside, a model village built by Lever Brothers for the workers of their factories which produced the popular soap brands Lux, Lifebuoy and Sunlight.

 

Before the invention of aerosol spray starch, the product of choice in many homes of all classes was Robin starch. Robin Starch was a stiff white powder like cornflour to which water had to be added. When you made up the solution, it was gloopy, sticky with powdery lumps, just like wallpaper paste or grout. The garment was immersed evenly in that mixture and then it had to be smoothed out. All the stubborn starchy lumps had to be dissolved until they were eliminated – a metal spoon was good for bashing at the lumps to break them down. Robins Starch was produced by Reckitt and Sons who were a leading British manufacturer of household products, notably starch, black lead, laundry blue, and household polish. They also produced Jumbo Blue, which was a whitener added to a wash to help delay the yellowing effect of older cotton. Rekitt and Sons were based in Kingston upon Hull. Isaac Reckitt began business in Hull in 1840, and his business became a private company Isaac Reckitt and Sons in 1879, and a public company in 1888. The company expanded through the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries. It merged with a major competitor in the starch market J. and J. Colman in 1938 to form Reckitt and Colman.

 

Imp Washer Soap was manufactured by T. H. Harris and Sons Limited, a soap manufacturers, tallow melters and bone boiler. Introduced after the Great War, Imp Washer Soap was a cheaper alternative to the more popular brands like Sunlight, Hudsons and Lifebuoy soaps. Imp Washer Soap was advertised as a free lathering and economical cleaner. T. H. Harris and Sons Limited also sold Mazo soap energiser which purported to improve the quality of cleaning power of existing soaps.

 

Edith’s black dyed straw hat with purple roses and black feathers was made by an unknown artisan. 1:12 size miniature hats made to such exacting standards of quality and realism are often far more expensive than real hats are. When you think that it would sit comfortably on the tip of your index finger, yet it could cost in excess of $150.00 or £100.00, it is an extravagance. American artists seem to have the monopoly on this skill and some of the hats that I have seen or acquired over the years are remarkable. This hat is part of a larger collection I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel.

 

In the background you can see Ada’s dark Welsh dresser cluttered with household items. Like Ada’s table, the Windsor chair and the ladderback chair to the left of the photo, I have had the dresser since I was a child. The shelves of the dresser have different patterned crockery and silver pots on them which have come from different miniature stockists both in Australia and the United Kingdom. There are also some rather worn and beaten looking enamelled cannisters and a bread tin in the typical domestic Art Deco design and kitchen colours of the 1920s, cream and green. Aged on purpose, these artisan pieces I recently acquired from The Dolls’ House Shop in the United Kingdom. There are also tins of various foods which would have been household staples in the 1920s when canning and preservation revolutinised domestic cookery. Amongst other foods on the dresser are a tin of Macfie’s Finest Black Treacle, two jars of P.C. Flett and Company jam, a tin of Heinz marinated apricots, a jar of Marmite and some Oxo stock cubes. All these items are 1:12 size artisan miniatures made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire, with great attention to detail paid to their labels and the shapes of their jars and cans.

 

Robert Andrew Macfie sugar refiner was the first person to use the term term Golden Syrup in 1840, a product made by his factory, the Macfie sugar refinery, in Liverpool. He also produced black treacle.

 

P.C. Flett and Company was established in Kirkwall in the Orkney Islands by Peter Copeland Flett. He had inherited a small family owned ironmongers in Albert Street Kirkwall, which he inherited from his maternal family. He had a shed in the back of the shop where he made ginger ale, lemonade, jams and preserves from local produce. By the 1920s they had an office in Liverpool, and travelling representatives selling jams and preserves around Great Britain. I am not sure when the business ceased trading.

 

The American based Heinz food processing company, famous for its Baked Beans, 57 varieties of soups and tinend spaghetti opened a factory in Harlesden in 1919, providing a great deal of employment for the locals who were not already employed at McVitie and Price.

 

Marmite is a food spread made from yeast extract which although considered remarkably English, was in fact invented by German scientist Justus von Liebig although it was originally made in the United Kingdom. It is a by-product of beer brewing and is currently produced by British company Unilever. The product is notable as a vegan source of B vitamins, including supplemental vitamin B. Marmite is a sticky, dark brown paste with a distinctive, salty, powerful flavour. This distinctive taste is represented in the marketing slogan: "Love it or hate it." Such is its prominence in British popular culture that the product's name is often used as a metaphor for something that is an acquired taste or tends to polarise opinion.

 

Oxo is a brand of food products, including stock cubes, herbs and spices, dried gravy, and yeast extract. The original product was the beef stock cube, and the company now also markets chicken and other flavour cubes, including versions with Chinese and Indian spices. The cubes are broken up and used as flavouring in meals or gravy or dissolved into boiling water to produce a bouillon. Oxo produced their first cubes in 1910 and further increased Oxo's popularity.

 

The large kitchen range in the background is a 1:12 miniature replica of the coal fed Phoenix Kitchen Range. A mid-Victorian model, it has hinged opening doors, hanging bars above the stove and a little bass hot water tap (used in the days before plumbed hot water).

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.

 

“Luncheon is served, Miss.” Edith, Lettice’s maid, announces in a brave voice, disguising her nerves cooking for Lettice’s father the Sixth Viscount of Wrexham as she drops a respectful curtsey on the threshold between the dining room and the drawing room.

 

“What’s that?” Viscount Wrexham pipes as he sits up in the Art Deco tub chair by the fire that he has been comfortably installed in for the last hour and a half.

 

“Luncheon, Pappa.” Lettice replies. “Thank you, Edith.”

 

“Yes Miss.” Edith replies. She bobs another quick curtsey and wastes no time scurrying back through the green baize door into the relative safety of the kitchen.

 

“Shall we go through, Pappa?” Lettice asks with a happy smile and an indicating gesture.

 

The Viscount and his daughter stand up and stroll into the dining room, leaving their empty aperitif glasses on the low coffee table. Lettice takes her place as hostess at the head of the table, whilst her father takes his place to her left.

 

“What’s this?” the Viscount burbles discontentedly as he looks across the black japanned Art Deco table.

 

“It looks like luncheon to me, Pappa.” Lettice replies sweetly, aware that her answer will irritate her father. “Edith’s roast chicken. How delicious.”

 

“I can see that Lettice.” Viscount Wrexham growls. “Don’t be obtuse!”

 

“Then be more specific, Pappa.”

 

“To be more specific. Why did that lazy girl just leave it in the middle of the table. Girl! Girl!” he bellows towards the door. “Come here, girl!”

 

“Pappa!” Lettice exclaims.

 

Edith hurries back through the door with a harried look on her face. “Yes, Your Lordship?” She makes a quick bob curtsey and gazes down at her fingers folded neatly in front of her.

 

The Viscount glares firstly at her, then turns silently to glare at the food causing offence on the table.

 

“Thank you Edith,” Lettice says apologetically in a soothing tone. “His Lordship was mistaken. You may return to your duties.”

 

“What? I…” the older man splutters, turning his offended gaze to his daughter.

 

“Pappa.” Lettice places her elegant hand with its manicured nails over her father’s bigger hand and waits until Edith has slipped back through the green baize door like a shadow. “Papa. You’re in London now, not in Wiltshire: in my flat, not in Glynes*. This is luncheon, à la London. And in London, in my flat, we serve ourselves luncheon on informal occasions. Would you carve?” She proffers the carving cutlery to her disgruntled father.

 

“Well, I suppose someone must, since you see fit to deprive us of a butler,” he mutters.

 

“Pappa, look around you. I live in a flat, not a mansion. I don’t need a butler. Edith does very well as a cook and maid-of-all-work. And I’d like to keep her, so please stop terrorising her by bellowing at her.”

 

“What about for a dinner party! Don’t tell me you insult your guests as you do your poor Father by forcing them to serve themselves. You’ll never have a single client if you do.”

 

“No Pappa,” Lettice sighs in an exasperated fashion. “Edith can wait table as good as any butler.”

 

“Ptah! What nonsense! A girl waiting table. It’s like the war all over again.”

 

“Or,” Lettice speaks over her father forcefully to prevent a tirade coming from his lips. “If needs be, I hire extra staff from a domestic agency in Westminster Mamma put me in touch with. It’s the same agency she uses when you both come up to London from Glynes.” She spoons some boiled vegetables onto her plate next to the piece of roast chicken her father placed on it. “Thinking of which, it was lovely of Mamma to send up some orange roses from Glynes.”

 

“Yes, your Mother has done particularly well with the roses in the greenhouses at Glynes this year. They have protected the blooms from the Wiltshire cold and provided a profusion of flowers.”

 

“They are beautiful.” Lettice smiles as she looks at the fiery orange blooms in the tall cut crystal vase on the table before her.

 

“Well, your Mother and I both agree that this London flat of yours, like so much of London, lacks colour. It’s all black and white, just like those Bioscopes** you young people so adore.”

 

“Nonsense Pappa! My flat has lots of colour. Just look at the art on my walls.”

 

“Finger paintings!” he snorts derisively as he takes a bite of his chicken. “Your Mother and I agree about that too. Not to mention,” the Viscount pauses, deposits his cutlery onto his plate and turns in his seat to look behind him at the statue of the bronze woman reclining, yet gazing straight at him with a steely gaze. “Ahem.”

 

“It’s called modern art, Pappa. And she is divine: the embodiment of the New Woman in bronze. Anyway, thankfully my clients happen to like my choice of ‘finger paintings’ and modern sculpture from the Portland Gallery.”

 

“Aah, yes well,” the Viscount clears his throat and dabs the edges of his mouth with his blue linen napkin. “Thinking of clients. That brings me to the purpose of my visit.”

 

“Of course. There has to be a reason beyond visiting your beloved youngest daughter just to see to her welfare.”

 

“Now, don’t be like that Lettice.” He wags a finger admonishingly at her. “Many is the time I’ve come up to town just to have the pleasure of your company over luncheon at Claridge’s. No. No, your Mother, heard from… a friend, ahem.” The older man clears his throat awkwardly. “That you designed some interiors for the wife of that banker, Hatchett: the chorus girl.”

 

Lettice purposefully lowers her fork. Picking up her glass of red wine she replies, “I did Pappa. What of it?”

 

“Oh Lettice! Your poor mother and I were hoping that it was just a rumour.”

 

“Well why shouldn’t I design interiors for her? I’m an interior designer and she needed some rooms redesigning.”

 

“Lettice! You know perfectly well why. I shouldn’t have to spell it out for you. You aren’t a child anymore. You know your position in society. Be an interior designer by all means, but at least stick to your own class and be a society interior designer, my dear.”

 

“That doesn’t pay the bills, Pappa.”

 

The Viscount looks askance at his daughter. “For shame, Lettice!”

 

“Pappa, I’m a businesswoman now. I must talk about money. At least the Hatchett’s paid for my services.”

 

“You’re of age now Lettice, and I pay you a damn good allowance that should more than cover your expenses, and maybe even extend to getting a decent butler rather than a maid. Frocks, even the ones you like, can’t be that costly, surely.”

 

“Pappa, it’s not so much about the money. It’s about the success of my business. I want to do something with my life. I can’t be a successful interior designer if I provide my services at no fee. I’d be a sham!”

 

“Well what about that cousin of your Mother’s in Fitzroy Square? Cousin Gwendolyn wasn’t it?”

 

“Pappa, the Duchess of Whitby still hasn’t paid me a third of what she owes for the redesign of her small reception room. I’ve sent her two reminders which she has politely ignored. She is never at home when I visit, and she is evasive to say the least over the telephone.”

 

“Oh.” the Viscount looks down at his plate. “Well… well, I’ll talk to your Mother about talking to Gwendolyn about that.”

 

“It would be even better if you did Pappa.” Lettice raises her glass of claret. “She is more inclined to listen to you, as head of the Chetwynd household.”

 

“Oh, very well Lettice.” he sighs and clinks glasses with his daughter.

 

“Thank you Pappa!” She leans over and pecks her father on the cheek, sending a flush of colour across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. “You are a brick!”

 

The two continue to eat their luncheon from Lettice’s gilt blue and white Royal Doulton dinner set in an avant garde Art Deco pattern. For a short while the companionable silence is only broken by the sound of cutlery against crockery.

 

“Your Mother is right. I never could say no to you, Lettice.”

 

“You have to have a favourite Pappa.” Lettice smiles happily. “Why shouldn’t it be me?”

 

“It should be Leslie, as my son and heir.”

 

“Oh, he’s Mamma’s favourite.” Lettice flaps the remark away with a flick of her left hand. “We all know that. We’ve always known that.”

 

“Well Lettice, as I said before. Just remember your position in society. Your Mother and I, we’re prepared to tolerate your wish to dabble in this business folly of yours before you settle down and get married, but please be a society interior designer and design for your own class. Be discerning with your choice of clients. Hmmm?” He smiles hopefully at his daughter.

 

“We’ll see Pappa.” Lettice replies, a smile dancing on her lips as she sips her glass of claret.

 

*Glynes is the home of the presiding Viscount and Countess of Wrexham, the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds in Wiltshire.

 

** The Bioscope is an early term for what became by the mid 1920s a motion-picture theatre or cinema. The Bioscope was a hand-driven projector with a low-watt bulb placed behind the reel. Originally a Bioscope show was a music hall and fairground attraction. Mary Pickford was the original Bioscope Girl, so named because of the Bioscope films she starred in during the Great War and early 1920s.

 

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 tableaux include:

 

The roast chicken, tureens of vegetables and the gravy boat of gravy on the table all came from an English stockist of 1:12 artisan miniatures whom I found on E-Bay. They all look almost good enough to eat. The 1:12 artisan bottle of Pinot Noir is made from glass and the winery on the label is a real winery in France. The bottle was made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire. The wine and water glasses, carafe of water and the vase are all 1:12 artisan miniatures too, made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering in England. The vase is especially fine. If you look closely you will see that it is decorated with lattices of fine threads of glass to give it a faceted Art Deco look. The orange 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.

 

In the background on the console table stand some of Lettice’s precious artisan purchases from the Portland Gallery in Soho. The pair of candelabra at either end of the sideboard are sterling silver artisan miniatures from Karen Ladybug Miniatures in England. The silver drinks set, 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, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces. ‘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 and the Art Deco cocktail cabinet (the edge of which just visible on the far right-hand side of the photo) which were 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.

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 northwest of Lettice’s flat, in the working-class London suburb of Harlesden where Edith, Lettice’s maid, is paying a call on her parents on her day off. Edith’s father, George, works at the McVitie and Price biscuit factory in Harlesden, and her mother, Ada, takes in laundry at home. They live in a small, two storey brick terrace house which opens out directly onto the street, and is far removed from the grandeur of Lettice’s flat, but has always been a cosy and welcoming home for Edith.

 

Edith is sitting at her usual perch on a tall ladderback chair drawn up to the round table, worn and scarred by years of heavy use, that dominates the cluttered, old fashioned kitchen, as Ada prepares a Christmas cake whilst her daughter regales her with tales from Cavendish Mews, her unusually liberated upper-class employer and her eccentric coterie of friends.

 

“And then he just swept me up, right where I stood,” Edith explains. “And spun me around in the most awkward waltz I think I’ve ever danced, Mum!”

 

“What? With the roses still in his arms?” Ada stops stirring the thick, shiny mixture in her large white mixing bowl as she looks at her daughter with incredulity.

 

“And the champagne!” Edith giggles, raising her hand to her mouth as she does.

 

“Well!” the older woman gasps. “I’d never expect such odd behaviour from a gentleman! You did say he’s a proper gentleman?” she queries as an afterthought.

 

“Oh yes, Mum!” Edith assures her. “Mr. Brunton is a proper gentleman: rather theatrical and prone to posturing, but a gentleman, nevertheless. He and Miss Lettice grew up together on neighbouring estates in Wiltshire. His father is a sir or lord or some such.”

 

“Well, that’s alright then.” Ada sighs and starts stirring the sticky mixture with her big metal spoon again. “Mind you, there are plenty who claim to be gentlemen with their smart clothes and silvery tongues who are nothing of the sort.” She pauses again withdrawing the spoon from her mixture and pointing it at her daughter, the mixture dripping off it back into the bowl as she wags it at Edith. “Don’t you ever let your head get turned by one of those toffs, Edith. Whether he’s a gentleman or not, he’s still just a man under it all, and well, we all know that men are always out to chase pretty girls.” She lowers her eyes as a blush flushes her face with embarrassment. “And once he gets what he wants, he’ll drop you like a hot potato fresh from the oven. No gentleman ever married a maid so far as I can tell, ‘cept in those romance books you read.”

 

“Oh Mum! You don’t have to worry about me being around Mr. Bruton.” Edith starts spinning the well worn enamel canister marked ‘flour’ distractedly. “He’s far more interested in the frocks he makes for debutantes and going out to dinner with Miss Lettice than to take an interest in me. I’m just the maid who serves drinks and dinner and hangs his coat.”

 

“But I do worry about you Edith. You’re still only a young girl. Working on your own for a flapper,” She utters the last word with some distaste. “And living under her roof, well, you could be exposed anything for all I know! Now, I do know Miss Chetwynd is good to you, and pays you well, and I’m glad of that. Nevertheless, those flappers seem eccentric and always full of odd ideas and up to mischief.”

 

“Oh, that’s just what you read in the newspapers, Mum. I think the columnists of those stories sensationalise the tales they tell to try and sell more copies.”

 

“Nevertheless, sensationalist or not, those writers have to base some things on truth, so it can’t all be porky pies*!”

 

“Well, you read the articles from The Tattler that I gave you, showing all the photos from Miss Lettice’s cocktail party for Mr. and Mrs. Channon, didn’t you Mum?” When Ada nods her head affirmatively, Edith continues. “Well, that was all true, so you know that whilst Miss Lettice and her friends might be a bit eccentric, she’s still a respectable lady, as well as a flapper.”

 

Ada frowns and shakes her head a little, giving her daughter a questioning look as she observes her sitting across the table from her. “Stop playing with my cannisters and make yourself useful, Edith. I need some more fruit in this Christmas cake batter. Will you cut me some orange and lemon slices, please?”

 

“Yes Mum.”

 

Edith obeys her mother and dutifully gets up from her seat, yet the way she rises appears different to Ada’s sharp observation to the way she used to stand up. It seems elegant, yet affected somehow, with sloping shoulders and a languid head. Every week she notices small changes in Edith: a broader vocabulary and a general improvement in the smartness of her appearance which she likes, yet also an independent boldness and a questioning manner that she thinks unseemly in a young girl, especially one in service. Ada quietly wonders whether her daughter’s current employer will spoil her for any other position Edith may wish to acquire in the future. Edith’s last position with Mrs. Plaistow in Pimlico might have been harder work for a lesser wage, but at least she didn’t come home on her day off with her head turned by the glamour of American moving picture stars and society ladies who have influence over their futures. Girls like Edith have few choices in life, and Ada hopes her daughter doesn’t forget it.

 

“Anyway, enough about me, Mum,” Edith stands at the chopping board next to her mother, takes up Ada’s kitchen knife and starts to slice thin slivers from an orange. “What news of Bert? Have you heard from him?”

 

“Yes, your brother sent a postcard from Melbourne. It’s just up on the mantle.” Ada motions to the shelf above the kitchen range. “Read it.”

 

“It’s hard to imagine Bert on the other side of the world.”

 

“I’m just glad he’s only working as a steward on a passenger liner now, rather than in the navy, and that we aren’t at war anymore.”

 

“Oh I’m glad of that too, Mum.” Edith falls silent as she thinks of her own lost love, Bert the postman, and then quickly blinks away the tears briming in her eyes that threaten to spill over.

 

Determined not to be caught crying, Edith turns and wipes her hands, sticky with orange juice, on the yellow tea towel hanging from the rail beneath the mantle before picking up a postcard featuring a painted photograph of the Federal Parliament House in Melbourne**. She turns it over and reads aloud, “Leaving Melbourne on the Demonsthenes*** on Wednesday. First class dining saloon.” Edith looks over at her mother and smiles. “First class dining saloon! That’s a step up for Bert, Mum!” she remarks before continuing to read aloud. “Sailing home via Capetown. Arrive London twenty third of December.”

 

“Yes, he’ll be back in time for Christmas!” Ada beams as she dips her finger into the mix in the bowl, removing it and tasting the Christmas cake batter. She considers the flavour for a moment before shaking some cinnamon from the red box in front of her into the bowl. “Your Dad and I are so happy! We’ll have our Christmas present.”

 

“And what’s that, Mum?” Edith replaces the postcard on the mantle before turning back to the chopping board where she continues to cut thin slivers of orange.

 

“Having you both home for Christmas, of course!” Ada replies happily.

 

“So, you can use the cottage ware teapot I bought you from the Caledonian Markets****, then Mum.” Edith remarks playfully.

 

“Oh, I don’t know about that, Edith.” the older woman defends as she empties a tin of preserved red cherries into her Christmas cake batter. “It’s much too good to use.”

 

“But you promised, Mum!” Edith whines.

 

“I most certainly did not, Edith!” Ada retorts scoffingly.

 

“Yes you did, Mum!” her daughter responds. “Right here in this very kitchen, the day I gave it to you!” Edith stops cutting the orange, puts down the knife and folds her arms akimbo. “You told me that you’d use it on Christmas Day when Bert and I were home.”

 

Ada stops mixing the batter, puts her hands on her ample hips and stares at her daughter. “Your memory is far too good for remembering incidental things, Edith!”

 

Edith smiles. “I know, Mum.” She picks up a few slices of orange an continues, “Oranges?”

 

*Porky pies is Cockney rhyming slang for lies.

 

**Located on Spring Street on the edge of the Hoddle Grid, Melbourne’s Parliament House’s grand colonnaded front dominates the vista up Bourke Street. Designed by British Army officer and Colonial Engineer, Commissioner of Public Works and politician in colonial Victoria, Major-General Hon. Charles Pasley, construction began in 1855, and the first stage was officially opened the following year, with various sections completed over the following decades; it has never been completed, and the planned dome is one of the most well known unbuilt features of Melbourne. Between 1901 and 1927, it served as the meeting place of the Parliament of Australia, during the period when Melbourne was the temporary national capital.

 

***The SS Demosthenes was a British steam ocean liner and refrigerated cargo ship which ran scheduled services between London and Australia via Cape Town. It stopped at ports including those in Sydney and Melbourne. She was launched in 1911 in Ireland for the Aberdeen Line and scrapped in 1931 in England. In the First World War she was an Allied troop ship.

 

**** The original Caledonian Market, renown for antiques, buried treasure and junk, was situated in in a wide cobblestoned area just off the Caledonian Road in Islington in 1921 when this story is set. Opened in 1855 by Prince Albert, and originally called the Metropolitan Meat Markets, it was supplementary to the Smithfield Meat Market. Arranged in a rectangle, the market was dominated by a forty six metre central clock tower. By the early Twentieth Century, with the diminishing trade in live animals, a bric-a-brac market developed and flourished there until after the Second World War when it moved to Bermondsey, south of the Thames, where it flourishes today. The Islington site was developed in 1967 into the Market Estate and an open green space called Caledonian Park. All that remains of the original Caledonian Markets is the wonderful Victorian clock tower.

 

This cluttered, yet cheerful domestic scene is not all it seems to be at first glance, for it is made up of part of my 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures collection. Some pieces come from my own childhood. Other items I acquired as an adult through specialist online dealers and artists who specialise in 1:12 miniatures.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

Ada’s kitchen table is covered with most of the ingredients needed to make a Christmas cake: red cherries, orange and lemon peel, raisins, flour, baking powder, brandy, cinnamon, eggs and sugar.

 

The bowl of Christmas cake batter, complete with red cherries, was made by hand of polymer 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.

 

On the chopping board and the table you will see two lemons and four oranges. The lemons and oranges are vintage 1:12 artisan pieces that have come from Kathleen Knight’s Dollhouse Shop in England. The attention to detail on these is amazing! You will see the stubs in the skin were the stalk once attached them to the tree, but even more amazing is that, if you look very closely, you will see the rough pitting that you find in the skins of real oranges and lemons! The orange and lemon slices on the chopping board come from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering, England. The orange slices in particular are so small and so fine. They are cut from long canes like some boiled sweets are but are much smaller in size!

 

The kitchen knife on the chopping board with its inlaid handle and sharpened blade comes from English miniatures specialist Doreen Jeffries Small Wonders Miniature store.

 

The rather worn and beaten looking enamelled cannisters, which match the bread tin on the Welsh dresser in the background, are painted in the typical domestic Art Deco design and kitchen colours of the 1920s, cream and green. Aged on purpose, these artisan pieces also came from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls’ House Shop in the United Kingdom.

 

The tin of My Lady red cherries came from Shepherds Miniatures in the United Kingdom, as does the tin of Bird’s Golden Raising Powder (an old name for baking powder). Bird’s were best known for making custard and Bird’s Custard is still a common household name, although they produced other desserts beyond custard, including the blancmange. Bird’s Custard was first formulated and first cooked by Alfred Bird in 1837 at his chemist shop in Birmingham. He developed the recipe because his wife was allergic to eggs, the key ingredient used to thicken traditional custard. The Birds continued to serve real custard to dinner guests, until one evening when the egg-free custard was served instead, either by accident or design. The dessert was so well received by the other diners that Alfred Bird put the recipe into wider production. John Monkhouse (1862–1938) was a prosperous Methodist businessman who co-founded Monk and Glass, which made custard powder and jelly. Monk and Glass custard was made in Clerkenwell and sold in the home market, and exported to the Empire and to America. They acquired by its rival Bird’s Custard in the early Twentieth Century.

 

The Tate and Lyall sugar packet was acquired from Jonesy’s Miniatures in the United Kingdom. In 1859 Henry Tate went into partnership with John Wright, a sugar refiner based at Manesty Lane, Liverpool. Their partnership ended in 1869 and John’s two sons, Alfred and Edwin joined the business forming Henry Tate and Sons. A new refinery in Love Lane, Liverpool was opened in 1872. In 1921 Henry Tate and Sons and Abram Lyle and Sons merged, between them refining around fifty percent of the UK’s sugar. A tactical merger, this new company would then become a coherent force on the sugar market in anticipation of competition from foreign sugar returning to its pre-war strength. Tate and Lyle are perhaps best known for producing Lyle’s Golden Syrup and Lyle’s Golden Treacle.

 

The eggs in the bowl with the whisk are 1:12 artisan miniatures with amazing attention to detail which I have had since I acquired them as a teenager from a high street stockist.

 

The box of cinnamon was made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

In the background you can see Ada’s dark Welsh dresser cluttered with household items. Like Ada’s table and the Windsor chair, I have had the dresser since I was a child. The shelves of the dresser have different patterned crockery and silver pots on them which have come from different miniature stockists both in Australia and the United Kingdom and the worn Art Deco tea canister and bread box that match the canisters on the table. There are also tins of various foods which would have been household staples in the 1920s when canning and preservation revolutinised domestic cookery. Amongst other foods on the dresser are a box of Typhoo Tea, a box of Bisto Gravy, a jar of Marmite, a jar of Bovril and some Oxo stock cubes. All these items are 1:12 size artisan miniatures made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire, with great attention to detail paid to their labels and the shapes of their jars and cans.

 

In 1863, William Sumner published ‘A Popular Treatise on Tea’ as a by-product of the first trade missions to China from London. In 1870, William and his son John Sumner founded a pharmacy/grocery business in Birmingham. William's grandson, John Sumner Jr. (born in 1856), took over the running of the business in the 1900s. Following comments from his sister on the calming effects of tea fannings, in 1903, John Jr. decided to create a new tea that he could sell in his shop. He named in Typhoo Tea. The name Typhoo comes from the Chinese word for "doctor". Typhoo began making tea bags in 1967. In 1978, production was moved from Birmingham to Moreton on the Wirral peninsula of Cheshire. Typhoo Tea is still a household name in Britain to this day.

 

The first Bisto product, in 1908, was a meat-flavoured gravy powder, which rapidly became a bestseller in Britain. It was added to gravies to give a richer taste and aroma. Invented by Messrs Roberts and Patterson, it was named "Bisto" because it "Browns, Seasons and Thickens in One". Bisto Gravy is still a household name in Britain and Ireland today, and the brand is currently owned by Premier Foods.

 

Bovril is the trademarked name of a thick and salty meat extract paste similar to a yeast extract, developed in the 1870s by John Lawson Johnston. It is sold in a distinctive bulbous jar, and as cubes and granules. Bovril is owned and distributed by Unilever UK. Its appearance is similar to Marmite and Vegemite. Bovril can be made into a drink ("beef tea") by diluting with hot water or, less commonly, with milk. It can be used as a flavouring for soups, broth, stews or porridge, or as a spread, especially on toast in a similar fashion to Marmite and Vegemite

 

Marmite is a food spread made from yeast extract which although considered remarkably English, was in fact invented by German scientist Justus von Liebig although it was originally made in the United Kingdom. It is a by-product of beer brewing and is currently produced by British company Unilever. The product is notable as a vegan source of B vitamins, including supplemental vitamin B. Marmite is a sticky, dark brown paste with a distinctive, salty, powerful flavour. This distinctive taste is represented in the marketing slogan: "Love it or hate it." Such is its prominence in British popular culture that the product's name is often used as a metaphor for something that is an acquired taste or tends to polarise opinion.

 

Oxo is a brand of food products, including stock cubes, herbs and spices, dried gravy, and yeast extract. The original product was the beef stock cube, and the company now also markets chicken and other flavour cubes, including versions with Chinese and Indian spices. The cubes are broken up and used as flavouring in meals or gravy or dissolved into boiling water to produce a bouillon. Oxo produced their first cubes in 1910 and further increased Oxo's popularity.

 

The large kitchen range in the background is a 1:12 miniature replica of the coal fed Phoenix Kitchen Range. A mid-Victorian model, it has hinged opening doors, hanging bars above the stove and a little bass hot water tap (used in the days before plumbed hot water).