Monthly Archives: November 2012

The secret life of furniture (from yesterday’s Times)

I recently had the pleasure and privilege of going round the V&A’s new furniture gallery, which opens this week, and writing about it for yesterday’s Times. Here’s my piece: ‘I’ve a great respect for things!’ says Madame Merle, in Henry James’s 1881 novel A Portrait of a Lady. ‘We’re each of us made up of some cluster

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What it’s like to live at Hampton Court Palace

Lucy Denyer from The Sunday Times recently interviewed me about my life when I lived at Hampton Court Palace. Here’s the finished result… ‘When I started my job as chief curator of the Historic Royal Palaces in February 2002, I moved down from Scotland and didn’t have anywhere to live, so for a while I

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Dorothy Hartley’s ‘Food in England’: recipes to make at home

Here for your delectation I’ve chosen some of the easier and more palatable recipes from ‘Food in England’ – nothing involving offal! Stargazey Pie This is a recipe I made with the present-day pupils at the boys’ grammar school in Skipton, Dorothy’s birthplace and her childhood home. It’s fairly easy: you tuck fresh pilchards (head and

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