The Bodleian Libraries at Oxford are safeguarding and showcasing outstanding texts and ephemera so we can all enjoy the benefits of 21st century enlightenment

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From July to November 2012 the British Museum is presenting what will most likely be one of the key exhibitions of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Celebrations. Shakespeare – Staging the World will be produced in collaboration with the Royal Shakespeare Company. It aims to provide an innovative perspective on the bard and his plays.

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Just recently one of my very stylish girlfriends played a major part at the Royal Sydney Easter Show. As part of her role as a Councillor of the Royal Agricultural Society, she attended a a dinner where formal etiquette was key. All the gentlemen had to wear a jacket and tie in the dining room [...]

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Later this year in The Met at New York will be a landmark exhibition of the furniture from the German Roentgen family cabinetmaking firm in operation c1740-1795

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The precise location of heaven on earth has never really been established. However it could be at the Villa Moro Malipiero at Padua, nearby to Venice in Northern Italy.

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Without romantic enthusiasm attached to a hunt for hidden treasures the true wealth of our cultural heritage would never have been re-discovered at all.

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Gazing at the US Vogue February issue, I was struck by cover girl pop singer Taylor Swifts amazing resemblance to a young Pattie Boyd. Boyd was, and is the beautiful woman who inspired Beatle George Harrison to write “Something” and “I Need You”. She is also the subject of” Layla” and “Wonderful Tonight”, both by [...]

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Delivering sustainable communities is big business. We need to fast-track informed, intelligent decisions and solutions for managing natural, urban and virtual environments. A lot will depend on creatively connecting communities globally, as well as computing the right answers.

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Auguste Welby Pugin [1812-52] and John Loughborough Pearson [1817-1897] were leading exponents of the nineteenth century Gothic Revival style in architecture in England from Waterloo (1815) to the Great War (1914-1918). Their connection with the expansion of the colony established in the antipodes during the late eighteenth century has almost been forgotten, especially in England.

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For historians the Regency era in England is about romantics and revolutionaries, poets and princes, architects and artists. It was a paradox where extremes met

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Ceramic traditions since ancient times have undergone many cross fertilizations by their exposure to various cultures. The first stirring of what we now describe as the China Trade began when Europe was still emerging from the medieval period and would build momentum slowly peaking during the nineteenth century.

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Queen Victoria received an openwork gold brooch from her beloved Albert in 1843,  accompanied by the text “from Albert Feby, 1843”, on their third wedding anniversary. It is of both romantic and symbolic significance. It is in the Elizabethan taste, a stylised crowned heart decorated with Gothic foliage and surmounted by four freshwater pearls from Scotland. [...]

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George IV was the last of the Hanoverian Georgian Kings and gave an impressive diamond riviére to his mistress Elizabeth, Lady Conyngham, who reputedly received gifts of jewels valued at the time in the region of 80,000 pounds. Jewellers in the early nineteenth century were realizing the importance of light to the brilliance of diamonds, [...]

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I think we all love the Academy Awards, in fact I love award ceremonies! I am always desperate to see who will make best dressed or has the biggest shocker! This week I am sharing my ‘Top Ten’ favourite Oscar Dresses. It was incredibly hard to cull my list, but I hope you will agree [...]

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The late 18th and early 19th century in England, Europe and America was a period of romantics and revolutionaries, politics, poetry, passion and enlightenment

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The Australian Chamber Orchestra (ACO) has inherited a fabulous legacy of music to perform in its established repertoire including stylish adventures in sound

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