Tea at Trianon: Restored Seventeenth-century Farmhouse

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, May 5, 2021

Restored Seventeenth-century Farmhouse

From Scene Therapy:

Rollitt also researched and acquired era-sensitive hardware that suited the 1675 building such as reclaimed kitchen floor flags, suitably sized chimneypieces and 17th-century parquet floors. However, the house is not stuck in the past, with lots of vivid pops of colours and strong prints to add flair and personality to each room, such as the specialist teal finish on the kitchen base cabinets, the zig-zag Watts of Westminster prints on the dining room chairs, and the deep red velvet regency sofa in the sitting room.The unique box bed in the attic’s eaves was made by Dunne & Co, and is the perfect space-saving creation for the awkward angles of sloping attic roofs, but is also a nod to the historic origins of this house. The rustic woods match the timber beams, while the print curtains add warmth to this snug sleeping space. (Read more.)