The real 'Downton Abbeys'

Associated media

The Edwardian Country House: A Social and Architectural History

By Clive Aslet

This lavish volume is as much social as architectural history: it trawls through literature, art, advertisements, social pages, diaries and photo albums to provide a fascinating exploration of Edwardian country house life.  As an award-winning journalist, a former editor of Country Life and a frequent contributor to radio, television and newspapers, the writer, Clive Aslet, is an entertaining guide.  He gives the gossip as well as the facts, but the scholarship is solid; Aslet is steeped in the period and is as likely to refer to a government paper, an economic treatise or a manual of household management as he is to quote from the intimate letters of the country house set.  His literary allusions range from Bertie Wooster and Toad of Toad Hall to the real Lord Marchmain behind Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited.

With much sly humour he traces the shifting role of the country house, from remote Victorian retreat embedded in the rural community, to weekend party venue removed from the local folk, where the guests, like the fish, were brought in from London.  Aslet has a great ability to make the details as interesting as the facts they are buttressing,  from the price of wheat to the manufacture of washing machines. He tells us that when a new terminus was constructed in London’s Waterloo district to service visitors to the south west, seven streets were demolished and their 1750 inhabitants were re-housed in a mere six blocks of flats.  The south west, he points out,  was particularly appealing to small country house builders as the land was poor, even after the improvements wrought by enclosures, but the  views appealed to those in search of the picturesque within a half-hour’s train journey of London.

Aslet is particularly interesting on the influence of the motor car in transforming the country house party from a seven-day event to a single meal.  As stables were turned into garages, the car was responsible, among other things, for an increasing informality, as rigid schedules and packed itineraries fell prey to the unpredictability of traffic and road conditions.  This informality engendered a revival of the ‘living hall’, which functioned rather like an hotel lounge; with no specific purpose it became a place to loll about, but as it was a public thoroughfare for staff and guests it was permissible to enjoy the company of the opposite sex there. 

Interestingly, Sir Phillip Sassoon was a key influence in the shift towards informality; the homosexual statesman, having no hostess to organize his guests, dispensed with formal introductions and encouraged the young men from a nearby airfield to mingle with his grand society friends, creating a novel atmosphere what was ‘almost American’ in its casualness…  And so it goes: Aslet traces the influence of everything from foreign investment to the popularization of golf on the style and lifestyle of the country house. Golf – being cheaper, easier to master and requiring less practice than the previously favoured shooting – appealed to the newly rich owners of the smaller, suburban, country  houses. 

Rather poignantly, Aslet points out that among the many changes wrought by the First World War was the disappearance of the bachelor bedrooms – a suite of austere rooms placed above the masculine wing of the house  (the billiard, smoking and gun rooms), used to house the affable young men that had made up the ballast of Victorian shooting parties.  The post-war loss of staff also affected the design and running of the country house.  In the late 19th century the 15th Earl of Derby employed 727 staff while the more modest Mar Lodge had 20 bedrooms for family and guests, but accommodation for 65 servants.  At the beginning of the 20th century more people in Britain were employed in domestic service than in any other occupation, but after the war the absence of domestic staff to polish, beat, dust, scrub, brush and clean led both to the spartan interiors of the Arts and Crafts movement and the sleek minimalism of the Art Deco style.  

Whether parsing the difference between the opulence of the Smart Set and the idealism of the Romantics, or charting the search for healthier, simpler, more spiritual lifestyles, or exploring the importance of the vacuum cleaner and telephone in country house design, or describing the shift from Louis XVI to Art Deco in interior decoration, Aslet wears his prodigious learning lightly.  Despite a tendency to repetition and a frustrating lack of coordination between the illustrations and the text, this is a riveting read for the interested amateur.  With its extensive bibliography, abundance of plans and plethora of photographs it is also an important reference work for the student of Edwardian architecture, décor or social history.

The Edwardian Country House: A Social and Architectural History  by Clive Aslet  is published by Frances Lincoln, 2012. 285 pp., 93 colour and 220 mono illus, £35.00. ISBN 978-0-7112-3339-3