OK, I admit it. I am property greedy. A country house in Dorset or Devon, a cottage in the Highlands and a pad in London are just bare necessities for me. Oh, and I'd like to throw in a second home somewhere in Italy and a small place in Barcelona. The snag is that a (hopefully temporary) shortage of funds prevents me from fulfilling my
modest requirements. To assuage my cravings, I have turned voyeuse instead. Which is why every week I pour over the pages of Country Life, both in print and online, and spend an inordinate amount of time on estate agents' websites.
My current favourite is a sporting estate in Brora, Scotland, which is
on the market with Strutt&Parker. It has all the requisites to entice the next Madonna ? traditional lodge, cottages, stalking, grouse, woodcock, snipe and duck shooting, and hill loch fishing. But what did it for me was the landscape. More than a thousand acres of rugged Highland countryside, the muted green and ochre of the land broken by the vivid blue of a stream. It's a place where I can see myself retiring to write a novel. Alas, I'd need a bestseller or three before I become what estate agents call 'a proceedable buyer'. But this corner of Highland paradise can be yours for only $2.5m.
There is also another, more subtle, reason I fell so quickly in love with the Highlands estate. Its particulars are reasonably concise and well-written. Which is a rare occurrence. One thing I have noticed while window home shopping is that, the grander the property, the more magniloquent the brochure.
Houses invariably 'benefit from', rather than have, underfloor heating; and always 'boast a wealth of period features,' rather than having an 18th century fireplace. This linguistic redundancy is so widespread that I am almost getting used to it. But a few days ago I read something that nearly made my eyes pop out of their sockets. I was looking at an Australian property website ? well, you never know where life is going to take you ? when I chanced upon a brochure that described the master bedroom as 'eloquent'. Presumably, it is better than sleeping in an inarticulate one...
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Can't you hear me S.O.S? Our treasured native dog breeds are at risk of extinctionDo you know your Kerry blue terrier from your Lancashire heeler? A simple lack of publicity is often to blame for some of the UK's native dog breeds flying dangerously low under-the-radar.
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'There are architects and architects, but only one ARCHITECT': Sir Edwin Lutyens and the wartime Chancellor who helped launch his stellar careerClive Aslet explores the relationship between Sir Edwin Lutyens and perhaps his most important private client, the politician and financier Reginald McKenna.
