Country Life November 29 2017
Christmas Special: Present ideas for everyone, the best canapés and how to compose a carol.


Country Life November 29 2017 is our stunning Christmas special featuring our annual advent calendar, present ideas for everyone, the best canapés and how to compose a carol. Find out more here:
GIFT GUIDE: Victoria Marston and Rosie Paterson find present ideas for indoors and outdoors, ladies, gentlemen and smalls
STILTON: Christmas just isn’t Christmas without a pungent Stilton. Nick Hammond finds out more about this very British cheese
CANAPÉ COMPETITION: We reveal the results of the Country Life and Plain English contest to find the best party food in London, plus essential canapé etiquette
LIVING NATIONAL TREASURE: Trombone maker
INTERVIEW: Simon Berry, scion of the wine merchant dynasty, talks to Harry Eyres about an ancient tradition and what he’s going to do next
FAVOURITE PAINTING: The designer and author Stephen Bayley chooses an erotic 19th-century work he discovered during his student days in Liverpool
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GARDENS: Jacky Hobbs visits Highfield Hollies in Hampshire, where hundreds of sculpted trees have been trained over 25 years
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ARCHITECTURE: Cesky Krumlov Castle in the Czech Republic was extravagantly remodelled in the 18th century. John Goodall pays a visit
LUXURY: Hetty Chidwick goes backstage at Favourbrook and finds out what essentials bestselling novelist Barbara Taylor Bradford can’t live without
INTERIORS: Amelia Thorpe finds out how to design a wine cellar
MOTORING: Charles Rangeley-Wilson test drives the Volkswagen Amarok, the poshest of pick-ups
WILDLIFE: Ian Morton admires the much-reviled amphibian – the toad
COOKING: Melanie Johnson finds surprising ways to use hazelnuts
CHRISTMAS CAROLLING: How do you introduce new Christmas carols? John Goodall gets a tune a day
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Agnes has worked for Country Life in various guises — across print, digital and specialist editorial projects — before finally finding her spiritual home on the Features Desk. A graduate of Central St. Martins College of Art & Design she has worked on luxury titles including GQ and Wallpaper* and has written for Condé Nast Contract Publishing, Horse & Hound, Esquire and The Independent on Sunday. She is currently writing a book about dogs, due to be published by Rizzoli New York in September 2025.
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