G Off the record

Gallery

Beyond the research, I take a camera most places I go. Here are a few photographs from my travels — from a day at Tatton Park, the great Cheshire house near home, to the Château de Versailles, the heights above the Dead Sea and the old streets of Jerusalem.

Tatton Park — the south front of the great Cheshire house, on a clear June day.
The Italian garden, its fountain and parterre falling away towards the mere.
A garden temple among the trees in the grounds at Tatton.
Rhododendrons in full bloom in the gardens.
White roses against the old brick of the kitchen-garden wall.
Canada geese and their goslings crossing the lawn.
The Dining Room laid for dinner — green walls, white plaster, candlelight.
Samuel Egerton, 'our protagonist' — a family portrait in the house.
A soldier raises his sword: an old master in the collection.
Schiavone's 'The Adoration', in its gilded frame.
A cabinet inlaid with mother-of-pearl and pietra dura, between the curtains.
Below stairs — the Victorian kitchen, all copper and scrubbed pine.
A state coach, the family arms on its door, in the old stables.
A 1900 Benz, kept in the coach house.
Dwarfed by an Egerton ancestor — a portrait rather taller than I am.
A morning in Montmartre, outside the old church of Saint-Pierre — Paris.
A statue of the King among the marble and gilt of the Grand Apartment — Versailles.
Painted ceilings and an equestrian king: a salon in the King's State Apartment.
Hyacinthe Rigaud's celebrated portrait of Louis XIV, on crimson damask.
Rigaud's full-length Louis XIV in its gilded frame — Versailles.
Veronese's 'The Pilgrims of Emmaus', hung in the King's apartments.
The arms of France, woven and framed against the red of a state salon.
Crimson, crystal and a painted ceiling — the Grand Apartment.
A painted oval set into a gilded ceiling, lit by an enormous chandelier.
Allegory overhead: one of the painted ceiling roundels at Versailles.
Looking up — gold, plaster and paint across a single ceiling.
A crystal chandelier beneath a fresco of gods and heroes.
Another royal portrait, framed in gold against figured silk.
A great chandelier in the Hall of Mirrors, the painted ceiling ablaze behind it.
A porphyry bust of a Roman emperor, draped in gilt bronze — Versailles.
The Hall of Mirrors, its vaulted ceiling running the length of the gallery.
Le Brun's painted history of the reign, overhead in the Hall of Mirrors.
Down the Hall of Mirrors — light, gold and glass without end.
Above the Dead Sea, looking out from the heights of Masada.
A hand on old stone along the Via Dolorosa, Jerusalem.
A fountain and cypresses in the gardens at Haifa.

36 photographs · all my own · shot on the road.