Country Life Magazine (July 23, 2024): The latest issue features ‘Talking Dogs’ – The secret language of the shepherd’s friends, Shooting on Lewis and fishing on the Test; Fired up – the foundry that made Trafalgar’s lions; Loving lapwings; Building with oak and summer in Paris….

Whistle while you work

It is mesmerising to watch one man and his dog moving a flock of sheep using a language all of their own. Katy Birchall admires the almost telepathic connection between sheepdog and handler

Who are you calling a peewit?

The pied plumage of the lapwing was once a common sight in our countryside and, as Vicky Liddell learns, moves are afoot to halt the beautiful bird’s decline

Heavy metal

The heat is on for Catriona Gray as she visits the UK’s oldest-surviving art foundry, now forging a successful future hidden away in the Hampshire countryside

The dogs that ask why

Patrick Galbraith is confounded by a case of mistaken canine identity when he embarks on a day of walked-up grouse shooting on the Isle of Lewis

The tale of the Croque Monsieur

Armed with an array of home-tied flies, David Profumo relishes pitting his wits against the wily trout of the South of England’s crystal-clear chalkstreams

From little acorns

We have been building with strong, sustainable and flexible oak since time immemorial — and the art continues to thrive, as Arabella Youens discovers

To Paris with love

The 1924 Olympics were the crowning glory of a golden age for culture in the French capital. Mary Miers looks back to an extraordinary, liberating time

Willie Hartley Russell’s favourite painting

The chairman of the Almshouse Association chooses a striking portrait of a remarkable man

Fitting like a glove

Jeremy Musson applauds the success of Woodford Hill Farm, a new country house perfect for its old Northamptonshire setting

The legacy

He is seldom given due credit, but there would be no modern Olympic Games without William Penny Brookes, finds Kate Green

As different as night and day

John Lewis-Stempel’s detour in Dorset is rewarded by an early-morning encounter with the enigmatic, elusive nightjar

The good stuff

Hetty Lintell is getting shirty with the best summer gents’ linens     

West is best

Eleanor Doughty explores the top places for London commuters to buy out west of the capital

The odd couple

Caroline Donald hails the marriage of a 200-year-old villa with a contemporary garden in Kent

Kitchen garden cook

Melanie Johnson on cherries

Bay watch

The bay leaf wins the laurels as a symbol of strength, courage and wisdom, says Ian Morton

Our daily bread

Neil Buttery examines the rise of the Anglo-Saxon Lammas loaf

Country Life Magazine (July 16, 2024): The latest issue features ‘500 Shades of Green’ – Why is it the eye’s favorite hue; Rex Whistler’s triumph and tragedy; Big hearts and funny faces – the bull terrier and Alan Titchmarsh’s favorite flower show…

Our green and pleasant land

Our eyes can detect more of its shades than any other colour and its many hues are bound up with everything from jealousy to British racing cars—it’s all gone green for Lucien de Guise

It’s a bullseye

‘Life is merrier when you live with a bull terrier’ owners tell Katy Birchall as she delves into the kindly and comic character beneath the muscular frame

Showing the way

Goodwill and gardening go hand in hand at the ‘beautifully formed’ Royal Windsor Flower Show—and Alan Titchmarsh wouldn’t miss it for the world

First to fall

Rex Whistler refused to leave fighting the Second World War to ‘young boys’, but his courage and leadership was to cost him his life, as Allan Mallinson reveals

Lyndon Farnham’s favourite painting

The Jersey chief minister picks a work that encapsulates the island’s spirit and determination

‘Most costly and church-wise’

In the second of two articles, John Goodall investigates the 17th-century expansion that provided Lincoln College, Oxford, with a quite outstanding chapel

The legacy

Music will ring around the Royal Albert Hall again this summer thanks to Henry Wood and his Proms, reveals Octavia Pollock

All The King’s Whales and all The Queen’s dolphins

With more species around our shores than anywhere else in northern Europe, Ben Lerwill keeps his eyes peeled for porpoises, whales and dolphins

The good stuff

Hetty Lintell shells out on fine jewellery that is sure to impress    

A stitch in time

Debo Devonshire’s love of chic, chickens and Chatsworth in Derbyshire is celebrated in a new exhibition, discovers Kim Parker

Interiors

Giles Kime explores large-scale wallpaper capable of transport-ing you to a whole new world

Country Life International

• Jersey earns royal approval
• Antonia Windsor marks 150 years of La Corbière lighthouse
• Paul Henderson spices up his life with Jersey’s East Asian cuisine
• Nick Hammond brews his own island tea
• Holly Kirkwood picks the best properties for sale

Over the hills and far away

Tiffany Daneff marvels at the spectacular views that have been restored at the Old Rectory at Preston Capes, Northamptonshire

Kitchen garden cook

Crunchy fennel is a summer highlight for Melanie Johnson

Time for some merriment

Michael Billington is royally entertained as Shakespeare receives a modern, mirth-filled twist in Stratford and London

Country Life Magazine (July 9, 2024): The latest issue features ‘The Experts’ Experts – 185 heroes the top designers rely on; Top dogs – politics of the village show; Boar wars – what to do with wild pigs; Tea and cakes – the rise and rise of the sponge…

The experts’ experts

Giles Kime and Amelia Thorpe ask Britain’s leading lights in design to name the talented professionals who inspire and transform their own projects

The dog with the waggiest tail

Move over Crufts, the village pooch parade is the one they all want to win with local bragging rights hanging in the balance, as Madeleine Silver discovers

Rooting for the truth

Pilfering pest or beneficial ecosystem engineer? Vicky Liddell examines the often-controversial return of wild boar to Britain’s woodland

Oh, crumbs! Secrets of the sponge

How did the Victoria sponge rise to be fêted as the queen of all cakes? Flora Watkins indulges in the history of the nation’s favourite teatime treat

Philippa Thorp’s favourite painting

The interior designer chooses a powerful work that unlocks a whole range of emotions

The devil is in the detail

Minette Batters insists that the incoming Government must be held to account over the many lavish pre-election promises on food security and farming

Salvaging the vine

In the first of two articles, John Goodall charts the long, hard struggle to bring to fruition one Bishop of Lincoln’s dreams of establishing a college at Oxford

The legacy

Amie Elizabeth White brews up  a tale of 18th-century success as she celebrates Thomas Twining’s role as a tea pioneer

The good stuff

Hetty Lintell earns her summer stripes with elegant blue-and-white pieces for home and away   

Ancient and modern

George Plumptre is heartened to witness a clever modern renovation of Nash’s Picturesque vision at Sandridge Park, Devon

If you’re lookin’, you ain’t cookin’

Tom Parker Bowles harnesses the flame’s fickle power as he shares a chef’s secrets of the perfect barbecue technique

In the dock

John Wright grasps the nettle in a hands-on investigation into the powers of the dock leaf—and, he says, it is your turn next

Word on the street

Smart Duke Street in London’s St James’s is the epicentre of British art. Carla Passino meets the larger-than-life characters who put the area on the map

Go tell the congregation

Matthew Dennison can’t help but sing the praises of Isaac Watts, that most prolific of hymn writers born 350 years ago

Goodbye, James Anderson

James Fisher pays tribute to English cricket’s legendary fast bowler ahead of his farewell Test match against the West Indies

And much more‘