
Style and Fashion
Perhaps Hand Wringing and Tears: Sixth Season of Downton Abbey
A video will reveal quite a bit about your favorite characters, renewed relationships, a blackmail attempt, tje nuptials of Mrs. Hughes and Mr. Carson, Edith's problems with the editor of the magazine left to her by Michael Gregson, Anna's continued problems concerning the murder of Mr. Green ... and so on. more »
Home Fires, A New Masterpiece Theater Series Based on Britain's Women's Institute
The series is largely based on Julie Summers book Jambusters, which details Britain's Women's Institute’s contribution to wartime food production, education, and social issues. Though World War II was a time of rations and sacrifices, there are still plenty of fashion moments in Home Fires. Actress Francesca Annis was especially struck by the original, period clothing used for the series. more »
An Elegant Society: Adam Buck, Artist in the Age of Jane Austen
Well-known to collectors and Jane Austen enthusiasts, Irish artist Adam Buck (1759–1833) was one of Regency England's most sought-after portrait painters. He worked in Ireland for twenty years, becoming an accomplished miniaturist; but moved to London in 1795 and immediately gained a roster of star clients including the Duke of York and his scandalous mistress, Mary Anne Clarke. more »
The So-called Mirror Image Has Become Oddly Suspect
Joan L. Cannon writes: The ubiquitous cameras of our daily lives may is some ways replace some of the older functions of the looking glass, but they don't give rise to the emotional resonances stirred by passing a household fixture or treasure that has seen most of one's years of consciousness. The missing image of a loved one who saw the same reflected surroundings we can still see becomes a nearly visible ghost. There's a forbidding precision in a photograph, precious as it may be. A shared home, visible in reflection behind the viewer is like an echoing chord of familiar music or the faint scent that memory never erases. more »