Living: The Stewart throw, possessing
a distinct flavour akin to The 39 Steps,
with or without H.P. Sauce.
Available at Ancient Industries.
29.11.10
23.11.10
Living: The mince pie.
Once known as the Wayfarer's Pie,
this is an early portable food, often
thought suitable for Father Christmas.
22.11.10
Living: Vogue magazine, established 1892.
Thanks Vogue for featuring Ancient Industries
in the Christmas Gift Guide.
Design and photography by Irving Penn, 1946.
19.11.10
18.11.10
Three Strap Boot, a Civil War style
Newmarket Boot, a summer field boot
Living: E. Vogel custom made boots since 1879.
17.11.10
16.11.10
Elizabeth Siddal in a sketch for Ophelia
Ophelia by John Everett Millais, 1852
Extinct: Fowler's Solution.
"Well into the nineteenth century, many women
drank a concoction called Fowler's Solution, which
was really just dilute arsenic, to improve their
complexions. Dante Gabriel Rosetti's wife,
Elizabeth Siddal was a devoted swallower of
the stuff, and it almost certainly contributed
to her early death in 1862.*
*Overcome with grief, her husband buried her
with a sheaf of poems that he had failed to copy;
seven years later he thought better of the gesture,
had the grave dug up, and retrieved the poems,
which were published the following year."
—At Home, by Bill Bryson
15.11.10
"I cannot say much for this Monarch's sense.
Nor would I if I could, for he was a Lancastrian."
"One of Edward's Mistresses was Jane Shore, who
has a play written about her, but it's a tragedy &
therefore not worth reading."
"I am necessitated to say that in this reign
the roman Catholics of England did not
behave like Gentlemen to the protestants."
Living:
from the reign of
Henry the 4th
to the death of
Charles the 1st,
by a partial, prejudiced and ignorant Historian.
(Words by Jane Austen, aged 15,
illustrated by Cassandra Austen).
12.11.10
11.11.10
Extinct: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.
Paintings by Eric Kennington, 1941,
at the Imperial War Museum, London.
10.11.10
Living: The trench coat.Claimed by Aquascutum and Burberry,
the style was available to British officers,
but not privates, during the Great War.
Later embraced by all classes of society.
9.11.10
1938
2010
Living: Salvatore Ferragamo, 1898-1960.
A pre-talkie Hollywood shoe designer,
he returned to Italy in 1927 and
formed the family business.
8.11.10
"The Eiffel Tower wasn't just the largest thing that
anyone had ever proposed to build, it was the largest
completely useless thing. . . . Eiffel gamely insisted that
his tower would have many practical applications—that
it would make a terrific military lookout and that one
could do useful aeronautical and meteorological
experiments from its upper reaches—but eventually
even he admitted that mostly he wished to build it
simply for the slightly strange pleasure of making
something really quite enormous."
—Bill Bryson, At Home
5.11.10
4.11.10
3.11.10
Extinct: The third caster.
"Traditional cruet stands came with three matching casters—
that is, bottles with perforated tops for sprinkling (or casting)
flavourings onto food. Two of the casters contained salt and
pepper, but what went into the third caster is unknown. It is
generally presumed to be dried mustard, but that is really
because no one can think of anything more likely."
—Bill Bryson, At Home
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