Charleston

The newly revised and updated Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden is the definitive publication on the Bloomsbury Group's rural outpost in the heart of the Sussex Downs. “It’s absolutely perfect…”, wrote the artist Vanessa Bell when she moved to Charleston in 1916. For fifty years, Vanessa and her fellow painter Duncan Grant lived, loved and worked in this isolated Sussex farmhouse, together transforming the house and garden into an extraordinary work of artand creating a rural retreatfor the Bloomsbury group.Now, Vanessa’s son, Quentin Bell, and her granddaughter Virginia Nicholson tell the inside story of their family home, linking it with some of the pioneering cultural figures who spent time there, including Vanessa’s sister Virginia Woolf, the economist Maynard Keynes, the writer Lytton Strachey and the art critic Roger Fry. Taking readers through each room of the house – from Clive Bell's Study, the Dining Room, the Kitchen andthe Garden Room, through to individual bedrooms, the Studios and the Library – Quentin Bell relives old memories, including having T.S. Eliot over for a dinner party and staging plays in the Studio, while Virginia Nicholson details the artistic techniques (stencilling, embroidery, painting, sculpture, ceramics and more) used to embellish and enliventhe once simple farmhouse. In thisrefreshed edition of the original 1997 publication, Gavin Kingcombe’s specially commissioned photographs breathe life into the colourful interiors and garden of the Sussex farmhouse, while updated text and captions by Virginia Nicholson capture the evolution of Charleston as it continues to inspire a new generation. For lovers of literature, decorative arts, and all things Bloomsbury, Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden offers a window onto a truly unique creative hub.

The newly revised and updated Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden is the definitive publication on the Bloomsbury Group's rural outpost in the heart of the Sussex Downs. “It’s absolutely perfect…”, wrote the artist Vanessa Bell when she moved to Charleston in 1916. For fifty years, Vanessa and her fellow painter Duncan Grant lived, loved and worked in this isolated Sussex farmhouse, together transforming the house and garden into an extraordinary work of art and creating a rural retreat for the Bloomsbury group. Now, Vanessa’s son, Quentin Bell, and her granddaughter Virginia Nicholson tell the inside story of their family home, linking it with some of the pioneering cultural figures who spent time there, including Vanessa’s sister Virginia Woolf, the economist Maynard Keynes, the writer Lytton Strachey and the art critic Roger Fry. Taking readers through each room of the house – from Clive Bell's Study, the Dining Room, the Kitchen and the Garden Room, through to individual bedrooms, the Studios and the Library – Quentin Bell relives old memories, including having T.S. Eliot over for a dinner party and staging plays in the Studio, while Virginia Nicholson details the artistic techniques (stencilling, embroidery, painting, sculpture, ceramics and more) used to embellish and enliven the once simple farmhouse. In this refreshed edition of the original 1997 publication, Gavin Kingcombe’s specially commissioned photographs breathe life into the colourful interiors and garden of the Sussex farmhouse, while updated text and captions by Virginia Nicholson capture the evolution of Charleston as it continues to inspire a new generation. For lovers of literature, decorative arts, and all things Bloomsbury, Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden offers a window onto a truly unique creative hub.

Stunning artwork and illustrated essays illuminate the modernist home and studio of artists Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Accompanying an exhibition at Philip Mould & Company in London, this lavish catalog tells the story of Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant's enduring attachment to their home at Charleston Farmhouse in East Sussex through the work of the artists produced between the two world wars. Members of the Bloomsbury Group, Bell and Grant's family home functioned as the collective's country retreat and became a venue for progressive social self-expression. Their fondness for their Charleston Farmhouse, its idyllic surroundings, and its constant flow of visitors can be witnessed through their art. Beginning with radical modern works influenced by European trends—from painted furniture to depictions of food preparation in the kitchen, from the barns to the pond, from people to the household cat—this catalog tells a story of more than thirty years of astonishing artistic output. Focusing on Vanessa and Duncan's most productive creative years, this volume illustrates how Charleston fed their artistic impulses and inspired a glorious canon of art.

Stunning artwork and illustrated essays illuminate the modernist home and studio of artists Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Accompanying an exhibition at Philip Mould & Company in London, this lavish catalog tells the story of Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant's enduring attachment to their home at Charleston Farmhouse in East Sussex through the work of the artists produced between the two world wars. Members of the Bloomsbury Group, Bell and Grant's family home functioned as the collective's country retreat and became a venue for progressive social self-expression. Their fondness for their Charleston Farmhouse, its idyllic surroundings, and its constant flow of visitors can be witnessed through their art. Beginning with radical modern works influenced by European trends—from painted furniture to depictions of food preparation in the kitchen, from the barns to the pond, from people to the household cat—this catalog tells a story of more than thirty years of astonishing artistic output. Focusing on Vanessa and Duncan's most productive creative years, this volume illustrates how Charleston fed their artistic impulses and inspired a glorious canon of art.