Yesterday we visited Loseley Park in Surrey, (just outside Guildford - and what a treat it was.I thought it was simply the headquarters of an ice-cream company having eaten it many times but in fact they sold the company some years a go. What it is is a small and exquisite Manor house set in beautiful gardens and I sincerely recommend a visit.We explored the garden 'rooms', the white garden, the herb garden, the lovely veg garden and a stunning rose garden, walked around the lake and had lunch in a centuries old Tithe Barn lovingly restored.
The house itself is still owned by the family who built it in 1560 and coincidentally it was built at the same time and in the ex-monestery stones just as our last home was, it even looked very similar. I wonder if Elizabeth 1st's courtiers swapped ideas?
Best of all was the beautiful needlework in the house, not just the centuries old crewel work bedcovers but the more modern stuff done by the owners wife, so delicate! Also a pair of Maid of Honour Chairs reputed to have been stitched by Eizabeth 1st and a stunning petit point firescreen that the guide said was Berlin work but I doubt that. The pattern certainly was Berlin type roses but it was done in silks and not wool which I always assumed Berlin was done in. And the stitches were really tiny and delicate.
One bedroom had another bedcover from the William and Mary era (late 17th century)that had apparently once been admired by the late Queen Mary (they were lucky to have kept it - she was renowned for wanting to be given anything she admired!) Amazing, it looked for all the world like William Morris Willow design. The pictures show the house and a random selection of the garden
