The Pre-Raphaelite Rooms

The pictures here, and in the adjoining dressing-room, reflect the interest of the 1st Lord Faringdon in the paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites and their contemporaries, and include works by Rossetti, Watts, Madox Brown, Etty and Leighton. New acquisitions have broadened the list by the inclusion of works by their contemporaries, Tissot, Spartali (later Stillman) and Weguelin.

The carpet has been especially woven for these rooms by Brintons Carpets Limited of Kidderminster in early 2012. The design dates from 1891 and was found in their extensive archive and seems never to have been made. The highly elaborate border has been simplified to suit the scale of these two rooms but all of the yarns have been dyed to replicate the exact original colours.

The bed, with its painted tester and cornice dates from the last quarter of the eighteenth-century. The Regency settee at the foot of the bed is decorated with brass inlay, while the wardrobe with its finely figured mahogany veneer has a frieze enriched with satinwood and ivory. The small late eighteenth-century mahogany secretaire is in the style of Thomas Sheraton.

In the illuminated case to the left of the chimney-piece is an engraved glass entitled Way Out by Laurence Whistler (1912-1999).

Dressing Room

The early nineteenth-century bed is a French Empire mahogany 'Bateau Lit' with elaborate ormolu mounts.

The contemporary oak hanging cabinet displays an original letter written by Sir Alfred Gilbert, the famous late Victorian sculptor responsible for the statue of Eros in Piccadilly Circus, to Sir Edward Burne-Jones after seeing The Legend of the Briar Rose for the first time.

The Estate Office,

Buscot Park, Faringdon,

Oxfordshire SN7 8BU.

Telephone: 01367 240786

Email: estbuscot@aol.com