Art and Architecture, mainly

Ladderback chairs designed in 1903 by architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868–1928) for  Glasgow Willow Tea-rooms came on the London market in 2014, and put me in mind of Glasgow businesswoman Kate Cranston ...

                                         aerial view of Angkor Wattotally surrounded by wallWhen the Khmer Empire came to power, Hinduism became...

Oliver Wolf Sacks (1933-2015) was born in London, youngest of four sons of two Lithuanian Jewish doctors. Oliver spent most of his childhood in London, though his GP father and surgeon moth­er sent him to a rural boarding school for 4 years in WW2 t...

Today’s German capital, Berlin, was the Capital of Spies in the Cold War. The situation of the divided city, which developed after WW2, was unique. The historical heritage provided for excit­ing tours through the city, but many places said that Be...

Peter was the first child born to Helen & Joseph; first grandchild to Thelma & Les in Melbourne, and to Chaya & Yehuda in Sydney; and first great grandchild to Sarah and Peter. He was conceived in Israel, born in Brit­ain in 19...

Noted businessman John Jacob Astor (1864-1912), who made his for­t­une in the fur trade, was 47 when the Titanic sank in April 1912. Acc­or­d­ing to survivor accounts, Astor didn’t believe the ship was in any kind of immed­iate danger. He hel...

In the Christian tradition, journeying was associated with conversion: all pil­g­rim roads potentially led to Damas­cus. All Christians were stained with sin in his life, but individuals’ motives for going on pilgrimage differed from person to p...