Your Places or Mine

Clive Aslet & John Goodall

A podcast about places and buildings, with tales about history and people.  From author and publisher Clive Aslet and the architectural editor of Country Life, & John Goodall

  1. John Kinross' Manderston: A Symbol of Edwardian England

    7H AGO

    John Kinross' Manderston: A Symbol of Edwardian England

    Send us Fan Mail Few houses better convey the opulence of Edwardian country house life than Manderston in the Scottish Borders. Built in the first years of the 20th century, it is an exquisite work of the scholarly architect John Kinross – which has always been kept up to the high standards set by Kinross’s client, the racehorse owner Sir James Miller.  Clive reveals a particular affection for Kinross because he knew his son, also called John Kinross, when the latter was an old but sprightly man with many memories to share – as well as because Manderston was the subject of one of his first sets of country-house articles for Country Life. Sir James had married Eveline, a daughter of Lord Scarsdale of Kedleston Hall, in Derbyshire, a masterpiece by Robert Adam which finds its reflection in Manderston.  But if the architectural style is Adamesque, the decoration by Charles Mellier and Company often strikes a French note.  Entirely of its time, however, is the staircase, whose balustrade is plated with silver.  There was a marble dairy to keep the milk cool in the Scottish Baronial home farm.  Given Sir James’s interest in horses, it is no surprise that the stables are splendid. But this was also the age of the first motor cars, much feared by some as an agent of change – which indeed it was. Not that Manderston itself has changed very much: it still perfectly conveys the domestic priorities of the Edwardian age, when country houses more comfortable than ever before.

    1 hr
  2. The History of Norwich: Conquest, Castle and Cathedral

    MAR 14

    The History of Norwich: Conquest, Castle and Cathedral

    Send a text The fascinating city of Norwich, capital of Norfolk, was one of the richest town in England during the Middle Ages.  The cathedral dates from the early Norman period, as does the Castle which has recently been magnificently redisplayed.  As Britain’s preeminent historian of the architecture of the Middle Ages, John has of course been to see it, and provides a superb commentary.  Clive does his best to keep up by describing a Victoria roller-skating rink which now houses a gallery of Asian textiles and craft.  Norwich is still remarkable for the density of its churches, from mighty St Peter Mancroft overlooking the market square to St Julian’s, where the anchoress Julian of Norwich was immured (her Revelations of Divine Love are the first works in English literature attributed to a woman).   The painters of the Norwich School of watercolourists – once revered and collected, their works are now akin, in terms of popularity in the market, to the brown furniture they would have sat on – can be studied in the Castle museum.

    57 min
  3. Archer's Masterpiece: The Building and Rebuilding of St. John's Smith Square

    MAR 7

    Archer's Masterpiece: The Building and Rebuilding of St. John's Smith Square

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    1h 1m
  4. Northumberland's Treasure: The History of Alnwick Castle

    FEB 26

    Northumberland's Treasure: The History of Alnwick Castle

    Send us Fan Mail Alnwick Castle in Northumberland is one of the most spectacular castles in England, an immense fortification that guarded the border with Scotland for centuries.  The Percy family who built it had almost king-like power over their territory – and were not above rebelling against the king himself: the impetuous Harry Hotspur was killed fighting against Henry IV at the Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403, while his wily father feigned illness.  John describes the history and setting of this formidable building, its battlements still lined with statuary figures of warriors (probably 18th-century) to repel enemies.   In London, the Percys owned Northumberland House, demolished in the 19th century, and employed Robert Adam to turn the old nunnery of Syon House into a spectacular neo-Classical villa, using decoration in the style of the recently discovered ruins of Pompeii.  Adam was also employed to decorate Alnwick but his scheme was swept away in the mid 19th century by Algernon Percy, 4th Duke of Northumberland, a man so solemn he was known as the Doge.  The principal interiors were sumptuously painted and gilded in the Renaissance style that the Duke had seen on his travels in Italy.  For this he employed the Italian architect Luigi Canina who used Giovanni Montiroli as his assistant.  John and Clive are very nearly lost for words at the magnificence of the result – but (just as well for the podcast) not quite!

    57 min
  5. Plinths, Columns and Controversy: The History of Trafalgar Square

    FEB 13

    Plinths, Columns and Controversy: The History of Trafalgar Square

    Send us Fan Mail Trafalgar Square has long been regarded as the centre of London.  It wasn’t always. John describes its medieval configuration when it was still countryside – hence the name of James Gibbs’s church St Martin in the Fields. This was where Richard II kept his hawks in the royal mews.  A square was proposed by the Prince Regent’s architect John Nash but not in the form we have it today.  The proximity of a barracks kept public order. What about the monument that dominates Trafalgar Square today, Nelson’s column?  Clive has the story of its slow journey towards completion, and the disappointments suffered by its architect William Railton.  Since then, the square has acquired fountains designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, with Art Deco sculpture – replacing ones by Sir Charles Barry that were fed from an artesian well. Within living memory, Trafalgar Square used to be a traffic island, cut off from the National Gallery by a busy road. Now it can justifiably be called the beating heart of the metropolis.

    1h 2m
  6. Detmar Blow: Disciple of Ruskin, Champion of the Arts and Crafts Movement

    FEB 6

    Detmar Blow: Disciple of Ruskin, Champion of the Arts and Crafts Movement

    Send us Fan Mail Detmar Blow was one of the brightest stars of the Arts and Crafts Movement – but his story is also dark and mysterious.  A pupil of the Kensington School of Art, where he met Lutyens – a lifelong friend – he won a travelling scholarship to draw cathedrals in France.  At Abbeville, he had a chance encounter with the great Victorian sage aesthete John Ruskin, then in the decline of his old age.  Blow escorted Ruskin to the Alps and imbibed his radical philosophy.  On his return to England, he did not complete his architectural apprenticeship but became a clerk of works to learn the fundamentals of building, as dictated by the principles of the Arts and Crafts Movement.  So he directed the building of Ernest Gimson’s Stoneywell Cottage in Leicestershire, a building that seems to have grown out of the ground it stands on.  And in 1896 he was with William Morris when he died and drove his coffin to the churchyard in a yellow harvest wagon decorated with willow boughs and vineleaves.   Immensely good looking, Blow became an intimate of the intellectual aristocrats of The Souls, for whom he designed or remodelled several country houses,  according to the philosophy of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings.  He had an affair with at least one of them, Pamela. Tenant.  In 1910 he married Gertrude, a daughter of the Hon. Hamilton Tollemache, whom he had met while touring Suffolk in a gypsy caravan.  The horny-handed craftsmen with whom he worked were given prime seats at his wedding in St Paul’s Cathedral.  Yet by then, despite his impeccably Arts and Crafts credentials, he had taken a French partner, Fernand Billerey, to undertake fashionable work in the West End.  He also, fatally, came into the orbit of Bendor, the 2nd Duke of Westminster.  After the First World War he became his factotum.  He was on the latter’s yacht, the Flying Cloud – whose interiors he had designed in Cotswold style – that Blow’s star came crashing down to earth.  He was accused of peculation and never recovered.  How did this extraordinary story unfold?  What were the motivations of the key players?  What role was played by the ideal country house that Blow created for himself and his family at Hilles, on a Cotswold escarpment with views to the Severn Estuary?  Do Clive and John have the answers?  Some of them, perhaps….

    1h 1m
  7. THE HISTORY OF WINDSOR CASTLE (PART 2) – FROM CHARLES II TO CHARLES III

    JAN 30

    THE HISTORY OF WINDSOR CASTLE (PART 2) – FROM CHARLES II TO CHARLES III

    Send us Fan Mail This week John takes Clive through Windsor Castle, a creation not just of the Middle Ages (subject of part 1 of this series) but of successive monarchs since the Restoration of Charles II in 1660.  George III, a King who had been trained in architecture, made it into a family home, before being confined here during his years of madness.  Typically, his eldest son George IV had bigger ideas, employing Jeffry Wyatt to revamp the castle after 1824.  This included a remodelling of St George’s Hall and making the Waterloo Chamber to accommodate the famous Waterloo Banquets at a table 150 metres long.  Wyatt also gave Windsor the romantic skyline we see today.  Knighted in 1828, Wyatt changed his name to the supposedly more medieval Sir Jeffry Wyatville with the King’s blessing and was finally buried in St George’s Chapel at Windsor in 1840.  For a time, he was joined by the Prince Consort who died in 1861, whose were removed to the Royal Mausoleum at Frogmore 10 years later.  Clive and John both vividly remember the Windsor Castle fire which roared through the building in 1992.  Discussing its significance they come to some possibly surprising conclusions.

    1h 3m
  8. The Crisis of Liverpool Street Station (EMERGENCY BROADCAST!)

    JAN 23

    The Crisis of Liverpool Street Station (EMERGENCY BROADCAST!)

    Send us Fan Mail This week John and Clive are frothing with disapproval at Network Rail’s plan to upgrade Liverpool Street Station.  It is proposed that this will be funded by a development which will impose an out-of-scale tower at the entrance to the station, which will deprive the concourse of natural light and destroy the surroundings.  What a pity.  Liverpool Street was brilliantly reimagined in the late 1980s, to make a virtually new station so much in the spirit of the old that many people assume that it is largely Victorian.  If only there was someone who could offer a design of similar sensitivity.  Fortunately there is!  John McAslan of John McAslan and Partners has come up with a spectacularly clever alternative scheme, fulfilling Network Rail’s objective at a fraction and far less environmental damage. This is an emergency podcast.  The City Corporation are about to decide whether the Network Rail proposal gets planning permission. John and Clive want McAslan instead. Listen as they debate what makes really good railway station architecture and what makes it so important.

    57 min
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About

A podcast about places and buildings, with tales about history and people.  From author and publisher Clive Aslet and the architectural editor of Country Life, & John Goodall

Information

  • Creator
    Clive Aslet & John Goodall
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    48
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Your Places or Mine
  • Show Website
    Your Places or Mine

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