2 Audley Square
Mayfair, London W1K
UK
Established in 1994, The Course offers exciting lectures in Art History, Literature and Music.
In this series of 10, when does a house become a “home”? When does a food plot become a “garden”? How do staircases and corridors reflect a new way of life? From the defensive architecture of the moat and keep to the 21st century urban fortresses of glass and concrete, from the monastic herbal garden to Chelsea show gardens for the urban terrace, we look not only at buildings, interiors and nature but, above all, at what they tell us about how people use their spaces to manage their lives.
Privacy and Palladianism
The great Palladian houses of the 18th century represent a revolution in lifestyle as much as in architecture. Graceful and essentially rural, they combine elegance with the possibility of intimacy, comfort with a managed offer of sophisticated activities. Against a background of upheaval in France and the agricultural revolution in England, the revolution in gardening is no less profound – from geometry to the “natural” landscapes of Capability Brown.