Country Life

Published by Time Inc. (UK) Ltd Country Life, the quintessential English magazine, is undoubtedly one of the biggest and instantly recognisable brands in the UK today. It has a unique core mix of contemporary country-related editorial and top end property advertising. Editorially, the magazine comments in-depth on a wide variety of subjects, such as architecture, the arts, gardens and gardening, travel, the countryside, field-sports and wildlife. With renowned columnists and superb photography Country Life delivers the very best of British life every week.

Miss Xenia Clegg Littler • Xenia is an aspiring actress with a degree in professional acting and a member of InterAct Stroke Support—a charity that aids stroke recovery by using actors to deliver stimulating reading material. She is also an administrator for Supporting Wounded Veterans, a gallery assistant at Long & Ryle, London SW1 and a private-events chef, having trained at Ballymaloe Cookery School, Ireland. Xenia is the daughter of George Clegg Littler and the Hon Sarah Clegg Littler.

Why we must settle for knowing only in part • On the eve of Easter, the Revd Dr Colin Heber-Percy considers how asking ourselves a question to which we already know the answer, but which we may have forgotten, echoes the message of the Resurrection

Country Life

Town & Country

Town & Country Notebook

Letters to the Editor

Say what you mean

Athena • Cultural Crusader

My favourite painting The Dean of Westminster

A silent witness • In the first of two articles, John Goodall looks at the recent completion of the chapel of Lancing College, one of the great landmarks of the Sussex coast

The legacy Roy Plomley and Desert Island Discs

A real nest egg • Despite their apparent delicacy, some eggs–when placed on end–can withstand the weight of a human, says John Lewis-Stempel, as he marvels at one of Nature’s smallest, yet mightiest miracles

Room with a pew • Bought, sold and inherited, parish seating not only confirmed social status, but came with its own temptations, discovers Andrew Green

Once more into the abyss • Having volunteered to look after his neighbour’s herd of Limousin cattle, John Lewis-Stempel is dismayed to find himself having to haul an elm-flower-loving heifer out of a ditch on a dramatic March afternoon

A prickly subject • Resembling a jumbo jacket potato on surprisingly long, scurrying legs, the hedgehog is Britain’s favourite mammal. Marianne Taylor takes a closer look beneath its spines

The Editor’s Easter quiz • Spring is finally here and our flora is bursting into life around us, but how many of these native wildflowers can you identify?

Luxury Notebook

A few of my favourite things • The author was born in 1948 and brought up in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), before moving to Scotland at the age of 17 to study at the University of Edinburgh. After a stint as a professor of medical law, he turned to writing fiction, but it was the ‘The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency’ series that made him a household name. He was awarded a knighthood for services to literature, academia and charity in 2024 and his latest book, The Perfect Passion Company (Polygon) is out now. The author has recently invested in Scottish tailors Stewart Christie (www.stewartchristie.com).

Springing up • Beautiful aquamarines are March’s birthstone. Here, they sparkle in the undergrowth, as spring starts to reveal its bounty

The designer’s room • Colour and pattern transformed what had been a dark space in a medieval manor house into an inviting drawing room

The benefit of foresight • The ability to anticipate the future is the secret of a successful building project

Deep in Hardy country • Hardy’s beguilingly pretty Wessex is the...