Daniel Cottier: The Complex Role of a Victorian Art Entrepreneur
In this blog, authors Petra ten-Doesschate Chu and Max Donnelly explore the multi-faceted career and legacy of Daniel Cottier, an innovative designer and farsighted…
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The Victorian with whom you would most want to have dinner
Walter Bagehot (1826-1877) was a prominent Victorian lawyer, businessman, essayist and journalist. For 17 years he was editor of The Economist, and to this…
Read MoreIn the Olden Time: Victorians and the British Past
‘When the painter Henry Wallis first exhibited his Chatterton at the Royal Academy in 1856 the painting was acclaimed by the public and critics…
Read More‘Hell Upon Earth’? The True Nature of the Victorian City by Emma Griffin
The Victorian city is often painted as a place of squalor and misery for the working class, where hordes of downtrodden workers were crammed together in dehumanising…
Read MoreAuthor Article by National Gallery curator Susanna Avery-Quash: How the Eastlake family shaped the Victorian art world
Art for the Nation by Susanna Avery-Quash and Julie Sheldon is a fascinating biography of the Victorian Eastlake family (Sir Charles, Lady Elizabeth and their…
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Women’s History Month: Uncovering Women’s History
For Women’s History Month 2025, we are sharing 10 free chapters from books uncovering women’s contributions to history. These extracts look at how women…
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History Books of the Year
This reading list brings you our top History titles of 2024 as chosen by critics. You can shop this selection with 30% off on…
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Cottages Ornés: The Charms of the Simple Life
In this article, author Roger White introduces us to the architectural style of ‘cottage orné’, the subject matter of his book which has just…
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What defines women’s quest for beauty?
How has women’s quest for health and beauty changed over the last four hundred years? And what has been its impact on gender definition, social inequality and the sense of aging?
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What the Greeks Did for the Olympics
In What the Greeks Did for Us, Tony Spawforth says ‘the modern Olympics are the most globally high-profile manifestation of ‘what the Greeks did…
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Gilbert Spencer: a Life in 6 Landscapes
Paul Gough’s illustrated biography of Gilbert Spencer is the first book to recount the life and career of a long-overlooked twentieth-century British artist. A…
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England’s Cathedrals: A Timeline — by Nicholas Orme
Nicholas Orme’s The History of England’s Cathedrals is the first history of the life and activities of all English cathedrals, from Birmingham and Bury…
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The Stripping of the Altars – 50 Years in 50 Books
Eamon Duffy’s landmark account of the pre-Reformation church in England was first published in 1992. The Stripping of the Altars is a major revisionist…
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The Gentleman’s Daughter – 50 Years in 50 Books
Winner of the 1999 Wolfson History Prize, The Gentleman’s Daughter invokes women’s own accounts of their intimate and public lives to reveal what the…
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How the Georgians Celebrated Christmas – by Penelope J. Corfield
In The Georgians, Penelope J. Corfield explores every aspect of Georgian life – politics and empire, culture and society, love and violence, religion and…
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