I’ll start this newsletter with a big AHHHHHHH!!!!
Because….. THE DOORS ARE OPEN! The Rory Hutton x Mapperton silk scarves are officially here, and I have been counting down to this moment.
In 1962, Country Life came to Mapperton House and photographed the West Room. It is a beautiful image. Grand, still, a little formal in the way those pictures always were.
Now look at the curtains.
Those are the same curtains hanging in that room this morning. At least sixty four years later, and very possibly a great deal longer, because all the photograph proves is that they were already there in 1962. They are sun bleached down one side, pelmets water stained, and holding on out of sheer good manners.
The West Room has simply been waiting. Waiting through a good many leaks, and more than six decades of Dorset light doing what Dorset light does.
I would rather like to stop it waiting.
Here is the plan, and I promise it is a good one. If we can raise the funds, the walls will be hung with de Gournay wallpaper. I have a meeting with de Gournay in September, and I may not sleep much beforehand! Gainsborough Silks are coming to Mapperton to sit down with me and go through fabrics, which means the new curtains and the upholstery will be woven properly, in England. There will be a new, bold colour of paint, and a rather lovely old duchesse brisée that has been longing for new life.
And no, the old silk is not going anywhere near a skip. It is being made into cushions, and one or two other things I am very excited about, but that is a story for another newsletter.
So that is the dream. Now the fun part!
I have teamed up with the brilliant textile designer Rory Hutton to create a limited edition silk scarf and pocket square, drawn entirely from Mapperton itself. Our family crest. The Rococo ceiling. King Charles II chair. An Earl’s coronet. A Sandwich. Our family Tiara. Alberta’s House of Worth dress. THE Peacock.
Twelve motifs in all, which I did not plan and only noticed later, given that I am the twelfth Countess of Sandwich.
Every penny of profit goes into the West Room.
Once they are gone, that is the end of it.
The scarf is £200, the pocket square £100, or you can take both for £260 and save £40.
I would so love you to be part of this one. Not watching it happen, part of it.
With love, Julie x
P.S. One scarf will be framed and hung in the restored West Room. So that when visitors come, the story of that room is not only about the history of the room and the family who lived in it. It is about you, and how you brought it back.
The photos are fabulous. Can't wait to wear my beautiful, one-of-a-kind Mapperton silk scarf! And VERY much looking forward to watching the amazing refresh of the West Room! xx