Month: August 2024

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Design Luxury People Restaurants

Sinabro Restaurant Battersea London + Yoann Chevert + Sujin Lee

Up and Down the Junction

The American journalist Abbott Joseph Liebling could have been writing about our favourite restaurant located Between the Commons rather than Between Meals: An Appetite for Paris (1986), “The small restaurants where a talented owner and his wife have direct control of the kitchen produce the best food in France now.” And England too. Sinabro is celebrating its 10th anniversary so we’ve hunted out the menu from our first visit in October 2014 to reminisce and booked dinner for the late reopening in August 2024 following the summer break. Owners Yoann Chevert and Sujin Lee have lots to celebrate.

Our decade old review below is already historic. Eateries Byron and Dip and Flip, estate agents Cluttons and Roderick Charles men’s clothes shop have all closed. Sujin, who hails from South Korea, explains, “‘Sinabro’ originates from the Korean term that signifies ‘progressing slowly but surely without noticing’. That aptly describes our 10 years on Battersea Rise. Our accomplishment is without any reliance on commercial marketing or media support. Instead it has been made possible by the incredible support of our cherished local neighbours and friends who resonate with our unwavering dedication to high quality cuisine.”

​First things first. Clapham Junction is not in Clapham. Never was, never will be. When the railway station was first built in Battersea, the Victorians had the bright idea of calling it after Clapham which is two kilometres away. The former was a slum; the latter as respectable as could be expected south of the Thames. How things change! Local campaigns regularly erupt proudly claiming back Battersea to where it belongs. Take note Clapham Cluttons on Northcote Road, Battersea. At least estate agents agree the best real estate in SW11 is Between the Commons. It’s a heated up toast rack of roads lined with handsome houses cushioned between Clapham Common and Wandsworth Common. As for the Clapham Omnibus it has long been replaced by the South Chelsea Tractor (range rover). This is after all Yummy Mummy Nappy Valley Uppity Middle Class Central. Upmarket has gone downstream.

Before London completely engulfed this part of semi rural Surrey, it was the home of architect Sir Charles Barry, property developer Thomas Cubitt, diarist Samuel Pepys, slavery abolitionist and saint William Wilberforce, and typographer and sinner Eric Gill. Not all at once. Battersea Rise forms one of the outer edges of the grill or grid. To the north, Lavender Hill may not have its mob anymore but gentrification – Sixties sociologist Ruth Glass is to blame for that overused term – hasn’t quite taken over. Yet.

The same cannot be said, to put it mildly, for south of Battersea Rise, the tract of land once owned by the 1st Earl Spencer. Here a Parisian meringue pâtisserie (Aux Merveilleux de Fred) qualifies as the corner shop. Byron as the chip shop. Dip and Flip as the other chip shop. The Bolingbroke Pub and Dining Room as the local. It’s not for the price sensitive. Everyone’s moneyed in The Old Bank Pub. There are as many red corduroys, yellow gilets, pink sweaters and pinkie rings on the street as in Roderick Charles’ shop window display. Welcome to Paradisian Battersea. Half the time the television series Made in Chelsea is made in Battersea.

Aside from Battersea Rise, the other boundaries of this low rise swathe of bed knobs and broomsticks land are Clapham Common West Side to the east, Bolingbroke Grove to the west and Nightingale Lane to the south. Social distractions aren’t new. William Wilberforce lamented in 1791, “I find that I must as little as is really right ask people to Battersea Rise to stay all night as it robs and impoverishes the next morning … in this way I love my time, and find indeed that less is done at Battersea Rise than elsewhere.”

So the competition is stiff, but really for boys who brunch not to mention wine and dine there’s nowhere quite like the restaurant Sinabro at 28 Battersea Rise. Welcome to Parisian Battersea. Francophile Marianne Faithfull’s song As Tears Go By plays softly in the background. In Paris do you drop the S? Does Moët have a hard of soft T? Do turbot and merlot rhyme? What about halibut and Malibu? But soon life’s perpetual worries and other first world concerns subside and fade away as lunch is served.

“We moved to Battersea three years ago,” relates Yoann who’s originally from Loir-et-Cher. “We fell in love at first sight with this area because of its urban and suburban mix. We didn’t so much choose Battersea Rise for our restaurant as it chose us. We’ve been looking for premises for four years in London and had several abortive cases. The pure Korean word ‘Sinabro’ resembles us. We work hard as ants or bees collecting their foods by instinct!” There are just 28 covers in the sparsely decorated restaurant: 12 at the bar overlooking the open kitchen, eight in a private space to the rear, and the remaining at two tables looking out the façade window onto Battersea Rise. “We have two, three and six course menus,” he confirms. “Eventually it would be good to keep only the six course tasting menu. Our customers say all of our ingredients in a dish have strong intense flavours yet are delicate.”

The two course lunch (£25.50) in October 2014 of liquid potato amuse bouche then Egg, Celeriac and Mushroom followed by Seabream, Cabbage and Mustard Sauce with Baby Gem Salad (£3.50) is modern French cuisine at its best. A two and a half course lunch soon stretches into three and a half with Fennel Bavarois, Strawberry and Lemon Sorbet for pudding (£6.90). The wine list is helpfully categorised. “Leafy and Savoury” includes Domaine Raymond Morin Saumur-Champigny 2010 Loire (£30). “Rich and Medium Bodied”, Weingut Von Winning 2012 Pfalz (£37). “Fruity and Supple”, Domaine La Ferme Saint-Martin Beaumes de Venise 2012 Rhone (£42). “Crisp and Mineral”, Château Carbitey 2010 Graves Bordeaux (£44). “Big and Bold”, Château Puy Mouton 2008 Saint-Emilion Grand Cru (£58).

“Frédéric Simonin in the 17th District is our favourite restaurant in Paris,” says Yoann. “We worked together for eight years! He is such a talented man.” His Parisian experience also included working at Michelin starred establishments Le Taillevent, Le Meurice and La Table de Joel Robuchon. Yoann met his wife and future business partner Sujin at Le Cordon Bleu, the leading cookery school in Paris. Yoann was formerly Sous Chef under Head Chef Hélène Darroze at The Connaught Hotel Mayfair.

We’ve eaten at Sinabro in the intervening years of course. There’s always the pull of a frequently changing menu. For example, in June 2016, our table for two had starters: Tomato Gazpacho (£8.00) and Egg Pasta (£9.50); mains Turbot (£11.00); and puddings Lemon Tart (£7.00). The menu varies but the standard remains ever high. In May 2020, Sinabro came to us. Opening times are now dinner Tuesday to Saturday.

À la carte dinner in August 2024 starts with a snack, Carmelised Micro Anchovies (£4.50). Starter is Beetroot Tart: goat’s cheese, onion compote, Granny Smith apple, hazelnut (£13.90). Main is Fish of the Day: cod, cavolo nero, cauliflower, mixed mushroom, orange reduction (£29.90). Pudding is Cherry: chocolate brownie, meringue, mascarpone, black cherry sorbet (£12.00). Sinabro is still modern French cuisine at its best. Sujin reveals, “We like to change the menu every few weeks.”

The wine list is more traditionally organised into “Sparkling”, “Champagne”, “White”, “Rosé”, “Red” and “Sweet”. Examples from each category in order include Crémant de Bourgogne Veuve Ambal (£59.00), Devaux Grande Réserve Pinot Noir (£82.00), Viognier Maison de la Paix 202 Pays d’Oc (£39.00), Cochon Volant Château de Caraguilhes 2019 Languedoc (£49.00), Pinot Noir Hautes Côtes de Beaune Domaine Cauvard 2018 Burgundy (£59.00) and Sauternes Château Simon 2018 Bordeaux. The Tasting Menu (£54.00) can be wine paired (£39.00). French singer Requin Chagrin’s hit Sémaphore plays softly in the background.

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Architects Architecture Art Country Houses Design Fashion Hotels Luxury People Restaurants

Marlfield House Hotel + The Duck Restaurant Gorey Wexford

A Bon Mot Cast in Stone

“Margaret and Laura Bowe inherited good taste from their parents,” states architect Alfred Cochrane. He worked on Marlfield House Hotel over a 15 year period starting in 1982. “Mary their mother has incredible style and she wanted more accommodation. My work at Marlfield is Postmodern. I wanted the Conservatory to be a room away from the house, not directly attached. It’s inspired by Richard Turner’s  Botanic Gardens Belfast and the National Botanic Gardens Dublin glasshouses as well as Brighton Pavilion. The pond front of the single storey wing is designed to resemble a French hunting lodge. I had to insert a fire wall into the Staircase Hall of the original house. The Bowes bought superb 18th century fireplaces like the one in the Library. Great artists were brought on board: Marina Guinness and Victoria Ormesby-Gore created the Print Room and Nat Clements painted the murals in the Entrance Hall. Mary’s husband Ray dammed a stream to create the pond.”

Alfred’s work augments Marlfield’s presence both physically and aesthetically. Creative clients helped. “We’re all mad about design,” declares Laura Bowe. “Our family all have a good eye. I worked in Alfred’s practice for a while.” Mary and Ray bought the house and 15 hectares from the widowed Lady Courtown in 1977. It was built in 1852 by the 4th Earl of Courtown as a dower house. The house is tall, slim and elegant. Three storeys: four bay entrance front; four bay corresponding garden front with a two bay breakfront; and two bay bowed side elevation. The other side adjoins a two storey ancillary wing. Faced with rugged semi coursed rubblestone and red brick quoins. A parapet free pitched roof over deep eaves is punctuated by tall chimneystacks. The 5th Earl swapped some of the ground floor multi pane windows for plate glass sashes in 1866. “Courtown House was across the road,” comments Laura. “It was sold to the Irish Tourist Board in 1948 and pulled down.” Jeremy Williams records in his 1994 guide Architecture In Ireland 1837 to 1921, “Courtown House, the seat of  the Earls of Courtown, was much modified during the 19th century … William Burn was involved in remodelling the house.” The 9th Earl, James Patrick Montagu Winthrop Stopford, recently enjoyed a weekend at Marlfield.

The vivid reinvention of the former dower house, a joyous revivication, begins at the entrance to the grounds. In place of traditional stone pillars are Alfred’s whimsical wrought iron columns supporting wry wiry pineapples. This design is shadowed in a gazebo on the lawn. The entrance portico of the house bridges the gap between Neoclassicism and Postmodernism. There’s a layering of stylistic language at play, apropos for a polyglot architect. A Doric centrepiece steps forward from smooth stone bays; it’s deconstructed to become not so much a broken pediment as a broken temple ‘glued’ together with glazing. Beyond lies the vast semicircular Entrance Hall partly mirrored in plan by a bowed external water feature. A picture gallery connects the Entrance Hall to the State Suites of the single storey wing: the French Room, Georgian Room, Morland Room, Print Room, Sheraton Room and Stopford Room. “Inspiration for the Print Room came from Mariga Guinness’s work at Leixlip Castle and of course Lady Louisa Connolly’s famous Print Room at Castletown,” notes Margaret. “When the doors are pulled across the bed alcove, wedding ceremonies are often performed in this room.”

There are another 13 bedrooms, all with marble bathrooms, upstairs in the main house. Guests can dream and more in coronet, fourposter and half tester beds. The Conservatory on the garden front balances the State Room wing on the entrance front. History, luxury, harmony, geometry and symmetry: all are important at Marlfield, a billet-doux to hospitality. The Conservatory, an adventurous addition, is a tripartite triumph in cast iron and glass. A central projection balloons up to a storey high ogee shaped dome. The vertical frame of distinctive lattice metal pilasters topped by stylised Ionic capitals is as stylish as anything produced in the Regency era. The Ionic order with cerebral associations bestowed upon it by Vitruvius has long carried intellectual heft. Soaneian mirrored cornicing, cills and starburst ceiling roses reflect the omnipresent brilliance.

“I worked with Alfred and his business partner Jeremy Williams in the summer vacations while I was studying architecture,” says Albert Noonan. “I was involved in drawing the magnificent curvilinear Conservatory. Extending a period property is full of design challenges. Alfred tackled these challenges with confidence, building on historic references to create a statement piece that harmonises well with the original building both inside and out. The Conservatory is a joy to walk around and the interior with frescoed walls brings the beautiful gardens into the Dining Room. Stylistically it has not dated and looks as good today as when it was first built.” It reminds us of sitting in the conservatory of Ballyfin, County Laois, or Rokeby Hall, County Louth.

Albert reminisces, “As a young architect I was impressed by the uplifting experience of visiting Alfred’s projects. His designs deliver on functionality but they also incorporate creative details that add a sense of intrigue and visual interest. This approach to design influenced my career – I endeavour to create designs that not only meet clients’ brief of functionality but also create appropriate environments that are uplifting and pleasurable experiences for the end user.”

In a mark of approval, a continuum of tradition, an aligment of the story arc, a refinement of the built form, he would return to Marlfield to design the restoration and conversion of the coach house, potting shed and gardener’s tool shed into The Duck. The hotel and restaurant share the same avenue but then it forks off into different, albeit abutting, worlds. “The Duck is a meeting point for all directions in good or bad weather,” Margaret clarifies. “People come in the summer to sit on the terrace. People come in the winter to be near the fire. It sits 100 for lunch and 120 for dinner.” There’s a rustic feel inside: exposed stone walls and timber panelling. “The beauty of the restaurant is it overlooks the kitchen garden. There’s a kilometre long walk around the meadow. This whole place is in use, all 36 acres.”

Two years later, Albert designed the remodelling of the tiny Gatelodge, transforming it into a spacious two bedroom single storey residence. “It’s extremely popular,” confirms Margaret. “People never stay once.” A pair of simple gate pillars marking the entrance to the Gatelodge garden is repeated in the hedge opposite lining the avenue: that symmetry in action. He recalls, “The original Gatelodge was a classic and modest design and the extended building retains these attributes externally. Internally, we created visual interest through elevated ceilings and a varied palette of materials and textures including exposed brick walls, timber panelling, stone flooring and earthy muted colours. Laura has a great eye for furniture and fixtures that convey a sense of luxury and comfort.” An opaque circular ceiling window – like the one over the Staircase Hall of Alfred’s County Wicklow home – lights the Lobby leading into the large open plan Reception Room.

“Following on from the Gatelodge project, the Bowes wanted to provide more bedroom accommodation,” remarks Albert. “Rather than extend the main house it was decided to provide five freestanding Pond Suites. They’re of a contemporary design intended to complement the woodland setting. Each Suite has large windows and a terrace orientated to capture great views over the pond and island.” Margaret adds, “They’re called The Peacock, The Fox, The White Heron and The Blue Heron. We named the two bedroom suite The Nest.”

He continues, “The Pond Suites are constructed in a lightweight timber frame walling sitting on bored pile foundations to minimise disruption to the ground beneath. The floors are floating just above ground level. Main exterior walls are clad in cedar which will transform into a silver grey finish over time. The rear walls and monopitched roofs are clad in black coated zinc. We used Crittal steel windows. The monopitched design maximises the height of the façade glazing.”

As night falls and sun sets, dinner in the Conservatory hits more high notes than a Wexford Festival Opera diva. First there’s the prelude of parmesan and spice bread which sides the Courgette and Goat’s Cheese Canapé. Mozart in a mouthful. Seared Irish Scallops (roast apple purée, Granny Smith crisp) form the brisk and lively first movement of this incredible edible symphony. Pachelbel on a plate. Roast Onion Soup is lyrically relaxing. Bach in a bowl. Fillet of Pan Seared Halibut (concasse of tomato, sugar snap peas, mussels, lemon beurre blanc) ups the tempo and pumps the mood music. Tchaikovsky on the tastebuds. Marlfield Garden Rhubarb Millefeuille (vanilla pastry cream, candied ginger) provides a rollocking finale. Pudding is La Passione. Encore will be breakfast and encore une fois coffee and shortbread while the car pulls up for departure.

“I joined the team in 1994 after working in event management in London,” Margaret concludes. “Laura arrived back in 2004 after leaving the film industry. She is responsible for brand development and I take care of the sales department. On a daily basis, we manage the hotel together. Ireland is essentially a rural country and I’ve lived in the countryside for much of my life. My love of nature is my way of expressing the attachment, this Irish identity.” A tortoiseshell runs past into the herbaceous border. Margaret mourns, “George the peacock and the ginger cat died a couple of years ago. In July and August, George was always crowing, calling out for a lady. There are three cats now. They just appear! There are lots of birds too.” On cue, a heron swoops out of the pond, past two gliding ducks.

Five years after opening, Marlfield became a member of the coveted Relais et Châteaux group. Add sustainability to its list of qualities. The Gatelodge has triple glazed windows and a heat pump. That open plan layout is never draughty. “We strive to constantly reduce our carbon footprint,” assures Margaret. “We operate on green energy and are moving towards biogas. The Pond Suites are close to zero carbon. Our menus use local produce within a radius of a few kilometres. Over the last two years we have planted at least 150 trees.”

Courtown House long gone, Marlfield House is in its golden era. The dowager is now the doyenne.

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Pont Street + 11 Cadogan Gardens Hotel Chelsea London

Beautiful as a Story

“Architectural fashion is so often a reaction to what went immediately before. There’s even a perceptible difference between the father A W Pugin and the son E W Pugin’s work. The second generation architect’s designs are more rationalised,” believes artist and architectural publisher Anne Davey Orr. “Later, the use of concrete in the 20th century would issue in a much more open expression of materials and structure.”

The penultimate decades of the last two centuries both stuck to something of a “more is more” mantra. A sort of turn of the century syndrome. Eclecticism gone wild. Not without honour and slightly mad. Pont Street for the 1880s and 90s; Postmodernism for the 1980s and 90s. Out went conformity and goodbye to context; in came variety and hello to contrast. It was the ever inventive cartoonist Osbert Lancaster who came up with the name Pont Street Dutch due to the style flourishing in Chelsea. It could easily have been North German Revival, Flemish Revival or New Queen Anne. Or even Hans Town or Cadogan. Sir John Betjeman abbreviated it to Pont Street, making it even more geographically precise. He calls it the “new built red as hard as the morning gaslight” in his poem The Arrest of Oscar Wilde at the Cadogan Hotel. These days the SW postcodes are as golden as they are terracotta.

That’s the name explained but who invented the style? Architect John James Stevenson claimed Queen Anne as his creation. The practice Ernest George and Harold Peto produced some of the most overblown examples in Harrington Gardens but really the style was to become synonymous with the dominating work of Norman Shaw. Pont Street rang the death knell, scrawled the writing on the wall, beckoned the banshee for regular terraces, heralding an asymmetric age of individualism. “Look at me, look at me!” screams each house as the rooflines tipsily whoosh and swoosh over more Dutch gables than Keizersgracht. Against the navy canvas of a sun drenched winter’s morning, and to be repeated nine years later on a sun drenched summer’s morning, the red brick dressed with white stone renders Pont Street a patriotic tricolour.

Such strength of character allows 20th century blips such as the picture window spanning the penthouse of 41 Lennox Gardens to be immersed into the wider townscape. The houses celebrate their birthdays: “1884” shouts 25 Lennox Gardens from metre tall letters on its third floor. A few doors up, 43 Lennox Gardens announces to the world it’s a year younger. A wander in wonder along the streets of SW1 and SW3, the blessed boulevards of the Cadogan Estate, throws up a maximalist impure visual feast, an aesthetic eyeful, for the devil and angels are in the detail.

At a glance, here are some of the hyperactive highlights. Keyhold silhouette broken pediment copper domes in Sloane Gardens. Double decker dormers in Culford Gardens. Witch’s hat copper turrets where Draycott Place meets Blacklands Terrace. Quoined porthole windows peering out of 54 to 58 Draycott Place. A neo Elizabethan fretwork loggia hugging 3 Cadogan Gardens. Pierless Brighton balconies clinging onto 85 to 87 Cadogan Gardens. A château mansard atop 89 Cadogan Gardens. Twin Queen Anne fanlights surmounting the doorcase of 105 Cadogan Gardens. Stumpy Ionic pilasters holding up egg and dart capitals framing the porch of 60 Cadogan Square. A pair of ballsy busty bulbous oriel windows on the side elevation of 63 Cadogan Square. And that’s just at a glance.

Pont Street the address bisects Cadogan Place Gardens under the watchful eyes of the 18 storeyed 1961 Jumeirah Carlton Tower. But the great swathe of red is mostly found between Sloane Street and Lennox Gardens. The extremities of Pont Street dive back into stuccoland. A morning of architectural investigation must be balanced by an afternoon of gourmet indulgence. Historically, afternoon tea was the outcome of dinner slipping to beyond 7pm by the opening years of the 19th century. Hiccupping ladies at first surreptitiously downed tea and gobbled cake in their boudoirs after midday. By 1842, trailblazing trendsetting taboo busting gal about castle Anna Maria Russell, 7th Duchess of Bedford, was bolshily dispensing tea in her sitting room to fill the gap created by the evening meal becoming later and later thanks to gaslighting. Fast forward to the Pont Street era and both sexes were merrily letting rip into cucumber sandwiches and scones with clotted cream in the drawing room or on the lawn. Where better then to indulge than 11 Cadogan Gardens, the hotel launched by the eponymous Estate in 2012? A Darjeeling fuelled calorific high awaits: Carrot Cake Explosion; Chocolate Fudge Bar; Lemon Drizzle Loaf; Macarons; Raspberry Orange Battenburg.

The first part of the hotel’s name is mildly misleading: the reception rooms and 54 bedrooms are spread across four townhouses (“5, 7, 9 and 11 Cadogan Gardens” being something of a mouthful). Bright red brick with white trimmings, in some places to stripy effect (more bands than a 12th of July march); terracotta tracery and scrolls; rusticated Doric columns and shortened Ionic columns; rectangular metal balconies and semicircular brick balconies; windows of every frame and shape and type (more casements than a West Belfast cemetery; and again more sashes than a 12th of July march) and orientation (more than a Pride march in London); oriels, chamfered bays and rectangular bays; flat, round arched and segmental arched windows; mini, Dutch and swan neck gables; 11 Cadogan Gardens is as dynamic Pont Street as it gets. The last part of the hotel’s name is wildly accurate. It faces a densely treed green square. The only two London members of the exclusive Relais et Châteaux group are 11 Cadogan Gardens and its sister hotel further round the square, The Chelsea Townhouse.
The interior is just as eclectic. A maze of lacquered cloistered sequestered panelled hallways and lobbies and corridors and passageways leads into the consciously picturesque opalescent Drawing Room. Starched linen at the ready, afternoon tea awaits, designed to instil a divine inertia into the remainder of a stimulating day. Decked and bedecked, espaliered and jardinièred, the Terrace is tucked between the townhouses and the mews. Alive with remote anticipation, it’s a place to dwell on the meaningfulness of life. Another surprising place is the Versailles inspired Mirrored Hall, a space designed to contemplate the advantage of beauty. Monochromatic photographs of supermodels line the descending staircase to the basement gym. Oil paintings of aristos line the ascending staircase to the bedrooms. Souls of different ages bordering the universe in process of consummation. This hotel has a distinct and dynamic personality, one that is warm and sensuous.

Over to the father of town planning Manning Robertson of Huntington Castle, County Carlow, for some pontification on not just Pont Street but classification itself. Everyday Architecture, 1948, “Definitions of architecture are as unsatisfactory as any other expositions of the aim and meaning of the arts; but if architecture is to be alive at all it must clearly involve the erection of buildings to suit the demands of the period, and the embellishment of those buildings according to the dictates of the materials in use, the treatment being a direct reflection of the outlook of the epoch, based of course upon past work, insofar as it is applicable. We cannot say that the 19th century, which produced principally a dead copying of the past, did not reflect itself truly; it was, on the contrary, amazingly accurate in illustrating that the worship of material prosperity is not consistent with a high level of art.”

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Hotels Luxury People Restaurants

Hôtel Meurice Calais + Charles-Augustin Meurice

The Last Word

More than a mere port, it’s a tale of two cities: Calais-Nord is a manmade island surrounded by canals and basins. St Pierre is the part of the mainland that hugs the island to the south and southeast. Calais has its own unique charm. Like Paris, there is a Notre Dame and a hotel called Meurice. The Calais variety is on Rue Ernest Lejeune in Calais-Nord. Since 1835, its Parisian equivalent has been on Rue de Rivoli. A glass of wine costs €4.50 in the former; €32 in the latter. To stay in one of the 41 rooms near Parc Richelieu will cost you at least €76; it’s a minimum of 12 times that for one of the 160 rooms overlooking Jardin des Tuileries. The interior of Hôtel Meurice Calais has mid 20th century geometric panelling and strongly coffered ceilinged rooms filled with local antiques. Le Meurice Paris was given an early 21st century cosmopolitan makeover by Philippe Starck. True to the designer’s form, it’s a luxurious whimsical creation playing with scale and form. The Paris hotel is two kilometres as the common buzzard flies from Notre Dame. The Calais one, 100 metres from Notre Dame.

Charles-Augustin Meurice (1739 to 1820) was an enterprising postmaster who realised the strategic location of Calais for English tourists travelling onwards to the French Capital. In 1771 he launched a coaching inn in Calais and eventually 46 years later opened another one in Paris, capturing custom at either end of the 36 hour journey. Monsieur Meurice trailblazed such innovations as laundry soap, currency exchanges and English speaking staff. The Calais hotel uses Damana bathroom products; the Paris one, Maison Francis Kurkdjian. Like much of Calais, Hôtel Meurice was destroyed in World War II before being rebuilt in a rationalist style in the 1950s. A sweeping staircase leads from the open plan ground floor reception to bedrooms on upper floors overlooking a walled garden to the rear.

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Architecture Art People Town Houses

Notre Dame Church + Tudor Garden Calais

Epiphanic Moments

On two glorious summer mornings, six years apart, we’re twice smitten by the shy charm of Calais and its most passionately historic monument. Eight centuries of art and beauty, faith and form, in glorious harmony. The grey spire of Notre Dame Church rising above the White City residential architecture of Calais is as beautiful as it is unexpected. What’s not to admire?

· 1214: A small stone church is erected.

· 1224: It is extended to become a parish church which will be subsumed into the final building.

· 1347: Calais is captured by the Plantagenets in August and the Archbishop of Canterbury becomes head of Notre Dame. The nave is heightened, the side aisles widened and a belltower is built above the intersection of the nave and transept. Flemish masons add their twist to the Perpendicular English architecture.

· 1469: On 11 July George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence, marries Isabel Neville in the church.

· 1558: Calais remains under English control until it is recaptured in January by Scarface, 3rd Duke of Guise. It then falls under Spanish control for a while.

· 1560: St Nicholas Church is demolished making Notre Dame the top place of worship in the city.

· 1598: Under The Treaty of Vervins between King Henri IV and King Phillipe II of Spain, Calais becomes French again. Phew!

· 1600: A side chapel is built. The church is now 88 metres long and has over 6,000 congregants.

· 1624: Adam Lottman, a sculptor from Coulogne, creates the tripartite marble and alabaster high altar, 10 metres high by 10.3 metres wide. Statues of St Louis and Charlemagne are mounted on either side with Christ at the top of the retable.

· 1629: Assumption of the Virgin Mary, a vast painted by Gérard Séghers, a student of Rubens, is placed in the centre of the high altar.

· 1631: The Lady Chapel is added.

· 1802: After being converted to a Temple of Reason during the French Revolution, the church is reconsecrated. Double phew!

· 1863: The Dean of Calais commissions plasterwork decoration of the vaults.

· 1921: General Charles de Gaulle marries local lass Yvonne Vendroux in the church on 7 April. Signs will be erected throughout the city over the intervening years to remind visitors of the marriage.

· 1944: Allied Forces bombard Calais and the 58 metre high belltower of Notre Dame falls through the roof into north transept.

· 1963: Reconstruction of the nave and belltower begins.

· 1970: The roof is put back.

· 1976: Stained glass windows by Gérard Lardeur are inserted to fill the medieval mullions and transoms.

· 2009: The Association for the Development of the Architectural Heritage of the Calaisis begins restoration work.

· 2010: English landscape architect Caroline Holmes is commissioned by the Association to create a Tudor Garden. She explains, “The garden is named after the dynasty that ruled over Calais during the period 1485 to 1603. The design and planting of the garden is inspired by the interior of the church.”

· 2010: Queen Elizabeth II visits and inspects the new Notre Dame de Calais Rose in the Tudor Garden.

· 2014: The jewel of the Pale of Calais is fully restored. Our Lady lives again. Triple phew!

· 2018: Lavender’s Blue visit Notre Dame, inspecting the subtly restored interior and walking round the Tudor Garden which is taking shape.

· 2024: Lavender’s Blue revisit Notre Dame, inspecting the subtly restored exterior only as the doors are shut and walking round the Tudor Garden which is in full bloom.