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Architects Architecture Art Country Houses Luxury People

The Baglianis + Gaultier Lodge Woodstown Waterford

Townland and Country

Gaultier Lodge Front Garden © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Bastardstown, Cheekpoint, Mooncoin, Passenger East, Priesthaggard… Names, names, such memorable names. Say them with a cut glass accent. Only in Waterford, the civilised southeast coast of Ireland. Geography is close, history closer. Everything is near water, everyone remembers generations past. Land of Molly Keane. Nowhere is more horse and hounds than Gaultier Lodge (pronounced “Gol-teer”) thanks to its country pursuits loving owners, Sheila and Bill Bagliani. Animal motifs abound, on potpourri sachets, coasters, wallpaper friezes, upholstery, saltshakers, pepper grinders, paintings (there’s an artist in residence – Sheila), even wine glasses. “We’re a bit obsessional!” jokes Sheila.

2 Gaultier Lodge Entrance Front © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge may have been referred to in Victorian times as “Gaultier Cottage” but don’t be misled by its reticent exterior. This is a sophisticated design befitting its former status as a hunting lodge of the Earl of Huntingdon. Four rooms span the original beach front, linked by a tripartite gallery along the entrance front. The middle two rooms are deeper with more ornate mantelpieces and cornices. Now the drawing room and dining room, they are interconnected by a vast pair of panelled doors. In the middle of the gallery is a square vestibule with symmetrical openings. Twin sets of doors include a false door for visual harmony. A guest bedroom bookends either extremity of the beach front.

1 Gaultier Lodge Entrance Porch © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

The hand of a master is at work. His name is John Roberts, the architect who designed much of 18th century Waterford City and worked on Curraghmore, the Marquess and Marchioness of Waterford’s stately home. Never has a piano nobile been more appropriate. The raised ground floor provides breathtaking views across Woodstown’s unspoiled golden strand to a Knights Templar church on the opposite side of the Waterford Channel. “Thank goodness low tide goes out 2.5 kilometres,” says Sheila. “Otherwise we’d be as developed as Tramore.”

1 Gaultier Lodge Pillars © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

In the early 1900s a two bay bedroom wing was added – no country house, however miniature, should be without one. And a porch. “We’ve done our best to dress up the plain porch,” she continues, “with pillars and sash windows.” A pleasant colonial appearance is the result. The coastline was damaged by the Lisbon Tsunami of 1755. Gaultier Lodge was built four decades later. A photo dated 1870 shows the retaining wall along the beach part concealing the lower ground floor. “A storm has since washed away the mound of rabbit burrows against the wall. Last winter another storm flattened our greenhouse and blew 100 slates off the roof.” There’s a price to be paid for the beauty of proximity to nature. Not that it’s apparent, on a long spring evening sipping wine on the lawn watching the remains of the day.

1 Gaultier Lodge Entrance Front © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

2 Gaultier Lodge Beach Front © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

1 Gaultier Lodge Beach Front © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge from the Beach © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge Driveway © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

1 Gaultier Lodge Garden © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge Garden © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge Beach © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge Bedroom View © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Gaultier Lodge View © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

“Historic houses are like horses,” declares Sheila. “They’re expensive to run!” That hasn’t stopped the Baglianis buying another one on the opposite side of Ireland. “Castle ffrench was the home of Percy French. Maurice Craig compares it to Bonnettstown in his book Classic Irish Houses of the Middling Sizes. All the original furniture was sold but we’ve bought suitable pieces, many from the US.” Sheila and Bill also own a stud in North Carolina, suitably called Castle French Farm.

Gaultier Lodge Entrance Hall © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

The fire roars. Frequently read books on the country and houses and country houses and country house owners and lovers of country houses and country house owners’ lovers pile high on occasional tables. “When I used to go to Mount Juliet, it was just like the famous Colman’s Mustard advert, where the butler is sent back from the hunt to get mustard for a guest’s sandwich. The butler really did cater to every whim,” recalls Sheila. Bats noiselessly swoop in eternal graceless circles across the lawn while inside dinner is attentively served. Red onion and goat’s cheese tart is followed by monkfish with salad on the side, an American touch. The hallmark of Gaultier Lodge cooking is fresh country produce, layered with taste, such as the carrots soaked in butter and citrus. Gin and tonic sorbet – what’s not to love? Pudding is Italian carrot cake “baked with ground almond instead of flour to make it lighter”.

Gaultier Lodge Cornice © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

Woodstown has always been famed for its decadent high end hospitality. In 1967 newly widowed Jackie Kennedy and her children Caroline and John stayed at nearby Woodstown House. The Daily Herald breathlessly reported, “Woodstown House, about seven miles from Waterford City, where the Kennedys will stay during their visit is one of the most beautiful residences in the area, known for its gracious mansions… Mrs Kennedy will occupy the main bedroom which is toned in a predominantly dark blue colour.”

Gaultier Lodge Breakfast © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

It keeps going, “The Woodstown area itself probably carries the greatest concentration of Anglo Irish blue bloods in the country and the social whirl runs at a pretty fast pace. Among her neighbours in the county will be the Duke of Devonshire who owns Lismore Castle and the Marquess of Waterford who lives at Portlaw.” Another temporary resident in the 1960s was Jack Profumo who decided to lie low at Ballyglan, his brother’s house across the road from Gaultier Lodge. Names, names, such memorable names.

Gaultier Lodge Carrot Cake © lvbmag.com Stuart Blakley

 

Categories
Art Design Luxury

Royal Mint 2014 Chinese Lunar Coin + Wuon-Gean Ho

The Whole of the Moon

Artist Wuon-Gean Ho © lvbmag.com

Like a scene from the movie Night at the Museum, the V+A is transformed as darkness falls. A rainbow of lights sends the angels in the architecture spinning in infinity to the melody of a violin quartet. Mere mortals fill the echoing marble halls below, indulging in stilton cheese on lotus oat crisps; scallops on a bed of seashells; vermicelli coated prawn sticks dipped in wasabi mayo; and Earl Grey macaroons. Psychedelic cocktails reflect the lights.

1 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

It’s the launch of the 2014 Chinese Lunar Year of the Horse coin by Royal Mint. A trained vet turned artist, Wuon-Gean Ho explains, “I have this dual heritage. I feel incredibly lucky! I grew up in Chinese culture but trawled antique shops and art galleries around Oxford where I lived.” Experienced in a range of media, Wuon-Gean won the commission to design the UK’s first legal lunar coin. “I made my first print when I was 12 years old. It was a linocut of a cat!”

2 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

“As a vet you have to observe animals closely,” she says. “I also drew horses at stables in Hackney. My dad is a vet. It is possible to get considerable detail on a coin design. Just think of the Queen’s head on the obverse side of the coin which even shows her earrings! I wanted the strong image of the horse in the foreground with the Uffington White Horse in Oxfordshire subtly placed behind.” Wuon-Gean holds a BA in History of Art from Cambridge. Her reverse coin design is the first of 12 zodiac animals to be featured in the Royal Mint’s Shēngxiào Collection. Prices range from £82.50 for the silver one ounce coin up to £1,950 for the gold one ounce.

3 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

4 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

5 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

6 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

Shane Bissett, Royal Mint’s Director of Commemorative Coin, emphasises the coin’s importance: “This is in effect a piece of public art with a likely circulation of 40 years. The Royal Mint’s Chinese Lunar coins lend a unique British angle to an ancient tradition. At Lunar New Year gifts and tokens are often exchanged, particularly money in red envelopes. This symbolises good wishes for the recipient’s health, wealth and prosperity.” Shane was previously responsible for growing Waterford Crystal’s UK market share: “I brought this experience of working with another heritage brand to Royal Mint.”

7 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

Wuon-Gean doesn’t think the Chinese community has that high a profile in London. “It’s best known for food,” she observes. It should, in her case, also be known for art. Capturing equine movement in millimetres is no mean feat. As for coins in envelopes, all are welcome at Lavender’s Blue. Usual address.

8 Royal Mint 2014 Lunar Year of the Horse © lvbmag.com

Categories
Design Hotels Luxury People

John Rocha + Waterford Crystal

Through a Glass, Darkly

John Rocha © Stuart Blakley

We caught up with our fellow honorary compatriot John Rocha at The London Edition. Yes, the hotel everyone is raving about with good reason. He was celebrating 15 years of creative glassware collaborations with Waterford Crystal. “I’m busy designing three hotels at the moment,” he told us. John and his studio are still based in Dublin – he lives in Leeson Park – and he flits between the Irish capital and London. “Most of my family now live in London,” says John. He’s also currently designing a chapel in the south of France, a monastic Zen-meets-Shaker alchemy of light and shadow. What’s his key to success? “I design houses I want to live in; I design hotels I want to stay in.” And presumably chapels he wants to pray in.