The World of Interiors

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In Edmund de Waal’s THE POT BOOK [ 1 ] (Phaidon rrp £24.95 Wo I

price £22.46)you’ll find a striped Sottsass vase from the 1980s

facing a Song fluted bowl and a Cornish kitchenware teapot co-

sying up to a 13th-century Cypriot betrothal bowl. Why? The

happy accident of the alphabet. From the Art Book onwards

Phaidon has long been the jim-dandy of juxtaposition. Across

history one sees the clay being pulled in two directions – to-

wards the pure minimal clarity of a Lucy Rie bowl or a Shino

sake bottle; or towards ever more elaboration whether that’s

Neoclassical jasperware or George Ohr’s crumpled spattered

vessels. Cross-references help one keep in touch with cousins.

Virtually no English panel paintings survived the Reform-

ation. That makes THE WILTON DIPTYCH [ 2 ] (by Dillian Gordon;

Yale rrp £14.95 Wo I price £14.20) a masterpiece of Inter-

national Gothic all the more special. Dating from 1395-9 this

portable possession of Richard II shows the king kneeling in

front of saints and opposite quite the most adorable golden

choir of angels you’ll ever clap eyes on. This we know. But de-

spite some revealing X-rays undertaken in the 1990s much is

mysterious. Who painted it and why? Is it a gift or an embodi-

ment of Richard’s own exalted idea of kingship? Unpacking the

symbolism of the heavenly host’s broomscod collars and track-

ing down a Medieval secret society the sleuths at the National

Gallery think they may have some answers.

If you think cartography is limited to the lay of the land

MAP: EXPLORING THE WORLD [ 3 ] (Phaidon rrp £39.95 Wo I price

£35.96) will make you think again. Yes there are plenty of

classics here – James Cook’s charting of his Pacific Ocean ad-

ventures say or Mercator’s brilliant 16th-century geometric

projection flattening the globe like so much orange peel. But

whether rendered on sealskin clay tablet or computer screen

maps can capture almost any spatial or topological relation-

ship. Here you can visualise the densities of Facebook friends

round the world the migration patterns of birds in the Americas

and the spread of cholera in Victorian London.

‘Maddened’ by the demolition of a Thomas Telford junction

house banking dynasts John and Christian Smith set up the

Landmark Trust in 1964. Intended to protect Britain’s heritage

its self-sustaining idea was to rent out the properties it rescued to

the public. Here that includes a Lundy lighthouse an Italianate

train station and a Mackintosh house in Perth shire. The chron-

ological LANDMARK: A HISTORY OF BRITAIN IN 50 BUILDINGS [ 4 ] (by

Anna Keay and Caroline Stanford; Frances Lincoln rrp £25 Wo I

price £23.75) charts developments such as the fall of Cardinal

Wolsey defending against the Napoleonic invasion and the

coming of the railways. Woven into this patchwork island story

is a cogent account of evolving conservation practice.

Generous glazing! Sliding partitions! Community spirit!

Concrete! In MODERNIST ESTATES: THE BUILDINGS AND THE PEOPLE

WHO LIVE IN THEM TODAY [ 5 ] (by Stefi Orazi; Frances Lincoln rrp

£25 Wo I price £23.75) which grew out of a blog a new breed of

design-savvy urbanite gives two fingers to the dominant nar-

rative about postwar high-density low-cost housing. You know

the crumbling vermin-infested sink estates with their pissy lifts

and ‘corridors in the sky’ offering escape routes for criminals...

Admittedly many of these places such as Isokon and Barbican

are quite high-spec and most are in London – but even the

once-infamous Byker estate in Newcastle and Sheffield’s Park

Hill have now it seems become sought-after $

All titles can be ordered for the prices indicated (plus £5.50 UK p&p) from the World of Interiors Bookshop on 0871 911 1747

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