Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden is a fascinating personal account by Quentin Bell and his daughter Virginia Nicholson of the extraordinary Bloomsbury Group country house, its history and the lives of those who lived in it.
Set in the heart of the Sussex Downs, Charleston Farmhouse is the most important remaining example of Bloomsbury decorative style, created by the painters Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Quentin Bell, the younger son of Clive and Vanessa Bell, and his daughter Virghinia Nicholson, tell the story of this unique house, linking it with some of the leading cultural figures who were invited there, including Vanessa's sister Virginia Woolf, the writer Lytton Strachey, the economist Maynard Keynes and the art critic Roger Fry. The house and garden are portrayed through Alen MacWeeney's atmostpheric photographs; pictures from Vanessa Bell's family album convey the flavour of the household in its heyday.
Angelica Garnett, daughter of Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell, called Charleston 'an earthly paradise'. In this haunting book you can see why. World of Interiors
