In the last blog I showed you the ground floor of Smallhythe Place, so time to go upstairs.....
The picture above is of Ellen Terry playing Lady MacBeth in 1888. The painting was done by John Singer Sargent in 1889. The dress is very famous as it was made using iridescent beetle shells sewn on to a crochet background. The dress itself is usually on show in Smallhythe Place but sadly it was 'on tour' while we were there.
However the headdress above was on show, and below are some examples of material used in the dress, and some of the beetle shells. 1000 shells were used in the original garment.
These items are under glass, so not easy to photograph, but they do give some idea of how the dress must look.
The photo below shows a Chinese dress alongside a beautiful dress which Ellen Terry wore as Beatrice in @Much ago About Nothing'
The dresses above and below were worn by Ellen Terry in her role as 'Beatrice' in the play 'Much Ado About Nothing'. Note the gorgeous shoes as well the amazing dresses
I love the fan in this case :)
A Japanese costume and below a close up of the embroidery on the coat (?) at the back.
Viking jewellry :)
Ellen Terry's dressing table
A corner of the bedroom.
The bedroom showing the bed and dressing table.
Another selection of lovely pieces, mainly Oriental pieces.
After a refreshing cup of tea in the tea room we walked through to the theatre which is housed in a barn.
What a lovely theatre, it is still used for plays etc.
We all had a fantastic time on our visit, and I am sure that if we walked round the house again we would spot lots of things we missed on this visit.
The National Trust have done a fantastic job preserving this house and contents. I think we will be visiting there again :)
No comments:
Post a Comment