One minute it was Memorial Day and the next it is almost back to school, two films worth watching, Victorian London done right and a woman who builds Scotland from cardboard.
Summer seems to be flying by. One minute it was Memorial Day and the unofficial start to summer, and the next it is almost time for back to school. My late mother-in-law Betty used to say that time flies the older you get, so savor it. She was right, as she usually was.
This summer, even though I have been lamenting the heat, I find myself wishing it would slow down just a little. My summer list is lagging behind. But the time with family and friends has been the best part. New Orleans, the Outer Banks, places in between. Those memories are etched on my mind in the way that only summer memories seem to be. The heat I could do without. The rest I would keep forever.
Kim and I have lots to share this week. Let’s meander.
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At the Cinema
500 Miles is the film I have been waiting for. Two brothers, Finn and Charlie, overhear their parents planning to separate and do what any clear-thinking child would do: run away from home in Yorkshire and travel, by train, bus, ferry and occasionally horseback, to find their estranged grandfather on the wild west coast of Ireland in Dingle, County Kerry. Bill Nighy plays the grandfather, and reviewers say he does some of the finest work of his career in this film, telling you everything you need to know with his eyes. Maisie Williams plays the free-spirited busker who helps them along the way, and by all accounts she is wonderful. It is a road movie and a love letter to Ireland and a story about family and forgiveness.
Don’t Let the Dogs Go Tonight is a very different kind of film. Based on Alexandra Fuller’s memoir, actor-director Embeth Davidtz tells the story through the eyes of eight-year-old Bobo, growing up in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, as the country moves toward its pivotal 1980 election and the end of white rule. It is a story about the collapse of colonialism seen through the clear, uncomprehending eyes of a child who knows only the world he has always known. Quiet, unsettling and beautifully made.
Home Tours
Two this week, both completely different from one another.
Danny’s Late Victorian Home in London. He bought the house in 2023 with a simple plan: move in, do a bit of wallpapering, take it room by room. Then the plaster started coming off the walls and what followed was a full strip back to brick. A year of planning and then restoration: Victorian cornicing reinstated, a plaster head cleaned of decades of paint, the original staircase brought back, a working gas fireplace fully restored. Alongside all of that, doors, a green quartzite island and a zinc-clad extension. Heritage and modern living together without an interior designer in sight. If you love Victorian renovations done properly this one is for you.
Merrydowns is a remote and rural farmhouse in the peaceful Maine countryside, more than 150 years old, full of charm and character. A complete contrast to the London Victorian and a perfect summer watch.
One More Thing
Two more that I could not leave out.
Karen Bones works in a tiny garden shed in Scotland and turns recycled cardboard into intricate portraits of the country’s most characterful buildings, some of which no longer exist. Legendary pubs. Cottages that could have stepped out of Outlander. Stone buildings full of grit and history. She rebuilds them brick by brick, in miniature, in cardboard, with complete love and imperfection and life.
Why British Aristocrats Are Purposely Letting Their Estates Go Wild is fascinating. The British countryside has lost half its native plant and animal species since the industrial revolution, stripped by centuries of intensive farming and drainage. Now a group of historic estates, including Mapperton House, Elmore Court and Castle Howard, are doing something radical: surrendering control back to nature. Massive horned cattle brought in to graze. Ancient forest management techniques revived. Ecosystems that vanished thousands of years ago being slowly coaxed back. It turns out that messy is better. That doing less is harder than it sounds. And that some of the most important conservation work happening in Britain right now is taking place behind the gates of ancestral homes.
Before you go, tell me: is your summer flying by too? And what have been the best moments so far? Leave a note in the comments.
Don’t forget to visit Kim at Northern California Style. We always have lots to share.
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Have a wonderful weekend, friends.
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