Castles

Wednesday

Amy Rose Everett

Exploring Edinburgh, from Princes Street to Pitlochry

From our US edition

I’m blinking through floor-to-ceiling windows that perfectly frame a pristine view of Edinburgh Castle, standing magnificent against an improbably cloudless Scottish sky. The elegant writing desk in the Archibald Signature Suite at 100 Princes Street hotel has all the makings of an elevated “work-from-home” set up, but the scenery – and the collection of aged single malt I know to be upstairs – make concentration an uphill battle. This luxury townhouse right on, you guessed it, iconic Princes Street was made for luxuriating, not hunching over laptops. Ducking into the entrance on Princes Street feels exclusive, like knowing a secret.

pitlochry

Thursday

Laura Gascoigne

The art of the pillbox

When Oscar Wilde famously claimed: ‘All art is quite useless’, he may not have had artistic subjects in mind. But it’s certainly true that since the Romantic era, artists have had a special affection for the superannuated. An image of an abandoned building with some sort of past, not necessarily glorious, appeals to our emotions, be it Rachel Whiteread’s ‘House’ or Constable’s ‘Hadleigh Castle’. Even ephemera pre-loved by strangers evoke nostalgia when incorporated in the shadow boxes of Joseph Cornell or the assemblages of Peter Blake. But what about things that are not just obsolete but have never had any use at all? That’s the curious question prompted by a new exhibition at Bodmin Keep, Cornwall’s Army Museum.