Emery Walker was an engraver and printer associated with the revival of fine printing in England in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He became friends with many of the members of the Arts & Crafts Movement and met William Morris, who lived close to him in Hammersmith, in 1883. They shared a passion for books, architecture and design and Walker inspired Morris to set up his famous Kelmscott Press.

A hidden gem, Boston Manor is a fine example of an early seventeenth-century suburban house. Built for Lady Mary Read in 1622-3, the house was purchased in 1670 by James Clitherow, a City merchant and remained in the Clitherow family until 1924 when the estate was sold to the Brentford Urban District Council. It has recently undergone a major programme of restoration which has revealed the many layers of decoration preserved over two centuries which give fascinating insights into changing domestic tastes.

The lecture will provide insights into the development of more sophisticated room arrangements and changing taste in interior decoration from 1600 to 1800. Boston Manor provides a microcosm of changing fashions, with elaborate ceilings and overmantels of strapwork decoration and allegorical themes in the Jacobean age giving way to a more elegant form of living, with reception rooms displaying a range of decorative elements including newly-fashionable wallpapers.

The Stanley Spencer Gallery, housed in a converted Methodist chapel, opened in 1962 and is devoted to the works of Stanley Spencer. The present exhibition The Cookham Brotherhood: The Art of Gilbert and Stanley Spencer celebrates the profound influence that Cookham had on Stanley (1891-1959) and his brother Gilbert 1892-1979) and demonstrates both their unified vision as well as their rivalry.

A day in East Sussex exploring the homes of the American writer, Henry James and the celebrated writer and horticulturist, Christopher Lloyd

The picturesque cottage became popular as a feature within the landscape garden in the late eighteenth century, developing into the vogue for the cottage orné during the Regency period. In the later nineteenth century antiquarians and Arts and Crafts enthusiasts rescued and lovingly restored medieval manor houses, enraptured by their romance, history and atmosphere.

This ambitious and enlightening exhibition charts the trials as well as the triumphs of women artists working in Britain over a period of four hundred years. It celebrates the work of well-known names such as Artemisia Gentileschi, Angelica Kauffman, Julia Margaret Cameron and Gwen John as well as revealing the work of those who have been all but forgotten.

This exhibition explores the history of the tea trade in Europe and the popularity of the drink from its introduction in the mid-seventeenth century to the present day. Fine silver objects from The Chitra Collection, a remarkable private museum of historic tea wares, will be seen alongside loans from the Pearson Silver Collection and the Goldsmiths’ Company.

Samuel Johnson’s China contagion reflects the fevered enthusiasm for tea drinking and the accompanying social discourse in the eighteenth century. The lecture will explore the fascinating history of tea-drinking in England from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries.

The Faringdon Collection was formed by Gavin, 2nd Lord Faringdon, the owner of Buscot Park. He purchased the early nineteenth-century townhouse in Brompton Square in 1953 and restored it as a private house. In contrast to the Palladian formality of Buscot, the London house was a blank canvas on which he was able to bring his strong decorative sense to bear, filling it with artworks and furnishings that reflected his eclectic taste and love of the unusual.

Gainsborough’s house, the childhood home of Thomas Gainsborough, has recently re-opened following a major building and renovation project to create a new gallery space celebrating Gainsborough’s work as well as a splendid new exhibition space.

Suffolk, its landscape and people, its towns and industry has provided inspiration to artists from Thomas Gainsborough and John Constable to Cedric Morris in the twentieth century. The lecture will explore the history of Sudbury, its silk industry and the artists who worked in this county.

The Holland Park area in the late nineteenth century became a favourite place for artists, writers and intellectuals, with many subsequently settling there. Leighton House and ,Sambourne House are very different but equally fascinating examples of the artist-house.

Artist houses of the later nineteenth century provide a fascinating glimpse of the personalities involved, the architecture and Victorian decoration and design. The lectures will provide a background to the studio houses of the Holland Park area and the fashionable Aesthetic interior of the 1880s made popular by the many books and magazines published at that time and influenced by the work of James McNeill Whistler, Walter Crane, William Morris and Owen Jones.

The Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn is one of the four medieval societies of lawyers known as the Inns of Court. The precise date of its foundation is unknown but its earliest records, known as the Black Books, date to 1422. . The Inn probably takes its name from Henry de Lacy, third Earl of Lincoln who appears to have been the Inn's patron, and whose own house was close by in Shoe Lane.

Lincoln’s Inn is the earliest of the four Inns of Court which gradually came to provide all that was needed for lawyers to practice at the Bar. There developed chambers to live and work in, a hall for eating and drinking, a chapel or church and a library.

The lecture will explore the fascinating history of the Inns of Court and trace the architectural development of Lincoln’s Inn and its surrounding buildings..

“The Cities of London and Westminster were again last night in a blaze of loyal illuminations …. in honour of his Majesty’s most happy recovery”. So reported The Times on 25th April 1789. Spectacular illuminations are explored in this fascinating exhibition which brings to life these magnificent displays which were such a popular form of entertainment in the later Georgian period.

This vibrant exhibition shows how developments in science and industrial technology, including the discovery of bright synthetic dyes in the 1850s resulted in an explosion of colour that was embraced by artists and designers and all classes of society. Vivid coloured textiles and fashion, brightly printed posters, wallpapers, ceramics all dispel the notion that Victorian Britain was a gloomy and grimy age.

This splendid exhibition celebrates the work of Willem Van de Velde the Elder and Younger, famous throughout seventeenth-century Europe as marine draughtsmen and painters

This major exhibition, held in Luton which dominated the British hat industry from the nineteenth century onwards, presents a stunning array of hats from around the world and explores the multiple purposes and significance of headwear over the centuries. Over two hundred hats ranging from the practical and purposeful to the whimsical and exotic reveal how headwear has been used both to protect and transform the wearer.

Farleys House was purchased in 1949 by the American photographer, Lee Miller and Surrealist artist Roland Penrose and over the next thirty-five years they built up a remarkable collection of contemporary art. he special visit to Zenzie Tinker Conservation Studio will look at the newly discovered collection of Lee Miller's clothes being conserved for the forthcoming exhibition in Brighton

This major exhibition, held in Luton which dominated the British hat industry from the nineteenth century onwards, presents a stunning array of hats from around the world and explores the multiple purposes and significance of headwear over the centuries. Over two hundred hats ranging from the practical and purposeful to the whimsical and exotic reveal how headwear has been used both to protect and transform the wearer.

This visit to Strawberry Hill will concentrate on spectacular objets d’art from The Schroder Collection in this special exhibition, Treasures from Faraway: Medieval and Renaissance Objects. These are displayed in Horace Walpole’s ‘state rooms’ - alongside are old master paintings currently on loan from the Dulwich Picture Gallery

The Augustinian priory and its hospital were founded in Smithfield in 1123 by Rahere, a courtier of Henry I. St Bartholomew the Great is all that survives of the priory but St Bartholomew’s Hospital, with its architecturally important buildings, has provided continuous medical care on the site that it was originally built on.

The Augustinian priory and hospital of St Bartholomew was founded in Smithfield in 1123 by Rahere, a courtier of Henry I. The lecture will explore the fascinating history of Rahere’s foundations and the long and colourful history of Smithfield.

The visit will explore the rich history of Rochester in Kent with visits to the Huguenot Museum, which traces the fascinating history of Huguenot enterprise in England, and the splendid Restoration House with its long history dating back to the medieval period.

Following a major redevelopment at the RCM, this delightful museum displays highlights from the College’s renowned collections of musical instruments, scores and portraits. These include a dated guitar of 1581, the earliest known stringed keyboard instrument – a clavicytherium – of 1480, a harpsichord by Alessandro Trasuntino of 1531 and a remarkable collection of English viols.