Friday 23rd to Sunday 25th August 2024
We spent the weekend attending the annual exhibition of the Camping and Caravanning Club, Photographic Group which was held at Princes Risborough School. We stayed on the car park.
The club held a successful exhibition with more than 300 entries including prints and projected digital images. The independent judge was Chris Palmer FRPS EFIAP DPAGB APAGB.
Princes Risborough
Princes Risborough is a pleasant, small market town on the edge of the Chiltern Hills.
Although we stayed in the town, we used it more as a base to explore further afield.
There is some very nice property in this area, including this house which we passed when out on our bikes:
Waddesdon Manor
Waddesdon Manor is a huge and beautiful French Renaissance-style château, built in the 19th century for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild as a weekend residence for entertaining and to house his collection of art and antiquities.
In the early 20th century, the Rothschild family owned 42 large houses across Europe. Waddesdon Manor is now owned by the National Trust, but is managed by the Rothschild Foundation. There are many extremely valuable art works in the house, including works by Canaletto and Gainsborough.
There is a recurring theme of birds in the various collections, including an aviary with many beautiful and exotic exhibits:
The bird theme is echoed in the grounds:
…but it is not all birds. This Asian elephant family was made in Tamil Nadu, India out of an invasive plant, and brought to the UK to highlight the problems of over population and loss of habitat for them.
The stables building also makes a statement and is now used as the National Trust shop and cafe:
In the house, there is an amazing array of artworks displayed in extremely opulent settings:
Throughout the house there are many antique desks, most are very ornate and valuable, but none more so than this French example:
The bird theme continues in the porcelain collection, which is huge and extremely valuable:
The boat-shaped porcelain dish below is worth tens of millions of pounds. There were only a few of them made. There are three of them in the house, each with a unique design.
On the third floor, there are many Rothschild family treasures on display:
There are also some more modern items in the collection, as with this chandelier, made of broken crockery:
Hughenden
Hughenden was the home of Benjamin Disraeli, a politician in the time of Queen Victoria. He was twice Prime Minister and three times Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Although not a complete contrast to Waddesdon Manor, Hughenden is on a much more comfortable scale and was clearly a home, albeit one where many VIPs were entertained, including, on one occasion, Queen Victoria.
Disraeli and Queen Victoria had a close working relationship based on trust and friendship. After his death, Victoria visited the house for a second time, spending some time in his library alone. As he did not have a state funeral, protocol dictated that she did not attend it.
Benjamin Disraeli died on 27th February 1882 and is buried in a family plot against the wall of the local church with his wife, Mary Anne, who predeceased him. Queen Victoria commissioned a memorial inside the church, which makes it clear that she held him in high regard.
The church is very old and ornately decorated. Some elements are medieval, such as the font.
"See-u-Later" 