The Houses of Guinness : The Lives, Homes and Fortunes of the Great Brewing Dynasty – 9781785516078

Tinniswood has created a tome of architectural brilliance, uncomfortable historical truths, and a complicated legacy of power and philanthropy.’ – The Irish TimesStep inside the historic homes of the Guinness family and enter a world of power, privilege and palatial living.  The Guinnesses became famous as brewers, philanthropists and socialites, but they also created some of the most distinctive homes in Britain and Ireland, where they lived, loved and entertained in high style.  Royalty was a frequent visitor to Ashford Castle and Elveden Hall. At Luggala Oonagh Guinness welcomed rock stars, actors and artists. At Biddesden Bryan Guinness lived the life of an urbane country squire, while at Kelvedon his cousin Honor left her husband Chips Channon to play the country gentleman while she ran off with her land agent. The family’s Dublin mansions – Farmleigh, St Anne’s and 80 St Stephen’s Green – were a byword for grandeur and opulence. And the Guinnesses spent a fortune buying two spectacular country houses, Kenwood and Castletown, not to live in, but simply to save them from destruction and to give them away.  Adrian Tinniswood, the bestselling historian of the country house, opens the door to castles and mansions that once belonged to the greatest brewing dynasty the world has ever seen. ‘Tinniswood … [is] an erudite historian of country-house life in all its anecdote-worthy vagaries.’ – Financial Times’We are in the company of a confident and skilled historian who understands the mores of his era and wears his learning lightly…’ – Virginia Nicholson, The Times’Few authors can combine serious social history with the sometimes sad and often hilarious narratives of country-house life in the way that Tinniswood can.’ – Jeremy Musson