22 January 2020

31A-Grove-End-Road-6-580x380

This studio, at 31A Grove End Road, St John’s Wood in North London, might be one’s dream room: ‘Studio, built c1926 by Thomas Tait, an early exponent of Modernism in Britain, in the garden of the family home of the sculptor Sir William Reid Dick. Reid Dick was a personal friend of Tait, and his work is seen at Unilever House and Selfridges by Tait and his partner, Sir John Burnet. Tait’s sculpture is also incorporated into the fabric of the studio and the garden. In 1974 the architects Colin St John Wilson and Mary Jane Long bought the building, restoring and adapting it as a family home. During this time they were working on their major commission, the British Library.’ (And, yes, the reader has no idea if here partner means business or romantic, you can’t be too careful with words.) Notice the Thonet bentwood chair by the piano –  we can’t have had any Thonet on the Post for, well, months – maybe we need some next week.