In this groundbreaking work, Clive Aslet brings us face to face with the personalities, technologies, industries, and histories that have shaped the English domestic house. The journey begins at Clive’s family home in 19th-century London, from where we peer out at the back-breaking business of brick-making and the gory executions at Tyburn. He then takes us to 20 houses around England, each throwing open a window onto a different period of history. From the imaginative wooden house a Marlborough silk merchant built for himself after 1653’s Great Fire, to a populist row of flat-roofed prefabs on the outskirts of Amersham in 1947, Clive explores how the basic concept of "home" has evolved through the years. On the grander end of the spectrum we meet "house as metaphor, house as art" at colossal Elveden Hall in Suffolk, a glittering tribute to the Taj Mahal that nearly bankrupted the original India owner, and the Butterfly House in Surrey, a 21st century glass-and-fibers homage to nature and a glimpse at the future of housing.

In this groundbreaking work, Clive Aslet brings us face to face with the personalities, technologies, industries, and histories that have shaped the English domestic house. The journey begins at Clive’s family home in 19th-century London, from where we peer out at the back-breaking business of brick-making and the gory executions at Tyburn. He then takes us to 20 houses around England, each throwing open a window onto a different period of history. From the imaginative wooden house a Marlborough silk merchant built for himself after 1653’s Great Fire, to a populist row of flat-roofed prefabs on the outskirts of Amersham in 1947, Clive explores how the basic concept of "home" has evolved through the years. On the grander end of the spectrum we meet "house as metaphor, house as art" at colossal Elveden Hall in Suffolk, a glittering tribute to the Taj Mahal that nearly bankrupted the original India owner, and the Butterfly House in Surrey, a 21st century glass-and-fibers homage to nature and a glimpse at the future of housing.