London’s Malplaquet House is an enormous Cabinet of Curiosities
The Malplaquet House is filled floor-to-ceiling with art, religious artifacts, and natural history specimens.
Regarded as one of the strangest residences in London, Malplaquet House is a 20-room historic mansion built in 1740 for a wealthy merchant. When current owners Tim Knox and Todd Longstaffe-Gowan bought the place from the Spitalfields Trust in 1998 it had not been inhabited in over a century.
They spent the next five years painstakingly restoring Malplaquet House to it’s former glory. Then they filled the house with their vast collections of art, artifacts and natural history specimens.
Love this house! Am not particularly religious, but do find the stained glass window in the bathroom – depicting Christ’s crucifixion – to be a bit much. Each piece of art has its own ethos, which touches on the spirit of a culture, era, or community, as manifested in its beliefs and aspirations. When you show disrespect to a religious artifact, you disrespect more than a particular religion (which is your right of course) you disrespect all of that as well.
I have a very similar house——do you know John Alexander-he was a neighbour of mine Roger Cole