When Wrest Park’s Jemima, Marchioness Grey, was widowed, she unleashed her purse strings to install lavish Chinese art across the Bedfordshire estate: perfect for taking tea with friends. 

You can get lost in the intricate birds, plants and people featured in Wrest Park’s Chinese wallpapers, but how was this part of a wider fashion in textiles, design and landscaping?  

Dr Andrew Hann and volunteer Richard Luscombe join writer and comedian Amy Matthews to find out how trade between Europe and China started a centuries long love affair with Chinese design and textiles, and how consumer demand and exotic ideals were used by skilled manufacturers to develop the Chinoiserie style we still enjoy in our clothes, homewares and furnishings today.  

You can plan your visit to see Wrest Park and its Chinese wallpapers at https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/wrest/  

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