Am I the only person to ask for a copy of the biography of Robert Birley for Christmas? I hope so, otherwise there’s another equally sad person in this world

Today is my 33rd birthday and I have just realised that I’ve had my top on inside out all day

I have written some great things this year but this is one of my favourites. For this week’s special Christmas Great Estates, I spent the day at a Trappist monastery – a historic house, yes, but one home to 14 monks with a brewery attached. It was totally amazing www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/b5820b4...

I have written some great things this year but this is one of my favourites. For this week’s special Christmas Great Estates, I spent the day at a Trappist monastery – a historic house, yes, but one home to 14 monks with a brewery attached. It was totally amazing www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/b5820b4...

Have you enjoyed this week’s Patreon episode? 🎧✨ Support the author, and me 📚❤️ by buying a copy of "Heirs and Graces" by @brushingboots.bsky.social through the History Rage Bookshop! 📖 Buy the book: uk.bookshop.org/a/10... Listen now 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #History #Podcast

🚨 THIS WEEK TO PATREON AND APPLE SUBS🚨Wentworth’s destruction wasn’t just architectural — it broke a family. 💔🏰 Hear @brushingboots.bsky.social recount this gripping story on History Rage. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #WentworthWoodhouse #Podcast

🚨 THIS WEEK ON PATREON & APPLE 🚨Mining at Wentworth Woodhouse came terrifyingly close to the back door. ⛏️💥 Hear @brushingboots.bsky.social tell the full story on History Rage. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #WentworthWoodhouse #BritishHistory

🚨 THIS WEEK TO PATREON AND APPLE SUBS🚨Aristocratic power today isn’t in Parliament — it’s in land and legacy. 🌿🏛️ Hear @brushingboots.bsky.social break it down on History Rage. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #SoftPower #Aristocracy #Podcast

🚨 THIS WEEK TO PATREON AND APPLE SUBS🚨TV has shaped our fantasies of aristocratic life… and not always honestly! 📺✨ On History Rage, @brushingboots.bsky.social exposes the gap between drama and reality. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #MediaMyths #BritishHistory #Podcast

🚨 THIS WEEK TO PATREON AND APPLE 🚨 Aristocratic life isn’t the fairytale people imagine. 💼💔 This week on History Rage, @brushingboots.bsky.social reveals the real grind behind the grandeur. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #Aristocracy #RealityCheck #Podcast

I had a fine day out in Bishop Auckland with Jonathan Ruffer, the man who predicted the credit crunch, who was earning the national average wage every six hours in 2015, who could buy Whistlejacket ten times over. This week's Great Estates is on Auckland Palace www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/0d6ac5c...

🚨 THIS WEEK FOR SUBSCRIBERS 🚨 Think the upper class disappeared? Think again! 👀🔥 This week on History Rage, Paul Bavill and @brushingboots.bsky.social uncover how the aristocracy still shapes Britain today. 🎧 www.patreon.com/post... #HistoryRage #Aristocracy #BritishHistory #Podcast

I had a fine day out in Bishop Auckland with Jonathan Ruffer, the man who predicted the credit crunch, who was earning the national average wage every six hours in 2015, who could buy Whistlejacket ten times over. This week's Great Estates is on Auckland Palace www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/0d6ac5c...

🚨NEXT WEEK FOR SUBSCRIBERS🚨 Paul Bavill dives in with journalist & author @brushingboots.bsky.social to rip apart the myths of Britain’s modern aristocracy 🏰🔥 Land, Wentworth Woodhouse, National Trust & what the upper class really looks like Early access: patreon.com/historyrage or Apple subs.

Officially made it now my book has been parodied in Private Eye! And yes this will be going in my downstairs loo. Amazing and hilarious and not at all mean – a bonus!

This week's Great Estates is on Salwey Lodge – a wholesome, wise tale this time, about love, loss and escaping the city for rural Shropshire www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/b68fbb9...

Nice to see that the Desert Fox is now working for DPD

Sweet lord there is someone on this train talking about sovereignty and ‘taking back control’ and suddenly it is 2015 again

Highly recommended. Even I, an Irish socialist, found it engrossing and educational :)

Super excited to say that I’ll be at Hatchards Piccadilly tomorrow signing books for their Christmas customer evening! Come and buy a copy of HEIRS AND GRACES, a history of the modern British aristocracy, from me! It makes a delicious Christmas present www.hatchards.co.uk/events/hatch...

Utterly amazed and delighted to discover that my book HEIRS AND GRACES, a history of the modern British aristocracy, has been named one of the FT's history books of the year! I am positively vibrating with glee – how fabulous! Thank you so much @frederick65.ft.com www.ft.com/content/a7c7...

Bizarre transcribing moment of the morning. Extremely nice interviewee: 'Well done on being left-handed' Me: 'Ah yes, I'm a witch, they should have drowned me'. ????

Utterly amazed and delighted to discover that my book HEIRS AND GRACES, a history of the modern British aristocracy, has been named one of the FT's history books of the year! I am positively vibrating with glee – how fabulous! Thank you so much @frederick65.ft.com www.ft.com/content/a7c7...

New favourite about page. www.vhely-hutchinson.com/about

If you want a challenge, let me recommend to you doing a talk on the history of the British aristocracy to a room full of sixth formers

This week's Great Estates is on Gorhambury, the winner of this year's Georgian Group's restoration prize: how a duke's daughter Rosie Grimston masterminded a generational overhaul of a house that needed lots of love, influenced by her childhood at Floors Castle www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/dd16c66...

This week's Great Estates is on Gorhambury, the winner of this year's Georgian Group's restoration prize: how a duke's daughter Rosie Grimston masterminded a generational overhaul of a house that needed lots of love, influenced by her childhood at Floors Castle www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/dd16c66...

Have to say I didn't think I'd ever be spending a Saturday afternoon reading the rule of St Benedict but hey, here we are. Work as a writer! It's so... random

Beautiful piece by @TimAdamsWrites on the brilliant Observer journalist Rachel Cooke who could write wonderfully about anything, has died tragically young and will be hugely, hugely missed by so many people. observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

Been on a work trip so extraordinary today that I didn’t even take any pictures, truly the marker of greatness (and of a very private interviewee)

Lovely tale from Alec Guinness' time at a Cistercian abbey, bumping into a fellow retreat guest in the corridor

Very pleased to say that I am on the excellent Better Known podcast this week talking about things that should be… better known! And actually I think my choices are quite inspired if I do say so myself betterknown.co.uk/better-known...

It is a mark of how utterly fascinating the next interview that I am due to write up is that I am actively choosing to do the transcribing for it on a Sunday evening. Writing is the best, huh?

The very first hint of the sun today has just come, at this late hour of... 15:43. Great!

Fancy just taking a job at Oxford to get over a bad ex – or school, in this case

This week's Great Estates is on Weston Park – that great house with a genuinely fantastic collection that Richard Bradford gave to the nation in 1986, after so much heartache, and thanks to punitive death duties. Almost 40 years on, how is it doing now? www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/a19cc3d...

This week's Great Estates is on Weston Park – that great house with a genuinely fantastic collection that Richard Bradford gave to the nation in 1986, after so much heartache, and thanks to punitive death duties. Almost 40 years on, how is it doing now? www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/a19cc3d...

Pls no, not Amal Rajan

Saturday at home book(plate) signing for Hatchards! If you want one for your own copy or for one you’re buying someone for Christmas, let me know and I will post you one! I love signing stuff

This is such a generous, lovely essay by Simon Heffer about my book HEIRS AND GRACES and the subject of it, the British aristocracy – in this month's New Criterion. And what a headline! Best headline I've ever seen on this subject, I reckon newcriterion.com/article/lord...

For this week's issue of The Tablet I wrote about one of my favourite subjects: the Catholic aristocracy! Ft an outstanding story from Lord Acton about growing up at Marcham Priory, Lord Mansfield's 1990s kidnapping, and a WW1 fighter ace decried for his religion www.thetablet.co.uk/features/bri...

I just said ‘I’m so so sorry’ to my dog and am now inexplicably thinking about Nick Clegg. It’s amazing what sticks

I should add that for this piece I interviewed my first cardinal – Cardinal Radcliffe – which was an enormous pleasure. He was absolutely fantastic – very thoughtful, very interesting, very calm. Could have talked to him all day. I recommend it to you on that basis alone

I should add that for this piece I interviewed my first cardinal – Cardinal Radcliffe – which was an enormous pleasure. He was absolutely fantastic – very thoughtful, very interesting, very calm. Could have talked to him all day. I recommend it to you on that basis alone

For this week's issue of The Tablet I wrote about one of my favourite subjects: the Catholic aristocracy! Ft an outstanding story from Lord Acton about growing up at Marcham Priory, Lord Mansfield's 1990s kidnapping, and a WW1 fighter ace decried for his religion www.thetablet.co.uk/features/bri...

I interviewed 'the wolf man' Paul Lister, MFI heir and owner of the Alladale estate in Sutherland about bringing wolves back to Scotland, the value of land in the UK, and why rich people like him keep buying estates. It was all quite bonkers and extremely good fun www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/3293012...

I interviewed 'the wolf man' Paul Lister, MFI heir and owner of the Alladale estate in Sutherland about bringing wolves back to Scotland, the value of land in the UK, and why rich people like him keep buying estates. It was all quite bonkers and extremely good fun www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/3293012...

Sunday at the county tip = the innermost circle of hell. People who can't park, half an orchard stuffed in the back of a Ford Focus, TVs being carried by kids. Deliciously awful

Sorry to whoever I mortally wounded in a past life that felt this strongly about my apparently appalling book! Very sorry! Very sorry indeed!

Not giving them up, just not using them. news.sky.com/story/prince...