EDWIN LUTYENS AND NEW DELHI - AN IDEAL GARDEN CITY ppt

EDWIN LUTYENS AND NEW DELHI - AN IDEAL GARDEN CITY With Louise Nicholson and Candia Lutyens Saturday March 9 – Saturday March 16, 2013 Government House, today Rastrapathi Bhawan, Luty

EDWIN LUTYENS AND NEW DELHI

- AN IDEAL GARDEN CITY

With Louise Nicholson and Candia Lutyens

Saturday March 9 – Saturday March 16, 2013

Government House, today Rastrapathi Bhawan, Lutyens’s centrepiece for New Delhi

When Edwin Lutyens won the commission to build a new capital for the British Empire’s jewel, his aim was to create a garden city ‘with room for endless expansion’ He did just that The city has expanded to be the capital of the world’s largest democracy, while its spacious core of immaculately designed and executed landmark government and civic buildings throb with activity, making New Delhi arguably the most successful planned city of the 20th century

On our journey we have the great good fortune to be accompanied by Lutyens’s granddaughter Candia Lutyens, who

will share insights and family stories Together we explore the India Lutyens arrived into, his views on the sub-continent’s 4,000-year-old cultural heritage, and what impressed him enough to be incorporated into his great design

We learn about the British government’s aspirations for their new capital and how Lutyens rebelled against them – even cheekily changing the location of the new city after the foundation stone had been laid by the King-Emperor George V! We see what his team of architects contributed, the scandals during the city’s creation, his breakfast

meetings with the horticulturalist who advised on which trees should line each avenue

During our Delhi days we go behind the closed doors of Lutyens’s masterpiece Government House (Rastrapathi

Bhawan, government permitting) and other buildings rarely open to the public We meet with historians, curators,

conservationists, botanists, gardeners and other specialists who maintain New Delhi’s integrity today We see public buildings, private buildings and monuments And we consider how Lutyens’s new city was received at the time and its later influence in India and globally Leaving Delhi, we then travel in the footsteps of Lutyens and, with his copious letters to quote from, visit Agra’s Mughal masterpieces, Gwalior’s great medieval fort and Datia’s Rajput palace

I do hope you will join Candia and myself on this remarkable study tour If a week is too short, we are happy to work with each traveler to create a tailor-made extension before or after it, to any part of the sub-continent

With best wishes, Louise

About Louise Nicholson Louise studied for her MA in History of Art at Edinburgh In London, she worked for The Victorian Society conservation body and was a founder of The Thirties Society (now the 20th Century Society) She became a specialist

in Indian and Islamic art at Christie’s, then an arts journalist on The Times where she had a weekly column throughout the Festival of India Her two dozen books include award winning guides to India; she was associate producer on Channel 4’s acclaimed six-part series, The Great Moghuls She has been leading trips to India for 27 years

Louise lives in New York Please visit www.louisesindia.com

About Candia Lutyens Candia Lutyens, granddaughter of Sir Edwin Lutyens, studied for her MA in PPE at Oxford and is married to Paul Peterson, an architect Together they founded Lutyens Furniture & Lighting in 1988 and have assiduously researched Lutyens’s drawings and surviving furniture to bring a renewed appreciation of his iconic designs and flawless details

Their bespoke pieces made by traditional craftsmen are considered museum quality

Candia lives in France Please visit www.lutyens-furniture.com

THE ITINERARY

Lutyens inspecting building progress by elephant

Deluxe rooms

Today is gathering day: met from your international flight, escorted to your hotel (40-60 minute

drive) and assisted with check-in Your room is available from noon today Should you wish to arrive in

advance to acclimatize, we can book these arrangements

Late this afternoon, an introduction to the tour

Our hotel: located right inside Lutyens’s core plan and inspired by its surroundings, the 1950s hotel has recently been beautifully and sensitively renovated www.claridges.com

Should you wish to upgrade your room, or stay at the lavish Imperial hotel, please ask LN for details Note: breakfasts and lunches are included in the The Tour starting tomorrow, March 10; the only dinner included is Monday March 11 gala dinner)

Depart early for a full and busy day touring the city

Morning: An overview of the historic Delhi cities that Lutyens was familiar with We visit Lal Kot, the earliest of several sultanate cities, and the Mughal emperor Humuyun’s fine garden tomb and nearby Purana Qila They are adjacent to the Sufi village of Nizamuddin - the oldest living area of Delhi and a main reason cities were repeatedly built here, another being their strategic position protecting India from invaders through the Hindu Khush

A break for coffee

We go north to New Delhi’s immediate predecessor, Old Delhi, inaugurated in 1658 when its builder, the Mughal emperor Shah Jehan, brought the capital of Northern India back here from Agra where

it has been for about 250 years We walk through the Red Fort and take bicycle rickshaws through Old Delhi city

Lunch is at the Maidens hotel, where Lutyens lived while working in Delhi

Afternoon: See the British cantonment and its surviving 18th and 19th century buildings, in particular St James’s church Continue north to the site of the enormous 1911 Durbar, where on December

12 the King-Emperor George V announced to 562 rulers that the capital of British India was to move from Calcutta (Kolkata) to Delhi The site would be right there – until Lutyens decided otherwise

We end the day with a visit to Imperial hotel, where New Delhi’s inauguration ball was held in 1932 The builders still own the hotel and the public rooms are hung with their remarkable collection of Company School paintings and prints, including, appropriately, many fascinating ones exhibited in the 1911 bar

We embark on our in-depth exploration the heart of Lutyens’s design for New Delhi, looking at plans, inspirations, exteriors and interiors of buildings including furnishings This will include Raj Path (Royal Way) punctuated by Lutyens’s India Gate memorial (visit), and Herbert Baker’s circular Parliament House (visit) and, up Raisina Hill, his North and South Blocks (visit)

The climax of our day: a detailed visit to Lutyens’s masterpiece, Government House (Rastrapathi Bhawan) and its Gertrude Jekyll-inspired Mughal Gardens and estate, its staff and carers

Note: this and some other visits today are dependent on government permission; our schedule, including lunch, will need to fit with those

We return to Claridges to prepare for our gala dinner at the renovated Imperial hotel (1933-35) designed by Reginald Bloomfield

Preceding the dinner, cocktails (direct payment) are in the Imperial’s aptly named 1911 bar which

displays the Delhi Durbar pictures; more of the hotel owner’s fine collection of Company School paintings and prints are displayed throughout the ground floor Dinner is in Daniels restaurant, where we are joined

by four or five New Delhi specialists and toast New Delhi’s inauguration on February 9, 1931 Dinner

included in The Tour

We broaden our exploration of New Delhi, looking at buildings and townscapes by Lutyens, Baker and the whole team of architects including included J A Brodie, G S C Swinton, and R T Russell (who designed more than 4,000 residences and civic buildings including Connaught Place shopping mall inspired by Bath And we look closely at the horticultural landscaping by Kew-trained William Robertson Mustoe and W S George, to transform desert scrub into a lush garden city of blossoming avenues

Our stops will include H E N Medd’s two churches, Church of the Redemption and Church of the Sacred Heart, and we hope to visit Arthur Shoosmith’s Garrison Church of St Martin (visit) We shall see Lodi Gardens (where Lutyens was obliged to incorporate medieval tombs into his grand plan), the High Courts, Princes Circle including Jaipur House (now the National Gallery of Modern Art) and Hyderabad

House (now used government entertaining, visit dependent on government permission), and the National

Museum We visit some original bungalows, such as Indira Gandhi’s museum-home and the Birla home (where Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated)

Early to bed! (see tomorrow)

Deluxe room

Today we go south from Delhi, to visit sites the Lutyens visited when he was researching India’s historic buildings – and about which he wrote with great frankness in his letters and diaries

Very early this morning, we board the train to Agra, departing 06.00hrs, arriving at Agra 08.00hrs

(This is the only daily service; and driving takes 5-6 hours) Today we see some of the great Mughal

buildings created by Akbar (r.1556-1605), his son Jehangir (r.1605-27) and his grandson Shah Jehan (r.1627-58)

We drive straight to Fatehpur Sikri (pausing for coffee/snacks en route) to see Akbar’s ideal palace-city, a collection of ravishing, exquisitely carved red sandstone buildings

Lunch nearby

Return to Agra, cross the Yamuna river and visit the Tomb of Itimad ud Daula, entirely inlaid with coloured stones, and a recently rediscovered Mughal garden, Mehtab Bagh, where we enjoy a beautiful sunset view of the Taj Mahal – until recently, most people saw the Taj from either the river itself or from this bank

Our hotel: part of the quality Oberoi hotel group, contemporary, rooms arranged around a central

courtyard, efficient staff www.oberoihotels.com

Superior rooms

Worth getting up early to experience sunrise at Taj Mahal, Shah Jehan’s wall garden tomb for his wife, Mumtaz, and exploring the whole complex in the soft morning light

Breakfast at our hotel

We visit Agra Fort, India’s greatest riverside fort, started by Akbar, with additions by Jehangir and Shah Jahan And we visit the craftsmen who today make pietra dura inlay work as it was made for the Taj Mahal and Agra Fort

After lunch, we drive south to Gwalior, arriving in time to visit the 1874 palace extravaganza designed by Lieut Col Sir Michael Filose for the Anglophile Gaekwad (ruler) of Gwalior

Our hotel: Built as the palace for the maharaja of Gwalior’s guests, this is a delightful, modest, renovated Art Deco country house www.tajhotels.com

Morning visit to the extensive medieval Gwalior Fort that Lutyens admired – built on a bluff above the city, with fort, nearby Hindu temples, Sikh pilgrimage gurdwara, monumental Jain sculptures, and a palace built for Jehangir’s visit

After early lunch, drive south to visit Datia where the a multi-storey, centrally symmetrical, stone palace (1620) built by the Bundelkund ruler Bir Singh Deo, impressed Lutyens greatly

Take evening train up to Delhi, departing Jhansi at 17.47hrs, arriving Delhi 22.30hrs Met, taken

to our hotel

Complete our Delhi sightseeing – there will be meetings with conservationists, restorers and their craftsmen (furniture makers, stone masons, etc) We also hope to have discussions with photography archivists, go behind the scenes at museum collections

As our finale, we take a walk along Raj Path and up Raisina Hill to enjoy magical a magical sunset

Departure from India:

Depart India on Saturday March 16 (late night) OR Sunday March 17 (early hours, early morning or lunchtime) – it takes 45-60 mins to reach the airport nowadays

Each client is escorted to the international airport and assisted with check-in

End of The Tour

We are happy to talk with travelers about tailor-made arrangements to extend their visit to India before or after The Tour

COST, INCLUSIONS, EXCLUSIONS, TERMS

Lutyens’s flawless detail

The Tour Cost: This is in TWO parts, both payable:

Part I: Booking Fee: USD $1,000 per person, the non-refundable Booking Fee secures your place

and

Part II: The Tour: USD $5,600 per person when sharing a room

The single room supplement for The Tour is USD $1,530 per person

The Cost includes, per person:

‘The Tour’ refers to the itinerary above, the period Friday February 22 – Thursday March 7, 2013

• The services of Louise Nicholson as consultant and resource before and during The Tour

• Candia Lutyens accompanying The Tour

• The services of Quo Vadis Travel’s representatives and local English-speaking professional guides throughout The Tour, together with entrance and still camera fees for all monuments and museums in The Tour above

• ACCOMODATION: 8 nights in hotels, in the category indicated; check-in time is usually 2pm, check-out time noon

• MEALS: Breakfast and lunch from breakfast March 10 to lunch March 16, table d’hote, at restaurants set out in The Tour

or chosen by Louise Nicholson, including mineral water Dinner on March 11 at Daniels (or, similar standard), excluding

alcohol, including bottled water Note: room service meals must be paid for separately, at check-out breakfasts; lunches

• TRANSPORT: All ground transportation as described in The Tour, in one air-conditioned bus, including bottle water; by rickshaw (Old Delhi); by train (Delhi-Agra, Jhansi-Delhi, including bottled water)

• SIGHTSEEING: Entrance and still camera fees to all monuments and museums visited during tour sightseeing

• All tips to drivers, bell hops, guides; and to porters at airports, hotels, boats and railway stations

• All presently applicable taxes for the above, as of June 2012 Should others be imposed, a surcharge may be payable

The Cost does not include:

• International airfares or any extra travel outside The Tour; any optional visits, upgrades or pre/post tour bookings

• Any insurance: e.g personal travel, health, luggage It is vital to consider taking adequate cover

• Expenses of personal nature such as alcohol, laundry, room service, excess baggage fees

• Personal tips throughout the tour (please allow about $100 for local guides, drivers, etc)

• Medical requirements, excess baggage handling, etc

• Visa, required for all foreign nationals visiting India; it is the sole responsibility of each client to acquire their visa

• Video camera charges; these should be paid direct at the time of entry

• Anything not specified in the Itinerary or Inclusions (Note: hotel lunches, all dinners, all alcohol are not included)

Terms:

- There must be a minimum of 10 participants on The Tour If fewer, it will be re-priced; the client may accept or cancel at no charge

- The Tour price and dates are firm, within the parameters of the Inclusions and set out above

- The Booking Fee is non-refundable if a client cancels; it is refundable if Louise Nicholson cancels The Tour, or the price increases

- Payment of The Tour full cost is by January 1, 2013 Each client will be invoiced Clients are welcome to make full payment as early as they wish If paying in currencies other than USD, the rate of exchange should be the date of payment

- Cancellation charges per person: up to January 1, 2013, nil; from January 1 to March 8, 2013, 50% of twin-sharing tour cost; after March 8 2-13, 100% of twin-sharing tour cost

- No insurance is included We strongly advise participants to consider cover for health, luggage, personal possessions, trip or flight cancellations/delays, and all tour-related needs

- Hotels and flights are booked in good faith; any changes we are obliged to make are beyond our control

EDWIN LUTYENS AND NEW DELHI

- AN IDEAL GARDEN CITY

With Louise Nicholson and Candia Lutyens

Saturday March 9 – Saturday March 16, 2013

BOOKING FORM

Please complete and send with your Booking Fee to:

Louise Nicholson, 135 East 54th Street, #15K, New York, NY 10022, USA

Personal information:

NAME(S) as on passport ………

………

Address……… ………

Telephone (day) ……… (evening) ……… (cell) … ………

E-mail address (s) ………

The Tour: Please reserve: Twin-sharing place/s in double room ………… Single places ………

Where possible I would prefer a) a double bed ……… b) twin beds ………

I am single but, if the option arises, would be happy to share throughout The Tour … ………

Upgrades: Please send me the full list of optional hotel upgrades ……… ……

I would like to discuss other ways of extending my trip at the start/end of The Tour ………

I enclose the non-refundable Booking Fee of $1,000 per person to confirm my/our places, total $ ………

(If you wish to pay in sterling or by bank transfer, please ask for details) I agree to the Conditions and Terms as set out above Signed ……… Date ……….