DENNIS SEVERS' HOUSE ANNUAL CHRISTMAS INSTALLATION ..........

The annual Christmas installation at Dennis Severs house throws Christmassy aromas, period festive decorations and olde world sound effects into the mix.

This candlelit house has a no speaking rule so your fellow snooper's modern voices don't interrupt your journey into the past { although, a few of our companions failed to comply with the silent treatment !!! }

Its creator was Dennis Severs, an artist who used his visitors’ imaginations as his canvas and who lived in the house in much the same way as its original occupants might have done in the early 18th Century. This he did for his own personal enjoyment as well as for the harvest of an atmosphere, which he then employed to provide the visitor with an extraordinary experience. To enter its door is to pass through a frame into a painting, one with a time and life of its own.

The game is that you interrupt a family of Huguenot silk weavers named Jervis who, though they can still sometimes be heard, seem always to be just out of sight. As you journey off into a silent search through the ten rooms, each lit by fire and candlelight, you receive a number of stimulations to your senses.

It is the smell of food that first aligns your imagination with the faces around you in portraits. Then… Mr. Jervis’ wig, is it not the very same one that hangs over the back of his chair? His meal is only half eaten; did he abandon it when he heard us arrive?

The house's motto is " you either see it or you don't " ...

On the top floor, all is stripped of the lower floors prettiness and the air has suddenly turned cold. Here the lodgers dwell  and life takes on a more sordid picture ..... 

Although there is little money, efforts have been made to cheer the room up for Christmas with a few paper chains ...

and, in the upper bedroom, a recording of Scrooge is playing !!

XXXX

images 1, 2, 3 & 4: via me, image 5: via lostpastremembered, images 6, 8, 12 & 13: via time out, image 7: via spitalfieldslife, image 9: via rbakker, image 10: via travelasmuch, image 11: via abouttimemagazine