If you're over the Cotswolds but want a rural idyll, Cathy Hawker highlights some of the best places to live in the UK ...

The size, climate and balling geological complexity of the British Isles have influenced national taste, too. The latter has given us a fabulous range of building materials so marvellously described ...

The glamorous, showy flowers of hibiscus are a joy in summer and autumn. Hazel Sillver looks which of these colourful, exotic plants to grow and how ...