The best of the season to inspire and admire

Leigh Lawson has embraced acting and poetry with the same determination that sustained Marie Lloyd, the music-hall queen whose memorabilia he collects, as Carla Passino discovers

CAROLS are playing softly, their melodies floating into the kitchen where Miranda is standing at the hob, gently stirring mulled wine. From the bubbling pot, the smell of cinnamon and clove wafts thro

CHRISTMAS 1962. Bitterly cold. Elvis was crooning on my dad’s wind-up radio. I was nine. Mum was cleaning rich folks’ houses right up to Christmas Eve because Dad was out of work. But he had a plan. M

The piece I’d never part with

Ushering in the New Year are the Decorative Fair, brimming with good-quality antiques, and the London Art Fair, with its tradition of tipping artists in the early stages of their career