Brass was once the predominant material for creating home hardware – it was cheap, readily available, and looked just a little bit like gold, for a touch of class. It has now mostly been replaced by steel or other alloys which technology has made more prevalent, but for those of us who love the mystery, lure and romance of anything old, brass is still a big part of our lives. From rings, to ornaments, to door hardware … if you want to look after your brass items, you will need to know specifically how to clean brass. That’s where the stark impersonality of modern technology actually comes...

Brass is one of the more common materials for your old home’s furnishings and hardware to be made of. Back in the day (when your grand dad was but a twinkle in his pop’s eye), it was the cheapest, most readily available and most suitable metal for creating these pieces. Coincidentally, it also looks lovely when it is aged! Shiny new brass can look a little bit like it came from a thrift store, or was just the cheap option when you went to the furniture store to replace your door handles, your knockers or your latches. The other thing about getting brass objects which are new and shiny is that...

Chandeliers have been a symbol of opulence and affluence for so long, that man has discovered strange, beautiful and most of all, monster-sized ways to make them! While we are well aware that it is not always size that counts most in how impressive something is, we’ve compiled this preliminary list of the 7 biggest chandeliers in the world, to give you a bit of inspiration about your own at home. While yours may not be architect-designed, and if it were a hundredth the size of one of these, still mightn’t fit through your front door, it’s your own! It’ll be a tiny piece of luxury, to remind...