Composition 15

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land
Says T S Eliot in The Waste Land

But when the lilac is in bloom, when it seduces all around with its blowsy blossoms and heady scent, surely it makes May the merriest month,

Framed by duck-egg Gainsborough damask, a swathe of lilac velvet and billows of lacy cow parsley, an aristocratic assortment of quintessential Spring blooms, led by the heady lilacs, pour out of an exceptional, purple-veined font.

The princely associations of the colour palette – imperial purples, regal blues – and the Breccia Medici marble whisk us off to a hillside villa above Florence and the sheer joy and playfulness of the flowers delight us in this unrestrained celebration of the joys of Spring.