A fascinating insight into high-society style and manners, from the time of Charles I to the reign of Queen Victoria, is presented in the exhibition The Conversation Piece: Scenes of Fashionable Life. Typically a Conversation Piece shows a family group or a gathering of friends participating in informal activities – perhaps at a tea-party, on a fishing trip or at a dining club. While a portrait primarily records the sitter’s appearance, the Conversation Piece depicts their way of life.

The Age of Discovery denotes the period from the late 15th century to the early 18th century. Enormous scientific and intellectual advances were made in Europe at this time, paving the way for the Enlightenment of the 18th century. The discoveries of new lands, notably by Columbus and Vespucci in the years around 1500, revolutionised the British and European worldview. Pioneering naturalists such as Maria Sibylla Merian and Mark Catesby made expeditions to the New World in order to study live specimens of many new and exotic species at first hand. Trade routes opened up, and products from newly discovered lands began to be imported to Britain and Europe.