Sandycombe Lodge in 1970. The most spectacular thing the builders have done in recent months is return the two wings on either side to how they were originally: they have demolished the second floors and turned them into single story wings with beautiful sloping tiled roofs. Turner designed the house as a ‘lodge’. There was the drawing room (with the balcony on the garden), the kitchen in the basement (with the curved window) and the bedroom upstairs (with one very small dressing room at the side).  One single story wing was a library and the other a small sitting room. And that was it. So visitors to the newly-restored house will be amazed by how small it was. But for Turner the most important thing was the garden and the view towards the Thames. Our ancestors needed much less space than us. For one thing they had fewer things. And for another they simply lived more minimally. The perils of living in a consumer society…