Book excerpt: "Sir Edwin Lutyens is widely regarded as one of Britain's greatest architects. In a career of more than 50 years, spanning both the Victorian and Modern eras, Lutyens was prolific. His work ranged from great country houses, city commercial office buildings, his famous First World War memorials across Europe and Britain, and his magnum opus designs for New Delhi, built during the 1920s and 1930s. Lutyens' most celebrated works remain his magnificent country houses that so frequently adorned the pages of Country Life magazine, and in particular his houses of the period from the 1890s and 1900s. Sir Edwin Lutyens: The Arts & Crafts Houses brings together for the first time in new, wide-format all-colour photography, the definitive collection of over 40 of Lutyens' great houses, in which Lutyens ingeniously blended the style of the Arts and Crafts movement with his own inventive interpretation of the Classical language of architecture. The book features over 500 stunning current photographs, together with floor plans of the houses, and a fresh reinterpretation of Lutyens' enduring architectural genius."--