My son Aidan is getting married next month. He and his bride will have their nuptial Mass in Cumnock, my old home town in Ayrshire. To be honest, the call back to the ancestral homelands was more to do with having their wedding reception at the astonishingly impressive Dumfries House, on the edge of the little town, which has become a kind of wedding Mecca in recent years.
Dumfries House is one of Britain’s most beautiful stately homes, owned by the Bute family until 2007, when it was saved for the nation by an intervention led by Prince Charles. It combines the stunning Neoclassical architecture of Robert Adam with bespoke furniture made by Thomas Chippendale.
