Stevns Klimt: Where geology, architecture and storytelling meet

Travellers familiar with the towering white walls of the Seven Sisters on the Kent Coast, or with Ireland’s spectacular coastline at Moher, may find the Danish deployment of the word “cliffs” at Stevns a somewhat amusing. Though composed of sparkling white chalk like their cousins around Dover, the cliffs of Stevns … called Stevns Klint locally … are just 130 feet at their highest and much lower for most of the 11 miles they run along the Baltic. So on first glance the fact that the cliffs have been named a UNESCO World Heritage site can be perplexing.

It’s not the size that makes these cliffs important, it turns out, but a wrinkle of geology.

Stevns is the best place in the world to see a long line of fish clay, known to scientists as the K-Pg Boundary, that separates the age of the dinosaurs from the rise of the mammals. It helped scientists Luis and Walter Alvarez develop and prove their theory that the dinosaurs were wiped out by the impact of a giant asteroid on the Earth.

You wouldn’t have thought that was enough to base a museum around, much less to captivate punters for well over an hour, but this place is well worth a visit even if you think geology sounds boring.  It’s not … and this may just change your mind. You’ll also be quite the trend setter; the museum was only opened by Queen Margrethe two months ago.

The beautiful, modern building is sunk into the cliff top, entirely invisible from the road and only really seen to its full beauty if you’re on the cliff walk about half a mile away. In between is a defunct limestone quarry, the source for many of Copenhagen’s grand 19th century stone facades, now part of the site's redevelopment as a cultural centre. It’s the massive hole left by stone extraction that now allows the museum to burrow into the limestone like a Bond villain’s lair.

Inside, an open plan space runs the length of the quarry-fronting windows, its sleek, white design reminiscent of a modern concert hall. A grand piano reinforces that perception; they host concerts here and the aunt who showed us around said the acoustics are surprisingly good, despite all those hard surfaces. Under normal circumstances, however, most of the space is taken up with a shop selling local crafts (jewellery and decorative items crafted from the limestone, watercolours, wood working, local honey) and a surprisingly good cafe with gourmet sandwiches, thick soups and local beers. My husband's aunt, who lives in walking distance, says the cafe is becoming popular with neighbours who go to the museum just for the food, and for walkers who use the car park to start cliff walks from here.

The museum stretches along the length of this space, but on the side dug into the cliff. You start in a theatre with a massive block of limestone taking centre stage, K-Pg line visible along its length. Even when the lights go down, its pristine whiteness glimmers in the dark. Then comes a film designed to use the odd projection space … stone at the front, stage around and behind … to dramatic effect. The stone appears and disappears as we learn how it came to be. You can ask for it to be run in English but, to be honest, the graphics are so good you don’t need to. There’s an ocean with a vibrant ecosystem living, dying and sinking its bones into the sea bed below that will become the base of our cliffs. Continents shift and it becomes a jungle, with dinosaurs stomping through. Then comes the asteroid, and a frighteningly effective cataclysm blasting through the room with more sound and light. And then primitive mammals emerge from their hiding places to forge a new world. 

After the film, a long gallery with multiple displays fills in the details, with all signage in Danish and English. There’s more on dinosaurs and fossils, with some skeletons kids will love. An entertaining tree of life, projected with light and growing from source to today every few minutes, shows how everything on earth connects to those lucky asteroid survivors. The movie explaining how the Alavrezes came to, and proved, their theory is a case study in how to use solid storytelling principles to make the complicated simple. Honestly, you can say that about the whole place. And there’s a highly entertaining table at the far end where you can play God, sending the asteroid towards Earth time and again to see the different ill effects. Show me the tsunami! This time, obliterate sunlight!

Given the horrors of the table of doom, it’s a good thing that the curators choose this time to point out the low statistical chances of this happening again and allowing you to dig into the variety of NASA-led global plans to stop an incoming asteroid should one appear. At this point, any American or English museum would doubtless have inserted a section on asteroid cataclysms in film history from Armageddon to Don’t Look Up, with Aerosmith’s Don’t Want to Miss a Thing on the sound system and an opportunity to have your photo with a cut out of Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck saving the world.

But the Danes are too classy for that. Instead, you head out through a glass tunnel called the triumph of life, where exquisitely taxidermised examples of today’s animal kingdom flock, prance, stroll and slither around you. The swan extended to full wingspan above you is a wonder to behold, but it’s the red panda all the kids will want to bring home. Cuddly toy animals are available in the gift shop, naturally. 

There are plans afoot to develop the artificial valley of the quarry, hopefully including the rescue of a magnificent turn-of-the-20th century round barn made entirely of wood. We walked through it and it’s a spectacular space. The cliff walks are lovely and there are some pretty beaches. Book a room at Rødvig Kro (Inn) and make a weekend of it. For now, this is well off the beaten track but just an hour from Copenhagen, making it an excellent side trip from the usual urban visit.

Who’s best at Christmas? Raise that Dannebrog high.

Marry the man (or woman), marry the family. The saying is usually delivered with a sense of menace. In my case, it turned out to be a winning ticket in the marital lottery. My husband’s network of Danish relations sprawls over four generations, from a nonagenarian aunt to newborn first cousins twice removed, all with vivacious senses of humour and lashings of charm. And those are just the ones likely to turn up for Christmas lunch. 

My welcome into real Danish life has been one of the delights of my marriage. Everyone loves Copenhagen, but few tourists get far beyond it. Most know the Danes are amongst the happiest people in the world (2nd after the Finns in the current World Happiness Index) but few are privileged to “go local” in Danish homes. The Christmas holidays are a brilliant time to do both. Between Dickens’ legacy and German Christmas markets, you might think the English and the Germans had cornered the market on Christmas tradition. Now visiting during the holidays for the third time, I may have to put the Danes at the top of my league table for Christmas cheer. Here, in some cases clearly thanks to my privileged access, are my reasons why. 

CHRISTMAS DECORATING

Our first married Christmases were a time of tension as I watched my husband react with distaste to many of my American traditions: decorations up on Black Friday; tree packed so tightly with an abundance of ornament you can hardly tell there’s greenery beneath; an infrastructure of coloured, flashing lights so bright you can read unaided from across the room by the light of the tree alone; an artificial tree because, given the preceding descriptions, starting with a real pine is a bit pointless. Seeing a Christmas tree in situ in a Danish home reveals the core of the difference: Americans are about the decoration, Danes are about the tree itself. 

All the ones I’ve seen here manage to look like they’re growing through the floor of the room. They are a celebration of bringing nature indoors. Baubles enhance but don’t overwhelm, and often reinforce the beauty of the natural world. With their white lights and decorations made of straw, paper and wool, Danish trees feel fundamentally organic. I also love the way that the national flag, the Dannebrog, is a regularly-used ornament, with strings of the red and white rectangles threaded through the branches to make an un-mistakably Danish tree.

The simplicity of the tree, however, doesn’t mean Danish Christmas decorations are austere … a point I missed before getting inside people’s homes. Christmas ornament can pop up anywhere, from festively adorned pots beside the front door to any table top or counter. Candles are an essential element of the Danes’ legendary hygge, and it’s all kicked up a notch at this time of year with traditional four-candle advent wreaths and fat advent candles that count down the days from one to 25, meant to burn a bit each day. 

Nisse are the Danish take on elves and they’re abundant in most homes. These are not the cute, lithe American spirits but something more ancient and gnome-like. Tall, peaked hats, enormous noses and abundant beards are classic features. They’re often joined by reindeer. And whether it’s the legacy of Hans Christian Andersen or simply that they go well with the flags, Danish soldiers in smart uniforms and tall bearskins often show up.

Unsurprisingly, all of these traditions make Copenhagen a wonderful place to shop for Christmas decor. For high-end, arty decorations head to the famous Illums Bolighus. Det Gammle Apotek, a few blocks down on the same famous shopping street, Strøget, is another home decorating store that’s a bit more populist. (If you’re in a hurry, both have branches at Tivoli.) I’m a huge fan of the shop at the National Museum, just behind Christiansborg Palace, that stocks lots of Danish classics. This includes reprints of 19th- and early 20th-century patterns for paper ornaments and nisse. None of these places do much in the way of after Christmas sales, probably confident that visiting foreigners will snap up much of the stock before they leave. The exception is Magasin du Nord, Copenhagen’s most famous department store. Its Christmas shop is the one locals swear by, and the one that’s reduced to clear floor space immediately after the holiday. By the time I got there at mid-day on the 28th, most of the stock was gone. 

HOMES WITH HYGGE

Winter in the south of England, despite its blessedly short and mild span, is a dim, wet slog to be endured

rather enjoyed. The Danes, forced to cope with a season darker, colder, and longer, embrace the challenge and build accordingly. The average British home, old and poorly-insulated, loses heat almost three times faster than a Danish one, despite the fact that Denmark’s housing stock is roughly the same age and Britain’s. (Source here.) All of the Danish homes I’ve been inside are light and airy, with open plans and large windows, solid insulation and often underfloor heating. We layer on jumpers as the damp sinks into our English bones; Danes just look out the window and celebrate being inside.

The famous Danish hygge is irrevocably bound with candlelight and open fires. Danes also decorate with a darkness-defying cheerfulness that embraces bright colours and a variety of pattern. Counter to perception, it’s not all mid-century modern and Ikea; I’ve observed a passion for classic antiques, often in pale wood finishes, and bold mixes of pattern and texture. Mirrors and glass make the most of light, but natural and artificial. It’s often dark here, but it’s never gloomy.

TIVOLI AT CHRISTMAS

Copenhagen’s famous Tivoli pleasure gardens are a year-round joy, but they have a special magic at Christmas. Everything is outlined in lights. The projections on the Moorish palace at the park’s heart may be the most spectacular, but I’m most fond of the enormous willows with their flowing, winter-bare arms glowing white. Extra rides like miniature trains and additional merry-go-rounds entertain the kids, illuminated by battalions of Christmas trees. All the regular rides are functioning as well. Someday I’ll hop onto the swings that ascend a tower and fly over Copenhagen, but not in cold rain.

No children are needed to be amused by the antics of the nisse on display behind the windows of Santa’s house. Christmas chalets pop up with holiday-themed shopping and cauldrons of steaming glogg, given extra spark with doses of rum and sides of klejner, deep-fried goodies that taste like the freshest, pillowiest, most subtly delicious cake donut you’ve ever imagined. 

Part of Tivoli’s magic comes from retaining a two-tier pricing system that separates admission from going on the rides. (Something Disneyland used to do until 1982.) That means you can get in and wander around for a relatively reasonable £17 each, less than any of the main British illuminations are charging for entry. Many people add dinner or a show at one of the garden’s many venues. We took advantage of a pop up stint by a Michelin-starred Portuguese restaurant inside the Japanese pagoda. Story to come.

THE DANISH LUNCH

Like Tivoli, the famous Danish lunch can be enjoyed at all times of the year, but it takes on added fun … and escalated levels of profligacy … with Christmas. The most we ever managed to get around the Ferrara holiday table was 10, and I was too young to remember it. For years, Christmas was usually only me and my mother. Eighteen sitting down to a single table that stretches across the ground floor of the house was nothing but a childhood fantasy. Something other families did. In our Danish family, it’s the norm. 

The main festivities are on Christmas Eve, with lighter lunches on following days. We had our lunch on Christmas afternoon, an epic feast that started about 2:30 and still saw a few sitting at table picking at chocolates seven hours later. In its multiple courses, length, diners wandering off and returning and constant grazing, the whole experience bears a striking resemblance to the time I joined distant cousins in New York for a Sicilian Easter. Except that this has a lot more alcohol. In between and throughout the fish, the meats, the cheeses, the rice pudding with cherry sauce and the chocolates laced with marzipan there’s beer and toast after toast with snapps. This is not the sweet, cocktail-making stuff but bracing, life affirming eau de vie in a bewildering variety of flavours. (Our hostesses home made version with orange, cinnamon and vanilla was fabulous. The Bornholm Distillery should use their chili version as a fire starter.) 

THE PARTY BARN

The typical Danish farmhouse is a long structure on an elevated basement with a deeply-stepped roof. In shape they’re not so different from the Viking long halls they descend from, though doubtless a good deal warmer. All the ones I’ve been in have a procession of high-ceilinged, often open-plan rooms on the main floor with some bedrooms lofted in the eaves. Typically there will be a series of barns facing the house in a “c” shape, making one complex around a courtyard. On bigger farms, there may be secondary courtyards. It’s easy to see how, in days before electric light and central heating, these complexes formed a defensive bulwark against the invaders of winter snow, sleet and wind.

I can’t confirm how common it is across all of Danish farming society, but in my husband’s family it seems essential to turn at least one of these outlying buildings into a party barn, complete with a proper bar. On our second night in the country we were celebrating a cousin’s birthday inside one, with a tree at the centre extending 20 to 25 feet to the barn roof, Christmas lights decorating tractors and harvesters to brighten the scene and banqueting tables groaning with the “pot luck” goodies contributed by guests. Another family barn is now a shop for an upscale French fabric business but that cousin has designed all of the stands holding bolts of fabric to roll easily into storage for parties. The bar, naturally, is a fixed structure. The cousins we were staying with have just moved into their property and are starting work on the barns now. I can’t wait to see their festive evolution. 

GLOGG

Most countries in Northern Europe have a version of mulled wine. The Danes’ is differentiated by raisins and slivered almonds stewed with the wine and served up at the bottom with a spoon to munch at the end. There’s also, inevitably, a lot more than wine to raise the alcoholic content. The specific recipe varies by family but it’s safe to say you shouldn’t be driving after even one glass of any of them.

Establishments vie for the title of best glogg maker of the season. My best this year was at Hviid’s Vinstue, a wood-panelled pub on the famous Kongens Nytorv that’s had 300 years to get their recipe right. We always warn guests about my husband’s version, but this is the first time that a single glass anywhere has made me feel positively unsteady. It was probably several teaspoons of alcohol plumped raisins consumed in place of lunch that pushed me over the edge.

Hviid’s recipe is a closely guarded secret but we’ve shared the Bencard family version here before. Follow this link, and have some lunch before you imbibe. Then have a Happy Christmas!

It’s back to “normal” as the pre-holiday diary burns the candle at both ends

Andy Williams really should have sung “It’s the most exhausting time of year…”

The whole world speeds up from the start of November, racing towards the Christmas break at an ever more frenetic pace. Work escalates with scores of projects needing conclusion before year end. A calendar full of annual events gets even more crowded with all of those people you decide you must get together with before the year turns. And just when you barely have a moment to spare, the load escalates domestically with the need to decorate the house, write the cards, do the Christmas shopping and gift wrapping and prepare any festive meals.

There’s no better proof that life has resumed pre-pandemic levels than the return of this blog’s holiday round-up. With me too busy to write about individual events, I’m crowding a madcap range of stuff into one entry.

The Bencards entered the pre-holiday season with a mutual case of COVID, clearly picked up on our American holiday but not symptomatic or testing positive until the day after we returned home. It was the second time around for me, the third for my husband. Thus proper returns to work didn’t happen until early November, making the office load that much heavier when we picked it back up. Our only completely clear weekend between vacation and Christmas disappeared beneath tissues, hot drinks and a flood of cough syrup.

And then the race was on.

The Lansdowne Club’s annual Winter Ball had a Versailles theme this year; ironic or appropriate as class divisions widen and we head into a winter of discontent? Only time will tell, but the tall wigs, free-flowing champagne and metallic fabrics made for a splendid display. The theme of French profligacy continued the next night at Le Comptoir Robuchon for a belated celebration of my birthday. Any menu that dominated by champagne, caviar, lobster, foie gras and truffles is either calculated to extract as much money out of its diners as possible, or to make guests feel very special indeed. Or both. I confess to having severe guest guilt after seeing the prices on the menu, but it was a lovely evening indeed. The restaurant is an homage to the late chef Joel Robuchon, named “chef of the century” by Guide Millau in 1989, and features many of the classics he made famous throughout his restaurant empire. Tournedos Rossini and truffled ravioli led the celebratory menu choices, but the surprises of the evening were an extraordinarily beautiful bread basket and the appearance of Fixin on the wine list, the little-known Burgundian red that is our favourite. 

Best customer service, however, belonged not to a fancy restaurant but to His Majesty’s Passport Office. Granted, I had to spring for the premium package to ensure a renewal between my return from the USA and our late December departure to Copenhagen, but you don’t always get what you pay for in government services. Happily this was an exception, arriving early for the appointment, being processed immediately, getting out before my original slot even came up and having a new passport (black, demonstratively non-European) delivered into my hands in less than a week. Can whoever shaped them up move over to the NHS? 

Joy continued across town that night when my team won the 2022 Corporate Communications Award for best use of corporate content in the UK. The winning project, a video news magazine called Tomorrow, Today, was very much my baby from its inception, so I couldn’t be happier. I could have done without the venue in a far corner of Bayswater, however. Porchester Hall is a Grade II* listed architectural gem (Edwardian in style though built in the 1920s), but beastly to get to if you commute through Waterloo. I really should have booked a hotel; I had to disappear almost as soon as we had the award in our hands.

My husband’s Twickenham debentures kicked off this autumn, so rugby dominating the weekends on either side of that award ceremony. (Debentures are somewhat like season tickets, but you buy the rights to purchase your dedicated seats at face value rather than the tickets themselves; then buy the tickets.) Japan was a definitive English victory, a good day out with friends and a rotten journey home. Train delays adding unwanted extensions to evenings are, sadly, becoming normal. England v. New Zealand plummeted downhill as soon as the opening light show and haka was over, and by half time it felt like it might have been a better evening if we left early. But England scored three tries in the last 10 minutes, making it perhaps the most exciting game of live rugby I’ve ever seen. It ain’t over ‘til…

Sadly that weekend was over by Sunday morning as I boarded a train to Birmingham for the Confederation of British Industry’s annual conference. It’s one of my company’s biggest sponsorships of the year and producing it without enough staff had sucked every ounce of workplace energy from me since our return from holiday. I did manage to meet up with a colleague for a couple of hours to stroll through Birmingham’s impressive German Christmas Market. Low on traditional shopping booths, abundant with mulled wine, sausages and other holiday comestibles. The architecture of the pop-up village is impressive, full of towers, chalets, arches and whirling carousels of Christmas figurines to equal a proper German venue.

That bit of free time grabbed, we headed off for 48 intense hours in corporate hotels and a rather odd conference centre at the top of a shopping mall (The Vox). For conference highlights … live with Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer … check out my LinkedIn article.

That Thursday was Thanksgiving, and while I am exceptionally grateful for my job I could have done without having to commute into London that day. Although I did bring a pumpkin pie to my team meeting in thanks for the marvellous folks I work with. Our club’s traditional Thanksgiving dinner could have made the day celebratory, but we have a new chef who decided not to carry on the annual event. I rushed home and threw together turkey cutlets, proper dressing (none of this frightful British stuff made with bread crumbs), sweet potato mash and spinach. I’d held back two slices of pie.

The best thing to be thankful for that week, however, came on the Saturday when a friend who’d been diagnosed with terminal cancer celebrated his 70th birthday. At the turn of the year, none of us thought he’d get here. To see him hale and hearty, toasting life in the private dining room of Tylney Hall, was a reminder of what’s really important in life.

Another work week sped by full of deadlines, reorganisations and video calls. But this is the time of year when people you work with thank you for doing business with them, so it also featured a farewell dinner for a beloved colleague going to pastures new, champagne at Claridges and the Cezanne exhibition at Tate Modern. In my agency days Claridges was my go-to spot to take visiting clients. Its combination of art deco elegance and quiet sophistication is rare amongst its showier London siblings. The afternoon tea that used to be my default booking has more than doubled in cost in the two decades since, and I’d find it very hard to justify more than £100 each for sandwiches, scones and pastries, whether I was spending my own money or considering it a marketing expense. We stuck to the bubbly, though a cheeky egg and cress sandwich might have appeared on a tasteful silver salver.

The Cezanne retrospective across town is a must if you’re a fan; it’s certainly the biggest collection of his work I can remember. I confess he leaves me cold. The awkward abstraction of his portraits frustrates me and his still lives leave me hungering for the precision of Dutch masters. But his landscapes … especially those from the Provençal mountains … are exquisite and can transport you instantly to a place of warmth, sand, sea and golden light. A very useful mental journey in a gloomy London winter. 

The next weekend saw us packing our bags and heading to Leicestershire for one of our last pandemic-delayed trips. Our friends and former neighbours had moved north just before the rise of COVID; we were scheduled to spend that Easter with them before the first lockdown prevented travel. Anticipation made everything the sweeter, and meant that we got to see their fabulous late Georgian house remodelled and decorated instead of in progress. It’s like something out of a Jane Austen novel. But so is the heating. Always worth remembering that visiting any historic home in England in the winter requires many layers of clothing.

This part of the country is saturated with stately homes, picturesque estate villages and gracious historic towns. Though only an hour from London on selected fast trains, it feels deeply rural and like stepping back in time to an older, simpler England. Our friends’ village of Buckminster sits at a high point for the region, a bit like Stow-on-the-Wold with its expansive views, glorious walks, gourmet farm shops and heritage sites, but almost empty of tourists. Unsurprisingly, I loved every moment and was calculating when I could return before I’d left. 

The sightseeing highlight was Belvoir Castle, decked out in full Christmas glory. It is a magnificent spot at any time, a Recency fantasy of a castle built upon medieval foundations, ancestral home to the Dukes of Rutland and home to one of my favourite podcasts, Duchess. Many stately homes now open their rooms to show off holiday decorations, but this is the first I’ve visited that tells a story. This year was Cinderella, with different scenes from the story interpreted through decorations throughout the house. Gloriously, the step-mother and step-sisters were all bling, characterised by metallic pinks, yellows, greens and golds, while Cinderella’s storyline was all whites and at one with nature. (Here was the English upper classes’ abhorrence of coloured, garish Christmas lights writ large. My husband was smugly satisfied.) Whether tawdry or sophisticated, the decorations were fantastic, you got to see the house at the same time and a live choir brought life to the heart of the tour. Well worth every penny and, unlike most Christmas-themed attractions in London, something you could actually book the day before you wanted to go.

Back in the capital, the highlight of the next work week was the office Christmas party, with coupes of Prosecco, buffets of nice things to eat and dessert cocktails. Everyone had slipped into formal wear, looked fabulous and was ready to party. American friends reminded me that company-funded Christmas parties are not the done thing there, and that alcohol has been banned from almost all corporate events due to fears over misconduct and the ensuing law suits. I valued that newly-refreshed passport more than ever and hummed God Save the King under my breath. It’s been a challenging year in so many ways and work … so little mentioned in this blog … has been harder, longer and more stressful than it’s been in almost a decade. The party was a reminder that you don’t put up with the BS for the salary. Or the big brand. You do it for your colleagues. And I work with probably the best and biggest assemblage of superstars ever gathered under one corporate umbrella in my professional life. The party reminded me that these are the people I work for, and the people who make the tough times worth suffering. Because with them at your side there will always be glorious times. Awards. Sparkling wine. Fellowship and caring. And that is worth a party.

Under normal circumstances, burning the candle at both ends would have continued at least through Friday the 16th of December. But British unions had something to say about that. Rail strikes throughout next week meant that my journey home on Thursday the 8th … after the girls’ trip foursome had celebrated Christmas with Michelin-starred Quilon’s Southern Indian tasting menu … was probably my last day of commuting into London for the year.

I confess to a monumental sigh of relief.

The enforced isolation of two Christmases in pandemic lockdown was frustrating. It seemed counter to all of the merriment and “togetherness” that the holiday season represents. But, I have to admit, it was a lot less exhausting.