Brave knight

It all sounds very kinky, really, bringing together the two Sir Johns under one roof; Sir John Betjeman, so amiable, house-trained and telly-friendly, and Sir John Soane, so arcane, Dumbledore-ish and stridently innovative. But I have to say I think it works rather well since, in such close proximity, each of the knights brings out the best in the other.

There’s a marvellous feeling of being in a burrow in the way the exhibition is done. Left, right and then a breakneck turn into the cursed forest of blasted architectural fragments leads you to a warm and cosy Bag End painted some shade of Farrow & Ball or other. Display cases are lined in ultra-Victorian hallway papers that heighten the feeling of a suburban home from home, and since so many of the exhibits are books there is a definite sense that this is where a learned Mr Tumnus has made a makeshift camp.