Watch Documentaries Online: June 2013

BBC - Hidcote: A Garden for All Seasons (2011)

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Documentary telling the story of Hidcote - the most influential English garden of the 20th century - and Lawrence Johnston, the enigmatic genius behind it. Hidcote Manor in Gloucestershire was the first garden ever taken on by the National Trust, who in a decade-long project completed in 2011 spent 3.5 million pounds in a major restoration programme. This included researching Johnston's original vision, which uncovered the compelling story of how a secretive and self-taught horticulturalist created such an iconic garden. Glyn Jones - head gardener at Hidcote - made it his mission to discover as much about the man as possible to reveal how, in the early 20th century, he created a garden that has influenced designers all over the world.

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BBC - The Genius of Carl Faberge (2013)

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The Genius of Carl Faberge
The World's Most Beautiful Eggs
Stephen Smith explores the extraordinary life and work of the virtuoso jeweller Carl Faberge. He talks to HRH Prince Michael of Kent about Faberge items in the Royal Collection and to Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, who spent a hundred million dollars acquiring nine exquisite Faberge eggs. The bejewelled trinkets Faberge made for the last tsars of Russia in the twilight of their rule have become some of the most sought-after treasures in the world, sometimes worth millions. Smith follows in Faberge's footsteps, from the legendary Green Vaults in Dresden to the palaces of the tsars and the corridors of the Kremlin museum, as he discovers how this fin de si�cle genius transformed his father's modest business into the world's most famous supplier of luxury items.

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www.bbc.co.uk

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Discovery Channel - Unsolved History: Death of the Red Baron (2002)

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Unsolved History: Death of the Red Baron
Unsolved History is history the way it was! Through detailed examination of archeological and forensic evidence, existing photographs, artifact examination, and carefully selected interviews from eyewitnesses and experts - events are reconstructed and historical questions are finally answered. Manfred von Richthofen, known to the world as "The Red Baron," was the greatest flying ace of World War I - and still to this day revered as the most famous and skilled pilot the world has ever known. He sent scores of Allied flyers down in flames throughout the war, but he was not invincible. Richthofen was shot down over a French field on the morning of April 21, 1918, killed by a single bullet that passed clear through his heart. Who shot The Red Baron? Was it Canadian pilot Roy Brown, who had been on his tail just a minute or so before the Baron's red triplane crashed? Was it one of the Australian gunners firing at the plane skimming just a couple of hundred feet above them? Or, was it another unsung Allied hero? To this day, it's been a mystery from history. But now, with the latest techniques in ballistic analysis, microscopic forensics, computer flight simulators and high-powered laser range findings, learn the truth behind what happened on the final flight of the Kaiser's finest air warrior.

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