Saint Valentine of Rome was added to the Catholic calendar by Pope Gelasius in 496. By the mid-17th century, the celebration of Valentine's day in England was customary.

The first commercial valentines day appeared in England at the end of the 18th century. They combined traditional symbo...

In the late 18th and early 19th century, during the Industrial Revolution, machines moved production from handmade in the home to factories. A frenzy of producing more goods more quickly became a kind of national pastime.

Low-wage factory workers, many of whom were children, toiled in unsa...

• In 18th-Century France, a taste for luxurious objects blended with the idea of the art of living. The rise in the power of individualism and new forms of artistry made French elites enjoy the creation of pleasing living environments.