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Kedleston Hall, a grand house, parkland and pleasure grounds built to impress: another ‘jolly.’ Part One revisiting my post during lockdown.

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Drawing on the monuments of ancient Rome and the designs of the 16th century Italian architect Andrea Palladio, Robert Adam was chosen to be the architect 'resolved to spare no Expence, with £10,000 a year, Good Temper'd & having taste himself for the Arts.'

Adam set out to build a house that would rival Chatsworth.

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Another Jolly: Knole House – once home to Vita Sackville-West and a Palace for Thomas Cranmer, and Henry VIII. I’m posting this again so do drop in…

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In my last blog I posted about my latest 'Jolly,' when I spent a few days with family members and was treated to a visit to the National Trust property Sissinghurst Castle Garden, former home of the poet, author, and famous gardener,Vita Sackville-West, and her husband  Howard Nicolson.

My next 'jolly,' with my sister and her husband, was to Knole House, which was, and still is, owned by the Sackville family.  Vita Sackville-West always felt resentful about not inheriting the house, which passed to a male heir. 

She loved the house with what she described as an 'atavistic' passion.  She said, 'Sissinghurst and St Loup are my spiritual homes.' She later wrote. 'and of course Knole, which is denied me for ever, through "a technical fault over which we have no control", as they say on the radio.' The technical fault being her gender.

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