We Are Open!

Today Ashdown House opens for the 2015 season! Opening hours are 2pm - 5pm every Wednesday and Saturday. The house is open by timed tour only at 2.15,3.15 and 4.15pm.

Here are a few of the highlights of a visit to this most unusual of NT properties (and yes we may be biased but we think it is fabulous!):

The Landscape. The Sarsen Field is the first thing you see on the left of the drive as you approach the car park. This is open to everyone to walk in and is a fascinating are of Special Scientific Interest where the huge, ancient sarsen stones lie amongst the grass as they have done for thousands of years. Legend says they are an army turned to stone by the magician Merlin.

High on the hill to the east is the weathercock. If you fancy a climb up onto the Downs this gives a

wonderful panoramic view of the park and the surrounding countryside.

The woodland dates back to when this was a medieval hunting ground and the deer still live here.

Landscaped in the 17th century, the woods are full of walks and glades where you can picnic and play and catch sight of the wildlife. The badgers have been digging up the area around the grand avenue for almost 1000 years! There are also hidden geocaches, a tree trail and our Pixie Path. In the fields behind the wood the Balleroy ponies graze.

To the west of the park lies Alfred's Castle, an Iron Age encampment. Smaller than Uffington and Liddington forts it nevertheless commands a wonderful view and at one time controlled the track south from the Ridgeway. Anglo Saxon weapons have been found here; legend states it was the place where King Alfred rallied his army before the Battle of Ashdown in 871 AD.

The house. A stunning 17th century hunting lodge, Ashdown is

well worth a view for the  architecture alone. Of the interior, only the hall, grand staircase and roof terrace of the house are open to visitors because the rooms are privately let. However the wonderful

guided tour weaves the story of Ashdown and its owners over the three hundred and fifty years since it was built. From Queens and cavaliers to Victorian servants, the characters come alive!

We hope to see you soon!

The Ashdown Parterre

The letter P, in the A - Z of Ashdown, stands for the parterre. The current Ashdown House parterre of box and gravel, laid out in S scrolls in the 17th century style, was created in the 1950s when the house came into the care of the NT. The previous elaborate Victorian parterre had been destroyed during the war and the rationale for choosing a 17th century parterre design was that since the 19th century additions to the house had been demolished and it had been taken back to its original 17th century style, it made sense to match this with a 17th century garden.

When the house was built it had gardens on the north and south side rather than to the west, as can be seen in the engraving by Kip from the early 18th century. Whilst it's not possible to see the detail of these they were very plain. The hunting lodge was considered in the 17th century to be a masculine style of building and a plain box and gravel parterre was a masculine style of garden to match. So the parterre we have today, whilst not identical to the original, is in keeping with the 17th century style of the house and contemporary garden design.

In the mid-Victorian period the Cravens did much work to their

houses at Ashdown and Coombe Abbey, including a major garden restyling at both properties. At Coombe this work was carried out in 1860 by the architect and garden designer William Eden Nesfield. It's likely that he also worked on the Ashdown alterations. His father William Andrews Nesfield was an eminent garden designer who specialised in parterres so it is tempting to speculate that he had an input into the new garden at Ashdown. The Italianate style parterre was very fashionable in this era with intricate flowerbeds, colourful herbaceous borders featuring exotic species, fountains and paths of coloured glass. We have detailed photographs of this parterre garden so know exactly what it looked like.

The Kreative Blogger Award

Thank you to Mrs Black’s This ‘n That for awarding the Ashdown House Blog the Kreative Blogger Award! We are all very honoured. Look out for a black cat on your visits to Ashdown as Minerva the shoppe keeping cat can sometimes be seen strolling around the grounds. We love her eclectic blog!

Upon acceptance of such award it is traditional that the recipients carry out the following instruction. We are to share with you 10 things you may not have previously known about us, and to recommend 10 blogs that are worthy of the Kreative Award.

So here are ten things you may or may not already know about Ashdown House:

Elizabeth of Bohemia never saw Ashdown, the house William Craven built for her, because she died before it was completed. However her son, the dashing Prince Rupert of the Rhine did visit the house, as did his equally dashing cousin King Charles II.

The entwined initials of William Craven and Elizabeth were carved onto the original gateposts at Ashdown.

The house has a box parterre garden because this was considered a “masculine” garden design to complement the hunting lodge which was considered to be a “masculine” building.

There is said to be a secret passageway cut through the chalk connecting Ashdown to the manor house at Russley Down several miles away.

At the beginning of the 18^th century Ashdown was used by Jacobites plotting the restoration of the Catholic succession.

There was an icehouse at Ashdown. There's a blog piece about it here. There may not be much of it left now but it was a jolly interesting building in its time!

The weathervane on the roof of the Victorian stables is original and features a coach and horses and also sports an earl’s coronet!

The Craven state coach was painted gold with a blue velvet interior and was even more elaborate than that belonging to Queen Victoria. It is now housed in the Carriage Museum at Arlington Court which is well worth a visit.

Ashdown is haunted by the ghost of stable lad and by the sound of a baby crying in the woods. Some of us have heard the crying and also seen shadowy figures and candlelight behind the shuttered windows of the house. Over the years there have been several other ghostly sightings as well.

There is only one staircase at Ashdown and no servants’ stair. The staircase turns in an anti-clockwise direction to allow a right-handed swordsman the advantage when fighting down the stair.

10 blogs we recommend:

There are so many wonderful blogs out there and we already feature some we follow on our sidebar. Here we’ve chosen a few that represent the different aspects of our interests at Ashdown, including history and natural history.

Number 1 London - The best address in London! A blog with an interest in England past and present.

The Purple Empire - All about butterflies from the National Trust expert, Matthew Oates.

Fair Isle Bird Observatory The blog of the world famous bird observatory on the wild and beautiful island of Fair Isle. 

Hoydens and Firebrands - Various fascinating aspects of 17th century history.

Status, Scandal and Subterfuge - Frances Bevan writes about the history of the St John family and their mansion Lydiard Park. Not only did the St John and Craven family intermarry, the St Johns were also involved in the Jacobite plotting of the 18th century (see above!) 

Two Nerdy History Girls - Two great historical authors who consistently reveal extraordinary and fascinating facts about many different aspects of history.

Untold Lives - The British Library sharing stories from the past.

Puppy with a Purpose - We have to confess to a vested interest here. Puppy with a Purpose is the blog of our very own guide dog puppy in training, Rochester, and is all about his experiences as he learns to be a fully qualified Guide Dog. Rochester is sponsored by Swindon Guide Dogs and pays lots of visits to Ashdown, enjoying running in the woods in his time off duty!

 Jane Austen's World - Bringing Jane Austen, her books and the Regency period alive. We are very proud of the Craven/Austen connection here at Ashdown House!

Georgian London - Fascinating and fabulous!

Carved Wooden Heads and Cursed Pearls!

As the new season at Ashdown House approaches I'm reminded of all the reasons why I enjoy working there. One of the main ones is that I always learn fascinating historical facts from our visitors. We get such a huge variety of people through the doors; history buffs, people with a connection to the Craven family, people whose ancestors worked at the house, and experts who have come to see the portrait collection or who are knowledgeable about 17th century architecture, or gardens or both or many other things.

Here are three of the most interesting things that I have learned from Ashdown visitors:

1. That the rather idiosyncratic carved wooden heads on which the antlers are mounted were the accepted way to display hunting trophies in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. The science of taxidermy had not progressed to the stage of allowing the preservation of the entire stag's head so the antlers were removed, a wooden stag's head was carved and painted and the antlers were attached to it. Each was done individually, by hand, which probably accounts for the difference in quality, the startled expressions and the lack of a resemblance to a real stag.

2. That the pearls which are worn by Elizabeth of Bohemia and her daughters in many of the portraits were part of a necklace of seven strings that belonged to Elizabeth and had originally been Medici pearls inherited by Mary, Queen of Scots. Elizabeth would pawn the necklace when she was particularly short of money during her exile and then buy it back if she had a special state occasion to attend. On her death she left one strand to each of her daughters. In the nineteenth century there was a long-running dispute between the British Royal family and the house of Hanover over possession of the pearls. The English crown claimed the necklace but only six strands were reassembled. The seventh strand had been given to Elizabeth's daughter Princess Henrietta Maria. She had died only six months after her wedding to Prince Sigismond of Transylvania and was buried in her wedding dress - and the string of pearls. Her descendents declined to open the tomb to retrieve the necklace! The picture shows Elizabeth's eldest daughter, also called Elizabeth, wearing her strand. This Elizabeth was considered one of the greatest beauties of the age and was known as "The Star of the North." She was also a great philosopher. What a girl!

It is also said that the large drop pearl in some of the portraits is "The Bretheren" a famous pearl that brings bad luck to the wearer. Elizabeth of Bohemia was, arguably, a very unlucky Queen but it is easy to attribute this to her poor choice of jewellery with the benefit of hindsight!

3. That in 17th century architecture a huting lodge such as Ashdown was considered a "masculine" building and it therefore required a masculine style of garden. The simple box parterre and stone statuary was considered suitable. There were no flowers or feminine-type adornments! That said, there are those who link William, Earl of Craven and Ashdown house to the Rosicrucian belief system and suggests that the house was an astronomical observatory and the gardens and grounds laid out as they are as part of a wider design in the ancient landscape. Intriguing!

Cross-posted to the Passion For History Blog.