The Great Country Estates of Britain Series: Holkham Hall Revisited 2 of 5

After taking in the park and external architecture we ventured inside, to be welcomed by the vast marble hall (actually made of Derbyshire alabaster)...

Above and Below: The amazing coffered ceiling.

The alabaster had dramatic red seams running through it which gave it a warmer atmosphere than a pure austere white marble would have. In the niches are plaster replicas of Greek statues.

Next is an assortment of photos of the statues from the statue gallery. This gallery boast having the most complete collection of authentic classical statues of any private house in Britain (many houses having sold off their originals when the fell on hard times, and replaced them with plaster copies). On the day we went there there was a display of dresses in the gallery, so one had to manoeuver oneself carefully to find shots without couture in them...

The gilded coffered apse at one end, with and without the chandelier...

Details from the marble fireplace in the statue gallery...

Other marble pieces from around the hall...

The North Dining Room...

I love the chair upholstery, being a very similar fabric to that which we have chosen for our dining room Chippendale styled chairs, and also the stunning savonnerie carpet.

The table is also amazing, using a very ingenious mechanism designed in 1830 by Robert Jupe, to enlarge or reduce the table top area as required...

and example of how the mechanism works can be seen in this video of a dining table on a yatch below:

Above: Panorama of the dining room...

The other clever feature of this room which I like is the apse, which when viewed from all but the most acute angles looks like a straightforward archway, but if you get the angle correct, you can see the hidden servants entrances on either side of the apse...

In previous centuries they would have lead down to an old kitchen like this...

Above: A collection of copper pans and fish broilers

Below: Juice jars, churns, butter patty makers and a marmalade slicer

Above: A large knife sharpener (as pointed out by Don of The Lothians)

Below: A large open over with mechanized spit roaster

Below: A close up of the cute marmalade slicer. One puts orange pieces in the forcer at the rear and then rocks the knife back and forwards as one forces the fruit up the chute...

The Great Country Estates of Britain: Holkham Hall Revisited 1 of 5

Having studied and blogged about Holkham Hall previously, I was pleased to have the chance to visit it last year on our country house tour. Over the next two weeks I shall share some of the photos I took of Holkham. 

We arrived at the estate by the north gate, having stayed the night at Wells-next-the-sea (that was another story in itself, having arrived there to find no accommodation available we almost had to stay on a fishing boat over night!)

Above: The North Gate

Below: Detail of the wrought iron work in the gate

We drove through the deer park, parked the car and arrived at the visitors centre.

Above: Small side gate and gate houses.

Below: One of the lead rainheads. Peter was quite under-whelmed by the brown brick, expecting the hall to have been fashioned from large slabs of stone like Chatsworth or Castle Howard.

The visitors centre which housed a cafe and gift shop...

As it was a lovely day we decided to see the park and gardens first. We departed by a gate to the right in the above picture and strolled around the hall anticlockwise... 

We came across two large bronze lions...

and the Leicester monument...

before coming to a small weir on the estate lake. 

From here we looked back towards the hall to notice a terrace with a large fountain....

Looking over the balustrades of the raised terrace lawn we could see the remains of a neoclassical orangery...

Unfortunately it appears it was necessary to place signage requesting people not to 'jump the fence'...

It was quite an attractive wall actually...

with the occasional self sown beauty...

Here are some photos of the large fountain, which unfortunately was not in operation...

To the right of the orangery there was a small classical belvedere...

We then walked back towards the lake and on to the walled garden.

on the way we passed the old ice house...

and fields of free-ranging pigs...

To be honest the walled gardens were very disappointing. Having just seen the fabulous gardens at Houghton the day before, the gardens at Holkham were looking very much under-loved...

There were parts where they had started to tidy them up...

In the next post we will venture inside the hall to see the marble hall, statues, dining room and kitchen.