Britain has more than 3,000 stately homes, and many are open to us hoi polloi. Indeed, visiting a stately home has become a staple leisure activity: what could be more British than a weekend drive to ...

Introduction: The stately homes and England -- Prelude: Houses of taste (to 1815) -- 1. The Victorian idea of heritage -- 2. Hosts and guests: the opening of the country house -- 3. Philistines, ...

Phil visits a masterpiece of Elizabethan architecture set in 1400 acres of Lincolnshire parkland, from its Heaven room and Hell staircase, to its extravagant antiques and gardens. Phil visits one of ...

Phil hears tales of lovesick ghosts as he surveys Longleat's lavish interior décor and some of the most elaborate gardening in history. When is a stately home not a stately home? When it's a stately ...