


The Great British Tour
Experience the real world of the country house
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Exclusive access to private houses around the UK
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Guests are received by the owners and welcomed as friends, offering a rare chance to connect with the houses and the people who keep them thriving today
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Tours tailormade to your own interests: whether you love Georgian elegance or Baroque drama, literary connections or simply want a taste of every period
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Stay as guests in the houses themselves or in luxurious boutique hotels
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Small groups, of a maximum of eight, with families welcome
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Experts will accompany you and bring the stories behind the bricks and marble alive
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Enjoy black-tie dinners with house owners and discuss the challenges facing them in the 21st century, how the house has changed and what it's truly like to live there
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Trips arranged and led by Oliver Gerrish (below left, with Tixall the Patterdale terrier), architectural historian, author and raconteur, together with Zuleika Parkin, cake-maker extraordinaire and art historian, who both possess a wealth of fascinating anecdotes from lifetimes spent exploring the secrets of Britain's homes
Highlights
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Houghton Hall, Norfolk (top left): one of England's greatest Palladian houses, built for Sir Robert Walpole in the 1720s and home to David, 7th Marquess of Cholmondeley
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Weston Park, Shropshire (middle left): the seat of the Earls of Bradford, a classical
17th-century house set in a landscape designed by 'Capability' Brown -
Tissington Hall, Derbyshire (below left): a Jacobean house at the heart of its own estate village, and home of the Fitzherbert family, 'entertaining since 1609'
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Dove Cottage, Grasmere, Cumbria (below): as the home of William Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy, this idyllic white-washed cottage in the heart of the Lake District saw the birth of some of the most beloved poetry in the English language
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Stansted Park, West Sussex (below right): an Edwardian country house set in 1,800 acres on the edge of the South Downs, former home of the 10th Earl of Bessborough
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The Drum, Midlothian, Scotland (background image): built by William Adam, father of Robert Adam, in the early 18th century, an architecturally fascinating classical house on the outskirts of Edinburgh not usually open to the public
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Wentworth Woodhouse, Yorkshire: a spectacular 18th-century mansion with the longest facade, at more than 600ft, of any private house in Britain, and the original home of George Stubbs's superb equestrian portrait Whistlejacket
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Drumlanrig Castle, Dumfriesshire: the four-square, castellated seat of the Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch and Queensberry with spectacular views
Tours can be arranged to any length. Six-day tour for four people: £7,000 (about $9,200)


