My favourite National Trust properties
Do yourself a favour and visit one of Britain's best historical homes and grounds
One of the best pieces of advice I could give anyone living in or visiting Britain for a length of time, is to get yourself a National Trust membership. Visiting these beautiful historic homes, grounds and landscapes, is the perfect way to spend the day, wherever you are, not least for their dependable tea rooms. (Sometimes, on particularly rainy days I’ve known people to visit just the tea room and go home. Speaking for a friend, you understand.) They’re also great for children, with most having adventure playgrounds and offering nature trails and indoor quizzes, meaning children view history as fun.
Recently celebrating its 125-year anniversary, the National Trust was set up in 1895 and looks after more than 300 historic houses, 1255 kilometres of coastline and 250,000 hectares of land. They’re all over England, Wales and Northern Ireland and visitors can buy a special limited-time touring pass here.
It’s hard to single out favourites, but these are the ones I particularly love:
Bateman’s, East Sussex
I live near the beautiful former home of Rudyard Kipling and absolutely love it, because I can fantasise I live in the pretty sandstone Jacobean home, surrounded by ponds, watermill and rolling fields, in the bucolic village of Burwash. Inside it’s satisfyingly higgledy-piggledy. After The Jungle Book author died in 1936, followed by wife Carrie, the house was gifted to The National Trust and so all the family’s possessions are preserved inside. For more, click here.
Cliveden, Berkshire
This grand house is astonishing. The vast 17th century chateau with 376 acres of grounds leading down to the Thames, was built by the Duke of Buckingham for his mistress and is famous for its role in the Profumo Scandal and for the place Meghan Markle stayed the night before she married Prince Harry. Unusually, it’s run as a five-star hotel (I was lucky enough to stay here, so more on that in another newsletter) as well as a National Trust property and is a wonderful place to walk around, or enjoy afternoon tea. For more, click here.
Hill Top, Lake District
One of the National Trust’s busiest sites is Beatrix Potter’s 17th-century cottage in Near Sawrey, the Lake District, which has 100,000 visitors a year come through its doors to see where Beatrix thought up her charming stories. She bequeathed huge swathes of the Lake District to The Trust, including Wray Castle, where she first had the idea for Peter Rabbit. Despite the queues, it’s worth going. For more, click here.
Beatles Childhood Homes, Liverpool
Full disclosure – I haven’t been through these homes, but wanted to include them because they are two of the more unusual National Trust properties. The childhood homes of John Lennon and Paul McCartney in Liverpool are preserved to show what life was like in the ’50s and ’60s and the modest post-war homes Mendips and 20 Forthlin Road, are a must-do on any visit to Liverpool. For more, click here.
Snowshill Manor, Cotswolds
One of the most eclectic houses I have visited is in the Cotswolds. We ended up going here because it was a rainy day and we weren’t disappointed. Snowshill Manor was home to eccentric collector Charles Wade from 1919 who stuffed his manor house so full of his collections of everything from toys to bicycles, that he and his wife had to live in an adjacent cottage instead. Thank goodness he died before the invention of Amazon. For more, click here.
Chartwell, Kent
The Tudor house of Chartwell is famously the former home of Winston Churchill and as such, one of the Trust’s busiest properties. It’s worth going to see though, just get there early. Set in vast gardens with ponds, hills, walled cottage garden and huge adventure playground, most people come to see the interior of the house. It has been preserved as the Churchill family lived in the 1930s, including Winston’s study, with his glasses on his desk. For more, click here.
Sissinghurst, Kent
Apologies for so many of these houses being suspiciously close to where I live, but I’m lucky to have many NT properties on my doorstep and as such, couldn’t leave out another of its most famous, Sissinghurst Castle. The home of writer Vita Sackville-West and husband Harold Nicolson, this is known for its gardens, which are some of the most beautiful in Britain. The house is a quirky mix of buildings, include a tower with Vita’s writing room half way up it. It has around 200,000 visitors a year and be warned, isn’t particularly child-friendly. It’s all about not damaging the flowers, so you have to carry babies and toddlers and park your buggies - see pic above. (For those with heavy babies, maybe head to nearby Scotney Castle instead.) For more, click here.
The British Travel List is the sister newsletter to The Royal List. It is a weekly guide to my favourite places to visit and stay around the country. I am an experienced travel and lifestyle journalist who writes for British and Australian newspapers and magazines and I am passionate about British travel. For more of my work, visit kerryparnell.com