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STATELY HOMES, PARKS & GARDENS
Norfolk’s history of wealthy landowners has left a legacy of magnificent stately homes open to the public. Our very own Downton Abbeys include Sandringham, the Royal family’s country retreat; Holkham Hall; Houghton Hall; the National Trust-owned Blickling Hall; Felbrigg Hall; Oxburgh Hall; and the Walpoles' Mannington Hall and Wolterton Hall.
Sandringham Estate
Sandringham, the Royal Family's private country house, all the main ground-floor rooms used by them, are open to the public. The Ballroom hosts a different exhibition each year, and the museum displays more of the family's possessions. There are sixty acres of informal gardens, six hundred acres of country park and the Sandringham Church.
Felbrigg Hall
Felbrigg Hall is a place of surprises and delights, a mixture of opulence and homeliness where each room has something to feed the imagination. Outside, the decorative and productive walled garden is a gardener's delight and inspiration, providing beautiful flowers for the hall, while the allotments within it provide fruit and vegetables for the community. The rolling landscape park, with a lake, 520 acres of woods, and waymarked trails, is beautiful to explore.
Hindringham Hall
Hindringham Hall is a Tudor flint house nestling at the bottom of a river valley, surrounded by a moat known to date from 1250. It originally enclosed a number of wooden medieval buildings and a community working for the Prior of Norwich to produce fish from the adjacent fish ponds. The south-east wing dates from the 15th century (Henry VII), and the remainder is Elizabethan (16th century). It is virtually unchanged from when it was enlarged by Martin Hastings in 1562.
Wolterton Hall and Mannington Hall are two magnificent, historic estates located in North Norfolk, about 1.25 miles apart. Long intertwined through the Walpole family, both estates offer stunning architecture, beautiful grounds, and public seasonal events.
Hoveton’s Hall
Hoveton’s Hall 15 acre Gardens are wellknown and loved by both locals and visitors alike and include the walled “Spider Garden”, the “Old Kitchen Garden” a one acre former Victorian walled kitchen garden now with the addition of lawns and herbaceous borders while still providing fruit, vegetables and herbs for the house. There is also a “Clematis Walk”, an Orchard, a “Woodland Walk”, the “Magnolia Garden” as well as two Lakes, The Arboretum, the Grade II listed Glasshouse and the 18th Century Grade II listed Ice Well. These beautiful Gardens begin with a burst of early Spring bulbs, the spectacular Rhododendrons and Azaleas in May and June through to the mid-summer delights of the ‘Spider Garden’. Full summer colours of Hydrangeas followed by autumn berried shrubs and leaf tints complete what is truly a garden for all seasons. There is the excellent Garden Kitchen Cafe.
East Ruston Old Vicarage Gardens
East Ruston Old Vicarage Gardens are one of the most remarkable and enjoyable gardens made in recent years. Created by Alan Gray and Graham Robeson, now 15 years old and expanding at a rate of knots, it is a feast of formal design, and decorative exuberance. It is located quite close to the sea and well protected from the full blast of the wind by dense wind breaks, making it possible to grow remarkably tender plants. Clustering about the Arts and Crafts Vicarage, walled and hedged compartments vary strongly in mood from cool formality to explosions of colour and form. Sculptures, lavishly planted pots and finely detailed walls and gates also play their decorative part.
Bickling Hall
Nobody ever forgets their first sight of Blickling Hall. The breath-taking red-brick mansion and ancient yew hedges sit at the heart of a magnificent garden and historic park in the beautiful Bure meadows. The landscape, with its hedges and narrow, tree-lined lanes, has changed little over the centuries and is quintessentially Norfolk. Hire a bike or grab a map of waymarked walks and head out into the park.
Holkham Hall
Steeped in history, Holkham Hall is a spectacular example of English Palladian style in local yellow brick, surrounded by acres of rolling parkland rich in wildlife and the nearby north Norfolk coast with its stunning beach. Discover more with cycle and boat hire, or explore the 18th-century walled gardens, the Grand Tour statuary and art collection, and the restored Victorian kitchen. The 3000-acre park contains a mile-long lake with a nature trail, a herd of fallow deer, and estate buildings left by the 18th-century farmer 'Coke of Norfolk’.
Houghton Hall
Houghton Hall is one of the finest Palladian-style houses in England, built and furnished between 1722 and 1735 for Robert Walpole, Britain’s first Prime Minister. The Hall is surrounded by parkland, home to a herd of white fallow deer and exotic deer, and features a restored walled garden and regular exhibitions.
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