Longford Castle, near Salisbury. This castle houses a hugely important art collection. Tours of the collection are available via the National Gallery and are very much sought after and are not frequent occurrences. We have been very fortunate to be able to organise this visit. The castle itself is one of the grandest stately homes in Britain and has been the residence of one family for over 300 years, the Earls of Radnor.

The cost for this visit will be £64.00; a buffet lunch is included in the price.

Great Dixter Garden, near Rye, and to Rye itself. Great Dixter Garden was the home of the gardener and writer Christopher Lloyd, and the garden is exceptionally interesting and beautiful.

Rye is an old, fortified town with great character. Some streets are cobbled, so sensible shoes are required. It is a Cinque Port and contains an interesting museum in the Ypres tower, named after its original owner John de Ypres, and the Lamb House, where Henry James lived from 1897 until 1915 (NT). There is also a beautiful 900-year-old church (St Mary’s), the famous Mermaid Inn (rebuilt 1420), haunt of the local smuggling gangs, and Rye Heritage Centre, where a quaint sound and light experience can be seen (and heard!).

The cost for this visit will be £46.00. No food or drink are included.

PLEASE NOTE that our third visit on Thursday June 11th to Great Dixter Garden, near Rye, and to Rye itself will depart at 9.00 am (not 8.30 am as indicated on the tickets).

The castle was built at the end of the 11th century. It has been the seat of the Dukes of Norfolk and their ancestors for 850 years . This year the castle includes a special exhibition entitled ‘’ Queen Victoria and the Dukes of Norfolk’’.

Tickets are £53.00 for a free flow visit to the castle and its  gardens . Add 50p if paying by cheque.

We shall leave the Church of the Sacred Heart, Sunningdale SL5 0JYat 8.30am and leave Arundel at 3.30pm.

For enquiries contact Janet Drayton on janetdrayton@hotmail.com

In the mid -1780s George, Prince of Wales, rented a small lodging house overlooking a fashionable promenade in Brighton. The prince had been advised by his physicians to benefit from Brighton’s climate and to try out the sea water treatments. The house was transformed firstly into a modest villa and then into the magnificent oriental palace by John Nash. Particular attention was paid to lighting, heating and sanitation, as well as to the provision of the most modern equipment of the day for the Great Kitchen. George’s presence had an enormous impact on the prosperity and social development of Brighton from the 1780s.

Cost £52.50

Oxford and Broughton Castle, near Banbury. Broughton Castle is a moated and fortified manor house.  The core of the house was built in 1306 but most remaining today dates from the 1550s.  It was a centre of opposition to Charles I and was besieged and damaged after the battle of Edgehill in 1642.  It is today the home of Martin Fiennes, 22nd Lord Saye and Sele.  The castle has been in the family since 1377.  It has been used for many film locations, including Wolf Hall, The Crown, Shakespeare in Love, and the Madness of King George.  We shall leave Sunningdale at 9 am and leave Broughton Castle at 4 pm to return.  Tickets for this visit will be £38.50 (or £25.50 for Historic Houses members).  Tickets will be sold at the May, June and July lectures or by contacting me (Janet Drayton) at janetdrayton@hotmail.com or on 01483 769874.  On the visit day call 077652126986.

Sudeley Castle and Gardens, near Cheltenham Visit on Thursday 1st May 2025 This is the home of the Dent-Brocklehurst family and is a Tudor jewel with formal gardens and a 1000 years of history.

Tickets are £57 and include a History of Sudeley group talk and tea/coffee/cake on arrival.

For members of Historic Houses Association the price is £39.50.

All visits leave from and return to the Church of the Sacred Heart car park, Sunningdale SL5 0JJY. We leave at 8.30 am.

Relatives and friends are very welcome to join our visits. If numbers are limited members have priority.

Any queries , please contact Janet Drayton on janetdrayton@hotmail.com or 01483 769874

Leighton and Sambourne Houses, Holland Park Visit on Friday 28th March 2025 These are the historical artist studio homes of the celebrated painter Frederic Leighton and Punch magazine illustrator Edward Linley Sambourne Tickets are £43.00 for those aged 65 plus and £45.00 for those aged less than 65.

There is now a waiting list for this visit.

All visits leave from and return to the Church of the Sacred Heart car park, Sunningdale SL5 0JJY. We leave at 9.00 am.

Relatives and friends are very welcome to join our visits. If numbers are limited members have priority.

Any queries, please contact Janet Drayton on janetdrayton@hotmail.com or 01483 769874

Chartwell, near Westerham, Kent (Winston Churchill’s house)

Tickets for this visit will be sold at the June and July lectures or you can contact Janet Drayton on janetdrayton@hotmail.com or 01483 769874. The coach will leave the Church of the Sacred Heart car park, Sunningdale SL5 0JY, at 9.00 am and will leave Chartwell for the return at 3.30 pm. The cost will be £20.50 for National Trust members or £38.50 for non-NT members. The price does not include any refreshments.

The morning will be spent at Kenwood House ( Free entry) then after lunch we move on to Fenton House (NT), a short distance away also in Hampstead.

Tickets for this day visit will be sold at the May and June lectures, or you can contact Janet Drayton on janetdrayton@hotmail.com or 01483 769874. The coach will leave the Church of the Sacred Heart car park, Sunningdale SL5 0JY, at 8.30 am and will leave Fenton House for the return at 3.30 pm. The cost will be £21.00 for National Trust members or £32.40 for non-NT members. The price does not include any refreshments.

The private home of King Charles III and Queen Camilla on Friday 10th May. The visit includes a guided tour of the gardens and a two-course lunch (note groups have to have either lunch or a champagne tea).  We shall leave the Church of the Sacred Heart, Sunningdale SL5 0JY at 8.30am and aim to leave Highgrove at 4pm.  The cost will be £86. 

The number of places are limited for this visit so if you would like to go, please email Janet as soon as possible - janetdrayton@hotmail.com – or phone 01483 769874 in order to secure a place.

Exbury Gardens are near Southampton.

Your ticket priced at £38 will include a welcome talk about the gardens and coffee/tea on arrival.

Departure time will be 8.30am from the Verona Fathers car park and we shall leave Exbury at 3.30pm.

Tickets can be bought at the March and April meetings or by contacting Janet on 01483 769874 or janetdrayton@hotmail.com.

Bletchley Park was once the top-secret home of the World War Two Codebreakers. Exhibitions, set within beautifully restored historic buildings, tell the story of this once top-secret operation. The museum includes films, interactive displays, special collections and faithfully recreated WW2 rooms. Visitors will find out about the brilliant minds and complex machines that made this vital work possible, and discover the global impact Bletchley Park had on the outcome of the last war.

We shall be leaving the Church of the Sacred Heart at Sunningdale SL5 0JY at 8.30am and leaving Bletchley for the return at 3.30pm.

The cost will be £43. The trip includes a guided tour but does not include any food or drink. 

A visit to Bateman’s ( Rudyard Kipling’s home ) and Scotney Castle is planned for Thursday September 28th. These are both National Trust properties.

The cost will be £23 for NT members and £50-50 for non NT members. Both visits will be free flow with lunch taken at Bateman’s and the morning spent there then the afternoon spent at Scotney Castle where people can have a cup of tea, cake etc. No food is included in the price.

We shall leave Sunningdale at 9am and leave Scotney Castle for the return at 3.45pm.

Tickets will be sold at the July and September meetings. Places can be booked by contacting Janet Drayton by email : janetdrayton@hotmail.com  or by phoning 01483 769874. You are welcome to bring non-members /friends.

A visit to Kingston Lacy house and garden at Wimborne Minster has been arranged for Thursday 29th June 2023.

Kingston Lacy has been the home of the Bankes family for more than 300years. It is described as an Italian Palace in rural Dorset and contains an acclaimed art collection, exquisite carvings and lavish interiors. It also has an extensive garden and parkland, including a Japanese garden.

The cost will be £38 , or £23 for National Trust members , payment by bank transfer or cash and payment of an extra 50p for cheques. The cost does not include any food or drink.

We shall leave the Church of the Sacred Heart, Sunningdale SL5 0JY at 8.30am and leave Kingston Lacy at 3.30pm.

Tickets will be sold at the May and June lectures. If you would like to reserve a place on this visit, please contact Janet Drayton by email. janetdrayton@hotmail.com or phone 01483 769874.

You are very welcome to bring friends who are non members of Windlebrook.

Visit to Blenheim Palace near Oxford. Departure 8.30am, leaving 3.30pm.
Tickets  £53 per person.  Free flow and places to eat.

Visit to Audley End House near Saffron Walden, Departure 9.30am, leaving 4pm. Tickets £35.50 per person (£20.60 if English Heritage member).  There are no guided tours, so a free-flow visit, no food included but cafes available.

Kelmscott Manor, near Lechlade, Oxfordshire was the summer home of William Morris, Kelmscott Manor is a Grade I listed farmhouse, built around 1600 adjacent to the River Thames. William Morris chose it as his summer home, signing a joint lease with the Pre-Raphaelite painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti in the summer of 1871. Morris loved the house as a work of true craftsmanship, totally unspoilt and unaltered and in harmony with the village and the surrounding countryside. He considered it so natural in its setting as to be almost organic, it looked to him as if it had "grown up out of the soil".  It’s beautiful gardens, with barns, dovecote, a meadow and stream, provided a constant source of inspiration. The house - perhaps the most evocative of all the houses associated with Morris - contains an outstanding collection of the possessions and works of Morris, his family and his Arts & Crafts associates, including furniture, original textiles, pictures,  carpets, ceramics and metalwork.

The cost is £40 and includes a guided tour and coffee and biscuits at Kelmscott. Lunch will be at the Bay Tree hotel at Burford , price not included . There will be an opportunity to explore Burford, we shall leave there at 3.30pm.

A visit has been booked to Sezincote House and garden near Moreton in Marsh, Gloucestershire for Thursday May12th. The house is built in the style of an Indian Mogul residence and was begun by Samuel Pepys’ grandson who worked for the East India Company.

The cost for this visit will be £48 and will include a guided tour of the house and a light lunch at the nearby Cotswold Food Store.   Sezincote has a cafe for tea and cake but does not do lunches. We will leave Sunningdale at 9.30 am and have a short comfort stop en route . We expect to leave Sezincote for the return journey at approximately 4pm.

If you are a member of the Historic Houses Association then the visit will cost £35.50.

Tickets will be sold at the March and April lecture meetings or you can contact Janet Drayton by email on janetdrayton@hotmail.com or phone 01483 769874. Please pay by bank transfer or cash (an extra 50p will be charged for cheques).

Arrangements for a visit to Leonardslee Gardens near Horsham hopefully on March 29th are in process of being finalised and tickets will be available at the January lecture onwards. Details will be put on the website and will be available from Janet Drayton from January 20th , 01483 769874 or janetdrayton@hotmail.com.

The visit to Chiddingstone Castle (near Edenbridge, Kent) will include coffee and biscuits on arrival, a ploughman's lunch and a guided tour at the Castle.  

Chiddingstone Castle has Tudor origins, Victorian rooms and was remodelled in the 19th century to resemble a medieval castle. It has been owned and lived in by an eclectic mix of people: the Streatfield family, Lord Astor, military forces during WWII, Long Dene School and the collector Denys Eyre Bower.

In 1955, Bower bought Chiddingstone Castle to house his extensive collections of art and antiquities. His dream was to share his collections with the nation and to preserve them for future generations.

After his death in 1977, a charitable trust was set up to honour his wish.

In the morning we visit Strawberry Hill house and garden commencing with coffee on arrival followed by a guided tour of the house.

Strawberry Hill house is in Twickenham . It is a Georgian Gothic revival house and was built in 1747 as Horace Walpole's summer residence. Horace Walpole was a pivotal figure in 18th century society, literature, art and architecture. Born in 1717, he was the son of Sir Robert Walpole, Britain's first Prime Minister.

We will have lunch in a garden centre adjacent to Dorney Court in Windsor . 

Dorney Court is regarded as one of England's finest early Tudor houses. It dates from 1440. We shall have a guided tour of the house, which has been used for the filming of ' The other Boleyn girl' and also the recent ' Mary, Queen of Scots' among other films.

The charge of £39 includes the guided tours at the two venues but not the coffee or lunch.

This house is near Tetbury, Gloucestershire and has been lived in since the reign of Elizabeth 1. The main historical interest is centred on the English Civil War. It has featured in many television productions including ' Poirot', ' House of Elliot', ' Tess of the D' Ubervilles', ' Wolf Hall' and most recently it has been ' Trenwith House' in Poldark. Our visit will include lunch and a tour of the house.

A self-guided tour of the Bank of England from approximately 10.30 and then
meet outside Mansion House no later than 1.50pm for a guided tour.

There are plenty of cafes/restaurants in the area for coffee/early lunch and it
is an easy walk from the Bank to Mansion House.
The cost per person is £21.15.

This will be a day visit to this impressive house and parkland in Hertfordshire. It will include a guided tour of the house. The Jacobean house was built in 1611 by Robert Cecil, First Earl of Salisbury and Chief Minister to James I and has been the home of the Cecil family ever since. An earlier building on the site was the Royal Palace of Hatfield , which was the childhood home and favourite residence of Elizabeth I.

Stonor Park

This has been the home of the Stonor family for 850 years. It contains a fine collection of furniture, paintings, drawings, bronzes and historic maps. It also has a large garden. It is situated on the edge of Henley on Thames. We shall have a guided tour and also coffee on arrival and lunch here included.

Greys Court

This is a picturesque Tudor Manor House set in intimate walled gardens and wooded parkland. It is also near Henley on Thames and we shall be free to wander in the house and garden in the afternoon.

Photo: A prospect of Dover Castle by John Wootton in the Ballroom

Built as an archbishop’s palace and situated in a huge medieval deer- park, the house has been lived in by the Sackville family for the last 400 years. The house is full of treasures – paintings by Gainsborough, Reynolds, Van Dyck, rare 17th century tapestries and furniture, some of which came from the Jacobean court.

Photo: Firle Place

Farley Farm is an early 18th century farmhouse set in beautiful countryside with views over the South Downs in a large garden which contains many modern sculptures. 

In 1949, Surrealists Lee Miller (photographer) and Roland Penrose (artist) moved here and the house soon became the meeting place of some of the key figures of modern art including Picasso, Man Ray, Max Ernst and Joan Miró. Their work is now displayed throughout the house giving visitors a fabulous insight into the lives and art of Miller, Penrose and their friends. 

Firle Place is an outstanding privately-owned country house that dates from the time of Henry VIII but was substantially remodelled in the 18th Century. The house, gardens and notable collection of works of art and porcelain are of national importance and the estate has been the home of the Gage family for over 500 years

Photo: The Housekeeper by Vanessa Bell in Charleston House

In 1916, on Virginia Woolf’s recommendation, the painters Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant, his friend and lover David Garnett, and Vanessa Bell’s two sons, along with Henry the dog, moved to Charleston, an ordinary farmhouse in East Sussex. Dating from the late sixteenth century and altered in the nineteenth century, it had previously been used as a boarding house. It was to be occupied by the family and their friends – the ’Bloomsbury group’ - for the next sixty-four years.

On purchasing Sheffield Park in 1769, John Baker Holroyd (later the First Earl of Sheffield) set about remodelling the house and garden in the latest fashionable style.  He brought in architect James Wyatt to design the house, and Capability Brown to work on the garden. Brown created walks through the woodlands, with clearings to give views down to the five lakes and nearby Fletching village. Over the last year, the gardeners have been restoring the landscape back to Brown’s vision. Our visit in March will be in time for a wonderful display of spring bulbs and shrubs.

Due to its reasonably close proximity the cost of a coach is not justified so Members should make their own transport arrangements.

Details of a meeting time will be published shortly both here and in the Bulletin together with a note on parking facilities.

Hampton Court train station is 200 yards from the Palace entrance.

Visit to Eltham Palace, an Art Deco house with a medieval Great Hall and ornamental gardens. It was home of Virginia and Stephen Courtauld. This will be followed by a visit to Dulwich Picture Gallery.

Visit to Mottisfont Abbey and country estate with its famous rose garden.

Visit to Waddesdon Manor, which houses Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild's outstanding collection of art treasures and has beautiful surrounding gardens.

Friday 5th May to Tuesday 9th May

Extended Visit:  The Art, Historic Houses and Gardens of Cornwall.  This is based in Falmouth and includes visits to Lanhydrock, Prideaux Place, Lost Gardens of Heligan, St Michael's Mount,Tate St Ives and Barbara Hepworth Museum as well as Killerton (Devon) and SS Great Britain(Bristol).  

Visit to Henry VIII's warship 'Mary Rose' in the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard.