The 24 best places to visit in the East Midlands

Althorp is a Grade I listed stately home and estate in the civil parish of Althorp, in Daventry District, Northamptonshire, England of about 13,000 acres. By road it is about 6 miles northwest of the county town of Northampton and about 75 miles northwest of central London.

Boughton is both a family home and one of Britain’s grandest and best-preserved stately homes. The house is renowned for its outstanding collections of fine art, furniture, tapestries, porcelain and carpets.

Visitors can view a magnificent range of paintings by great artists, including The Adoration of the Shepherds by El Greco, Gainsborough’s, more than forty grisailles and portraits by Van Dyck, and Breaking Cover by John Wootton to name but a few.

Cottesbrooke Hall is a fine red brick and stone Queen Anne house, begun in 1702. It contains English and Continental furniture and porcelain, and a renowned picture collection – particularly of sporting and equestrian subjects.

In the tranquil Wild Garden, laid out around a stream, you can enjoy wild flowers, specimen acers, bamboos and gunneras. The more formal gardens surrounding the Hall are a series of individually planted ‘rooms’.

Deene Park has been the home of the Brudenell family for 500 years since 1514 and was the seat of the 7th Earl of Cardigan who led the Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854.

The house has grown in size as generations have made their own mark through the years, providing the visitor with an interesting yet complementary mixture of styles.

Once the largest private house in England and subsequently the palace of James I and prison of Charles I, Holdenby has appeared in the BBC’s acclaimed adaptations of Great Expectations and The Woman in White.

Sitting on a hill overlooking 2,000 acres of rolling countryside, its suite of elegant state rooms open onto beautiful Grade I-listed gardens making it an enchanting and ever popular venue for weddings.

Built in 1732, successive owners and influences have left their imprint on this elegant Palladian style home.

From noted antiquarian William Hanbury to banker and horse-racing enthusiasts Richard Naylor, each resident’s stories can be found within the hall; but none more so than Nancy Lancaster, ‘doyenne of the Country House style’ or the servants working and living ‘below stairs’ and in the laundry.

Nestled in the Northamptonshire countryside, and yet only a short drive from the motorway network, Lamport has a story worth hearing.

A Tudor founder, blind book collector, wayward 17th-century grand tourist, eccentric Victorian, Hollywood actor, commanding wives and dedicated daughters – Lamport is full of characters.

Sulgrave Manor was built in 1539 for Tudor wool merchant Lawrence Washington, a direct ancestor of George Washington, the future first President of the United States.

It remained in the ownership of the Washington family for only two generations, and was sold out of the family in 1659. Substantial alterations were made to the house in the 18th century and during the following century it was inhabited by a succession of tenant farmers.