Beauty is to be enjoyed by all

History is about so much more than rooms, roofs, and relics. Independent heritage is alive in a way that no museum can be. In our houses, children are born and raised, dogs run about, the floors get muddy, and the sofas are used for sitting on.

And everyone is welcome to explore these fascinating places, in a score of ways: to visit, eat, shop, stay, get married, hold an event, or make a movie. Why would you do those things anywhere else, when some of the most ancient, exquisite, and extraordinary spaces, dripping with history and craftsmanship and the achievements of the finest minds in art architecture, are available instead.

It’s this that makes our places so special. They’re amongst humanity’s most significant aesthetic achievements – they easily give rise records, epitomes, and superlatives, from UNESCO World Heritage Sites to places with an almost mystical air of meaning and significance. But they’re also alive and evolving and working places, being used, as they were intended to be, for fun and inspiration. Historic houses aren’t just the works of past masters – they might be the places where the next Robert Adam, Capability Brown, or Hans Holbein will find their spark to create the twenty-first century’s masterpieces.