The private made public

Discover how the UK’s country houses defied the odds to survive as historic monuments and cultural centres

When COUNTRY LIFE’s Henry Avray Tipping spotted a 17th-century four poster languishing in a Herefordshire attic in 1911, he set off a chain of events that saw the bed leave its ancestral home and land at The Met in New York

Two great houses, rich with fascinating history and beautifully apportioned, put the county on the map

“ I met Charles Dickens today, except he had clearly been so busy working on The Mystery of Edwin Drood that he had fallen asleep, so I didn’t get to speak to him!” I laughingly proclaimed to Ro when

Glamis Castle, Angus, part 2 The seat of the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne

Home to a marquess and an RAF air crew – and believed to be the birthplace of a Queen – this red-brick Jacobean mansion contains stories spanning centuries