The spirit of the age
HOLKHAM HALL is one of those rare buildings that seems to embody the spirit of the age in which it was created. Its outward appearance, set in spreading parkland, answers the popular ideal of a great nobleman’s seat. So, too, does the sumptuous interior, which not only preserves most of its original collections and furnishings, but much associated documentation. Added to which, exemplary recent stewardship of the house means that there are few places a modern visitor can get so close to the realities of life on the grand scale in 18th-century Britain.
Such riches have, naturally, attracted a great deal of scholarly attention, not least by figures such as John Cornforth, former Architectural Editor of COUNTRY LIFE, and, more recently, by the former archivist of the house, Christine Hiskey, in her own magisterial history titled simply Holkham (2016). This pair of articles draws heavily on such work, but it also seeks to stand back from it and, with the help of new photography, offer a short, fresh overview of the story by which this familiar and celebrated building came into being.
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