Waddesdon Manor

Waddesdon Manor is an impressive French Renaissance-style château set in Buckinghamshire, with sweeping landscapes and manicured gardens. Originally developed in the 1870s and 1880s for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild to house his collections of decorative arts, Old Master paintings and 18th-century portraits, Waddesdon welcomed the fashionable world with Saturday to Monday house parties. Ferdinand’s social circle spanned royalty, including the Prince of Wales, historians, explorers and writers.

To secure its future, Waddesdon was left to the National Trust in 1957. The Rothschild Foundation now manages Waddesdon on behalf of the National Trust, and has continued to add to the collections, with both 18th-century and contemporary art.