Burton Agnes Hall

During our recent visit to the East Riding of Yorkshire, we called in to Burton Agnes Hall, an Elizabethan manor house in the village of Burton Agnes, near Driffield. It was built by Sir Henry Griffith in 1601–10

There is an older Norman Manor House, originally built in 1173 on an adjacent site; both buildings are now Grade I listed buildings

 

 This is an old dog kennel

The estate has been in the hands of the same family since Roger de Stuteville first built a manor house on the site in 1173. In 1457 Sir Walter Griffith came to live there. The Griffiths were a Welsh family who had emigrated to Staffordshire in the thirteenth century and inherited the Burton Agnes estate.

In 1989 the property was left to a distant cousin, Simon Cunliffe-Lister, then aged twelve, grandson of Viscount Whitelaw and son of the 3rd Earl of Swinton.

Today, the estate is owned by the Burton Agnes Preservation Trust and is managed by Cunliffe-Lister and his mother, Hon Susan Whitelaw.

 

The gardens boast 3,000 plant species and include the National Collection of Campanulas

The walled flower garden has a games motif with a central chess board played on black and white paving stones. Other games include draughts, snakes and ladders and hoop toss. Each of these games is in a separate garden surrounded by plants selected by flower colours

The walled garden also had many, many butterflies

This bird house is at the centre of the maze - I took several wrong turns before reaching the centre!

We came across this pair on the Woodland walk.

For more details of this Hall see Burton Agnes Hall

For any readers who are steam engine enthusiasts, a Hall Class railway engine was named Burton Agnes Hall, and is preserved at Didcot Railway Centre