A romp through the bedrooms of Mapperton with the Countess of Sandwich and Julie Montagu

hi everybody welcome back to mapperton and our house and Gardens tour I just want to quickly say hi to everybody there's so many people from America which is amazing but of course all over the world Las Vegas Nevada we've got Louisville Kentucky whoops that's just me talking to myself Hinsdale Illinois Thank You Mary we think you and your family are pretty amazing to offer these tours it's a highlight otherwise Groundhog Day I totally get you on that one hi fitzy hi Blaine we've got oceanside california midwest representing oh my gosh so many Rhode Island Del Mar New York mother and daughter her a brilliant new guys and you were going to come visit us on Mother's Day so it's good to be able to visit this from a distance and from Poundbury brilliant so just keep saying hello and Indiana remember I want to get all 50 states Michigan Tampa Texas we're doing it you guys thank you so much again I'm here with my wonderful mother-in-law that Countess of sandwich you would say hi to all always say hi and thank you very much for wanting to listen to us exactly good morning for you it's a wonderful sunny afternoon here but we do have somebody from wails nearby Wales we like that of course Reading Berkshire did I say that the right way Berkshire I know but it spells Pennsylvania we're getting there brilliant and Blaine from our American Montague cousin so there we go North Carolina I think that could be a new one London brilliant amazing keep it coming so as you guys probably saw we're gonna be doing the tour today on four different bedrooms historical bedrooms in the house and I'll be asking your questions and probably my questions to to my mother-in-law who knows more about this than anybody else so here we go over to you where are we right now well we're in the great reception room of the house which is called used to be called the great chair because the reception room in these Tudor and seventeenth-century Stewart manor houses was always on the first floor the first the biggest room was on the first floor and that of course is where they had the parties because downstairs in the hall it would have been full of sort of rather grubby eyed people right would have been too cold smoky and full of sort of chaps knowing bones and dogs right so you've treated up here and you've got an elegant room so this was not a bedroom as we're seeing it now this is why they were called the Great Chamber because there was a guy called mark juruá who wrote the great book on English country houses and sort of defined this and in this one we've got of course do you remember last week we were talking about Robert Morgan who has to marry his wife well he built that he built this where he put in this room so he put in the lovely fireplace there and with the overmantel there which has his motto on it loyalty will prove itself and the same coat of arms that we saw last or the week before now it's done in the drawing-room and then this wonderful frieze of Tudor people and this sort in Dorset is probably put in by his grandson not by his or even his son but as a generation later it's probably 1560s well the end of the rest of this room is 1540s right because when people come and tour they this is the ceiling that people really want to see because this is special is it special England yes that's it yeah three or four of these ceilings that's it and isn't there one similar in Hampton Court Palace North right we're getting lots of comments and what an amazing ceiling that ceiling that ceiling that ceiling exactly I might just comment back that there was one moment when I was asleep in this room when suddenly I heard a terrible drip drip drip and I of course with a cup switch on the light went and looked and there was coming through the ceiling here and I thought oh my god the ceiling will come down so I went up into the attics and opened one of the attic cupboards and crawled along to see where the water was coming in right and as I was crawling along I stubbed my knee on a rolled steel joist steel joist and I was so pleased because it meant that actually the house wasn't gonna fall down because mrs. lab or sure had put steel you know I got to the place and there was no baby bath there and luckily the ceiling didn't fall down so speaking of leaks by the way there are every time it rains here we do have lots of leaks don't we pretty much 15 years ago when we won the nation's finest manor house there was a article in The Daily Mail on mapperton and on me didn't kill you I said that we were always going round for leaks and when a rather distinguished group of historians came for a tour they bought me a bucket and mop because of the yes and if you've been to my yoga retreat before we had a massive leak that everybody had to help with buckets and pots and pans it's just what it's like all right so moving on so weird yet wonderful screen there yes is 17th century Dutch can I touch this it's good I can't thank you so I do have to ask I get very nervous so 17th century Dutch and they were probably panels for war and turned into a screen later and it is signed but I lost where the signature is about 10 years ago and I haven't spent enough time to put the purpose of screens because they came later on so it was well the purpose of screens were sort of because a lot of times people would put you know Norman against draughts right to keep ourselves interesting I just can't find it so we've got that's beautiful this is the most distinguished piece of furniture in the room you out his French Louis the 15th it's called a bureau play your a flat desk right and it's truly wonderful wonderful wonderful piece of French furniture so this and then also we've got this piece as well which is French and it's sort of Louie cars I mean sort of Louie the 15th not quite quite not good enough I mean not quite as good as hell nowhere near as good actually it was some rather pretty little silly pink roses well I think that's lovely and this room also has an incredible view doesn't it which you guys saw when you were when my husband who's filming it we can see it's got pictures or great views to the gardens down below let's see if he can get it going going there's the and there we go we got a we got a bit of it we'll take it in this room views views we like in this room as well let's look at these five pictures here yeah these are pictures of the family house Hinchingbrooke which we've talked about endlessly yeah and there are about 1740 and there are the primitive there then the perspective is a bit extremely odd and the size of the people is pretty odd and they must have been I think May it painted by a local painter locals are beautiful so these date back to when is our date I am sort of right 1740s so those of you who are just joining us remember Hinchingbrooke house was the original family seat and like many homes after the Second World War in across Britain it was sold so many homes and luckily it's still intact because in fact after the Second World War many homes were demolished or left in ruin because the home owners couldn't keep the upkeep so luckily we have this beautiful out here and of course I used to sleep in this bed here and I do remember one wonderful occasion when it was winter and I was going out to dinner with my father-in-law's uncle right as I went I said to my father no I'm going out to dinner and I'm coming back please don't lock me out oh dear and of course he did lock me out and I've rattled the door and of course it was locked so I had to crawl in down the anthracite down the coal chute right into the cellars yeah covered in thank goodness oh and he turned all the radiators off I didn't think I was going to well if we love all these stories so we do have we've got some we've got laughing somebody's laughing emoji laughing that we've got some questions I just want to pause before we move on we've got a couple questions about how many bedrooms does mapperton have and that's kind of a hard question to answer as depends how you use I mean well yeah big use I think's about ten isn't it thirteen there we go so here was thirteen exactly and then we've got the rugs do the rugs have any historical we've got questions about the area rugs do they have any historical I mean they're just fine that's person that is I think Caucasian no it's not it's um it's southern Asian and that is very fine tribal rug again right then you find tribal rug from probably okay fantastic we've got they're not doesn't know I mean they're historical rugs but there's no historical right right so then we'll carry on is there a large closet or dressing area for this room no no no no um how insulated in that house I noticed the windows are single pane he's looking right there so how he can here so how insulated is the house well I had double glazing put on these windows oh and your husband took it off oh my oh dear okay oh dear ok so there's your answer to that one yeah there was a question how it's like the answers I guess cost of a double plays panel right right and I don't understand it okay is there a notebook or binder with listings of furniture in history for each room of house well yes we've got of course we've got a we've got a full inventory of what everything in the house yeah yep and and and and we really you're on we don't keep it in the rooms but what we do have is we have in the house earlier when in Hinchingbrooke house they kept meticulous inventories meticulous inventories so we can see everything that's been sold for some of it yes all right we're entering into here we've got hello from Pacific Palisades California want to say hi to everybody we've got really quickly oh there's so many people who have come on now oh I'm not gonna get to Birmingham Alabama that's the one I would say another kentucky boston UK nottingham UK brilliant connecticut okay I've got you all so we're entering into now and Diane we're gonna answer that question right now in a second what we've got and now come into what's called the West room because it's in the West Wing and it's the only room that actually faces north and south it's the only room with a decent facing window actually right and yet it did have double glazing on the North facing windows as well so a little bit the important thing about this room is again there's absolutely stunning fireplace and the grass to work above it again Robert Morgan but this room is interesting because you you remember when we talked about the staircase hall and as in order to put in the grand staircase two rooms were shortened yes yes this is one of them right result it's got a very pretty and done by those wonderful contractors called the bastard brothers the best yeah the master brothers from Lansford and so that pretty little circle yeah fantastic so speaking of fireplaces is there fireplaces in each of the bedrooms not quite there are on this floor right aren't in the Attic bedrooms right so much there are a couple in the attic bedrooms Jack Williams both have one yeah so we've got the question about the tapestries were it's on one of the episodes of the TV series that's coming out on Sunday night in America Smithsonian Channel so I can't give too much away about these tapestries because they feature but we can say that they are 18th century Brussels that's what we that's what I use that yep that's what they said okay yeah 18th century in Brussels I'm going to say that the tapestries in this house suffered from the Montagues in the 19th century in Hinchingbrooke in the old family house because in that century those wicked Victorians simply chopped up tapestries to fit the bit of job they wanted to cover so I think you can see topped up and another one that we have is another one is cut yeah exactly it is not talked about yeah no no let's talk about these two beautiful bits of French furniture here these two commodes yeah Oh about 1710 very early very rich and very generous proportioned commodes these two lovely things and then this piece of furniture here is called a douche it's breezy and it's a daybed on which you sort of lay after lunch okay when I first came into this house I looked how awful yeah this material was it is in fact cut silk velvet and I took a bit a cent bit to a specialist firm in Northampton in the Silurian weaving areas and asked if how much it would be to get some and even then 30 years ago it was going to be about 600 times yard but you can see right there where it hasn't been faded it was wonderful yeah beautiful absolutely beautiful feels wonderful so we have a question about the furniture again and this is a really good was the majority of the furniture collected during a specific era or everything kind of over time which was I thought that the French furniture of which was quite a lot was probably collected after the French Revolution which was 1789 and it was either either collected possibly by the six counties Luise or it could have been a lot of English families thought they would scoop up French furniture after the Revolution so they said they're overseas or factotum Sauveur to France to the auctions of the good French furniture while the French fur of the French Fonuts owners have been guillotine right good parent brilliant furniture I love it so we've got a question about like are the bedrooms used or are they just for the tours so they're used they're used maybe not this one because let's talk about this bed that we don't really use this do we so for people to stay I'll well I have lived in here before I have always used it and it's probably 17th century could be a tiny bit earlier what what I'm not sure what name is showing there I think he thought it was a horsehair mattress really is that these sixteenth and seventeenth-century beds are always too short for 20s or 21st century people but my father-in-law had this lengthened you can see there so actually an ordinary person now can sleep in it quite comfortably and also these holes here's what I learned is that these holes were used to help keep the mat mattress high height so all these holes down here all the way across what helps make the mattress tight so and they used to I think my husband was trying to pull up that there was a horsehair mattress is that what you were thinking I knew it there's not there used to be a horsehair mattress it's actually a very pretty bad it's very charming and I think it would have had curtains around it we're gonna move to the next room and we can ask we can answer Betsy's question was the furniture brought from Hinchingbrooke or was it at mapperton brought from Hinchingbrooke so we've tried you've tried to keep the Hinchingbrooke collection we've just it's just in a different point exactly wide as we go through here I think it is important for your viewers all my friends in America not to see that here is my mother in a very tight look boxy picture from about 18:16 I should say and there next to her is a self-portrait of my mother-in-law John's mother rosemary Peter who was an artist smoking eternally cigarettes fantastic yep of course I mean a number of her friends always spoke or was oh my I mean I don't know there I you know I've never smoked a cigarette in my life this is about 1710 1720 when it was made it would not have been rigged so the rigging is properly later okay again terrific it is terrific frightful thing is that Julie you and I can do a little job on it this year which is we've got to take off the ultraviolet protection and put on new ultra violet protection I didn't even know that there was a survivor violet protection on it yes there you go somebody's asked what are used to polish all the wood furniture well it's abuse back furniture polish beeswax furniture polish good question I didn't even know that somebody has said to the one has to love the stripy mattress yeah okay you want to come in I want to come in here so I'm gonna come in here because this is I as an American I love this this is called a thunder box Lou so a thunder so a thunder box Lou is where the chamber pot used to be under is that correct see what I think it was always like this but you'd always have a handle at the side and you just pulled it yeah so this is can I just demo this Luke I know you can't get in but hopefully you can see it you're here I open it up use the loo and pull that and hold up which isn't working oh it's not working oh dear there you go but usually it does work usually it does work so this is we've got a few of these in the house don't wait one whoa - one more note one three yeah it doesn't work we tried it yeah yeah I did I went like this here we go we do that and then it flushes usually it works everybody but why are we in here Luke I'd like you just look at that little cartoon there that's a cartoon of something called Maisy I think she was called stuck in a traffic block and she's saying why can't I get anywhere and it's it's saying that my father in law who was against English foreign policy in Suez in 1956 had to put a couple of block ships in Piccadilly fantastic and that's a sandwich that is 18th century cartoon of the fourth Earl of Sandwich with two girls each sandwich each side of sandwich oh oh do you know I've seen that so many times I never heard it's now the penny is just dropped okay so we're gonna head into the third bedroom that we're showing on this tour and interesting this one let's go to this one first okay we're gonna go into the chapel room so it shouldn't be called a chapel room because that chapel was always a church but it's always been called the traffic room right that's why it's always been called the chapel room there it's a little bit indented there because that's where our cat likes to sleep Sophie well I was going to tell you another story about a mattress this has always been the main spare room of the house where people friends have slept we used to have concerts here by a very famous cellist called Steven listeners and Steven and his wife Pauline came to stay and he was going to do a concert and he said you know Karen I'm quite outspoken I'm never coming here again to do a concert oh because that mattress is like the Andes so I said okay well if you'll do this concert we'll put the condom they will put the proceeds of the concert towards a new mattress so as far as I know it's the only concert he's ever played for mattress there we go much better mattress than the one that you saw in the West room I'm certain of that we're gonna look at yeah okay what else in this room do we want to see some music these pictures of Rome of all eight or ten of them absolutely charming beautiful watercolors of Engraving so not at all valuable I mean that's sort of just very charming their typical 18th century postcards you know if you went to Rome you couldn't take a photograph so you've got to have some right now I've just been looking her up this little girl there's grown-up girls right but this one is here it's supposed to be Augusta Montagu who was one of the illegitimate children of the fourth out of Martha Raye incidentally she had nine children with the fourth Earl apparently which five lived so Martha Raye had nine with the fourth Earl and five Lassiter well married somebody called Henry's speed now you might think that's really boring it doesn't know because it was an alien alias his real name was of course Wa Dae back on de cocoa shows that was because after the French Revolution he and his four parent his family had come over to Britain and changed their names right French to English he then was arrested for fraud oh and and ran away to the Isle of Man not very far actually and then he then tried to get into Parliament got into part no they he got into Parliament hoped he wouldn't be arrested but was arrested no finally he went back to France after the restoration of the Marquis okay interesting story all right this really quickly this one I love I love this because this is gonna look like it's just been painted embroidered it's embroidered this one I couldn't I had to literally look at this yesterday to actually see that it's embroidered and it's so probably done by one of my forebears in Lancashire because my family came from East Lancashire under pendel and of course were associated with like switches probably that was done by one they had masses of time on their hands so they probably were just well we all have masses of time on our hands these days right we can start embroidering I'm just kidding all right last room that we're going to is right now called the Tudor room but as I learned yesterday is actually not called the Tudor room or shouldn't be or wasn't or something like that that right and don't yeah I know it shouldn't be called that's at all used to be called the chapel dressing room because it was the dressing room for the chapel room so this used to be a dressing room for the room we were just didn't really imagine that because when people came to stay the woman would have the big room and her husband would have a room to address the chapel dressing the dressing room to travel of the this has had mrs. LaBelle shared remember mrs. lab yes in the house from 1919 almonds because she clearly I think that fireplaces 17th century but she put her coat of arms up there coat of arms right so that's mrs. love Shea's area yeah it's a bit sort of gross rather late 19th 20th century whereas my husband John's coat of arms is kind of clean and clear now that I this is my favorite oh yeah because it's you hate my favorite that's so beautiful I think I was cold yeah got a choice and it was done by the same artist who painted my mother this was done in 95 to five or six or seven no six and painted by the same artist who painted that top they track the outer perfect I love it so we've got a couple questions can I know I just would like to that chapter we none of us know who he is Oh Stephanie Marty he's not a Montague he's not a hun Luke he's not a Haman we can recognize him if anybody recognize him yes don't hesitate to tell us exactly you'll win a prize we've got a couple questions here are there any William Morris textile fabrics wallpaper in mapperton yeah there's a so far down in the oh yeah which is William most material but it's a temporary material right right yes absolutely great standard and then we've got a really good question that says are as the bedrooms are all used where are the bathrooms right we're not but there are I promise you Nigel there are we've tried to put in bathrooms but let's remember that when this house was first built and and even all the as it continued to be built there's really only one bath is no more than that I mean there was one two three four bathrooms on this floor and then two upstairs okay but it is said that mapperton had the first bath in Dorset exactly do we know the square footage of the whole house no no no exactly we do have week just have to say hi to Ned and Sarah Pakenham um those Regency so net is a furniture experts those Regency Keynes chairs we just saw do want to read that are by Oh because I'll say kilos but I'm sure it's not I did well I believe you because I always believed no partner and we're made in 1803 so we've got a really good friend on here I've admitted through a lot of other ones made to the same designer look who told me that right so Fanta that yeah it is more when I came to this house they were painted nursery white because the Victorians either paint things I thought have chocolate brown or nursery white and I looked at these tests that's not correct they shouldn't be nurse nursery white and so I had them realized I'm guilty and exactly I loved having met and Sarah on here though that's brilliant so those of you tuning in that Pakenham is a very good friend of ours so is Sarah and he is a furniture expert he just spotted those and told us 1803 Gil owes brilliant Regency caned chairs so Oh Melissa thanks for your comment so kind they are called the months Montgomery pattern that's right yeah that's right it was a rather it was a rather well known why don't you come down and do some more and you can do a show exactly we do want none to do a show on furniture okay so that's it we are going to oh yeah can I just point out here we go in this hole here this whole way here here is my lovely mother-in-law and my lovely father-in-law and the painting in between them hasn't he did we just put that there yeah yeah I just thought I'd yeah but is it's lovely these are by Maggi Hambling and they are the cottages the drawings for the portrait that she did of us oh yes and the portrait is in London it's in London yes of course so um you guys thank you so much if you have any other questions please be sure to ask them now it's a beautiful day here I can the sunshine is incredible we'll give you a view out to the front of the house and again we'll be back here next Tuesday with my father-in-law the Earl of Sandwich will will be discussing naval history and heaps yes I must mention two things that I completely forgot in the Great Chamber we has been used for filming and the last time it was used for filming it was for far from the madding crowd with Karim Allah Karim Allah GaN and they read they dress the room completely and they painted it navy blue and it looked wonderful yes we've had at Gwyneth Paltrow here with Emma Carey Mulligan far from the crowd and coming soon on Netflix Rebecca Lily James we've had Robert Downey jr. and Hugh Grant and all the rest of them yes that's true so again you guys thank you so much for joining as we are closed to the public so as we are closed to the public for the for the time being and for who knows how long any donations that you can give goes to the upkeep of of the of this historic house and towards obviously preserving England's heritage we appreciate any donations they go again straight into the repairs and the upkeep of this house my husband has already had to fix how many leaks so far so thank you guys so much he loved the stories and the personal touches and that's what makes it can I just say one more thing and that's what make these makes these homes so special and very different from going to a museum or a National Trust home where it is somebody who's of course told the stories and they're just retelling those stories we have stories straight from my mother and my father-in-law who know these stories better than anybody else will ever know them and so that's what makes this makes this tour even more special so thank you guys so much for joining in somebody put great filming Luke we won't even show you guys the one down the other halt that is a bad one and still has to be fixed thank you guys and those of you in America I am gonna just shoot my show it's airing premiering Sunday night May 17th 9:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time and American aristocrats guide to great estates and we I start in Scotland at Inverrary castle set your DVR especially those of you watching Michael Jordan's the last dance I know it's at the same time set your DVR and make sure that you record it see you guys next Tuesday bye have a lovely day he's locked down that was jolly good think cheerio love it somebody put your lovely elegant wonderful voice

Channel: Mapperton Live: This (un)Aristocratic Manor Life

Views: 117,742

Keywords: Mapperton house, Dorset, Julie Montagu, An American Aristocrat's Guide to Great Estates, montagu, sandwich, history, british history, grand historic tours, stately home, stately home tour, viscountess Hinchingbrooke, Lady Sandwich, countess of sandwich, Far From the Madding Crowd, film location, Netflix Emma, bedroom, country house bedroom, Restoration (film)

Id: sCFpDi2FNIo

Length: 33min 35sec (2015 seconds)

Published: Wed May 13 2020