Castle Howard

I spent half a day at Castle Howard back in June 2009. This is a stately home a little bit Northeast of York. There is a lot of great art inside, including lots of Roman stuff (or convincing replicas at any rate). The central atrium is particularly impressive. It also has a very nice garden, with some decent fountains and woods.

This was the setting for two different filmings of Brideshead Revisited, and some of the rooms in the house have been left as they were done up for filming. It's pretty interesting to see the difference between the fake fanciness of movie plaster and the real thing!

The approach to the house is majestic, as it is with all of the stately homes I've visited here.

The walking tour of the house takes you past lots of great pieces.

The decor of the rooms was all a bit busy, but I guess it allowed them to display more of their art.

This looked like an authentic Roman floor mosaic.

There was a big fire in the house back in 1940, and it did some serious damage to the central atrium. It has been mostly restored, and looks pretty amazing. You can't quite get the scope of it from the pictures, but it's very tall and majestic.