Thornbridge Hall stands at Ashford in the Water, three kilometres north-west of Bakewell, and it is a rather unusual proposition among Peak District houses: a privately owned Victorian hall, lived in, opened for guided tours on set days, with a hundred acres of gardens around it and no National Trust apparatus at all.
Most visitors have heard the name because of the beer.
There has been a house here since the sixteenth century, but what you see is largely the work of the nineteenth: a Jacobean-revival hall remodelled in the 1870s by the Sheffield steel money of the Longsdon family, and again in the early twentieth century by George Jobson Marples, who filled it with salvage — panelling, fireplaces, stained glass and carving rescued from demolished houses and churches.
That salvage is what makes the interior interesting. The house is a collection of other buildings’ best bits, assembled with enormous confidence, and it should not work as well as it does.
It later served as a teacher training college and then as a Sheffield University hall of residence before returning to private hands in 2002, and the current owners have restored it.
Access to the interior is by guided tour on set days, and the tours are the reason the estate’s visitor reviews are as good as they are — small groups, guides who know the house and the archives, and an atmosphere a good deal less formal than a national institution manages.
Book ahead. Tour days are limited and they fill.
A hundred acres, and open more often than the house.
The Italian garden, terraced with statuary. The water gardens and a series of ponds. A koi pool. The kitchen garden. A hedge maze, woodland walks, a temple, follies and a great deal of Victorian statuary — much of it, like the interior fittings, salvaged from elsewhere.
There is a café with a strong reputation for its food, which for a house of this size is unusual and which a good many visitors mention before they mention the gardens.
Thornbridge Brewery began in 2005 in the hall’s outbuildings, and it is one of the most significant British breweries of the last twenty years — the beer that came out of that stable block did a great deal to establish modern British craft brewing.
The brewery has long since moved to a larger site in Bakewell itself, where it can be visited, and the hall and the brewery are now separate businesses sharing a name and a history. Do not turn up at the hall expecting to tour a brewery.
Season: the gardens and the tours run to a defined season with limited days, typically spring to autumn. Check before travelling — this is not a house that opens daily.
Booking: essential for house tours; advisable for the gardens on busy days. Online booking in advance is often cheaper.
Time: an hour for a tour, two to three hours with the gardens and the café.
Accessibility: the gardens are on terraces and slopes; the house has stairs. Contact the estate in advance.
By car: three kilometres from Bakewell on the Ashford in the Water road, with parking on site.
On foot: about four kilometres from Bakewell via Ashford, or along the Monsal Trail and down.
By bus: services between Bakewell and Buxton stop at Ashford in the Water, a short walk away.
Ashford in the Water, next door, has the Sheepwash Bridge — a packhorse bridge with a walled pen where sheep were washed before shearing — a good tea room and a dining pub. Monsal Head and the Monsal Trail are a short distance north.
Yes, by guided tour on set days. Book ahead — the days are limited.
Not any more. Thornbridge Brewery started in the hall’s outbuildings in 2005 and has since moved to a larger site in Bakewell. The hall and the brewery are separate businesses.
Yes — a hundred acres with Italian terraces, water gardens, a maze and woodland, plus a well-regarded café.
No. It is privately owned and lived in, which is part of what makes the tours good.
Three kilometres north-west at Ashford in the Water.