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| Mapperton Gardens is a romantic
valley garden deep into a lost Dorset combe among tumbling hills and unspoilt
countryside. The gardens descend from the great lawn, through the formal
topiary down to the woodland garden. The manor house with its church, stable
block, coach house, dovecote and courtyard identifies with its
countryside, a glorious harmony of golden sandstone. Pevsner's Dorset
guide reckons "there can hardly be a more enchanting manorial group than
Mapperton." The house, Elizabethan in origin, enlarged in the late 1670s, is a marvellous example of a West Country manor in harmony with its surroundings, growing into the landscape with every century. Now, the home of the Earl and Countess of Sandwich, Mapperton continues to be a family house and harks back to the restoration of Charles II when the first Earl of Sandwich brought the King back from Holland. |
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The Nation’s Finest Manor House voted by Country Life May 2006 |