SCOTNEY CASTLE

Squeezing in a bit of recreational rest before embarking on what I hope will be our final furniture building project with a day out at the picturesque Scotney Castle.

Not far from Tunbridge Wells, this beautiful stately pile is perfect for a relaxing day out.

Scotney Castle - main house

For gardeners, there’s a delightful walled garden filled with colourful flowers, fruit and veg.

The Walled Garden

Bees also enjoying the garden

Bumper pumpkin patch

For those who like property porn, there’s a wonderful country house to explore. Clearly the Hussey family loved wood panelling and libraries judging by the copious amount of both things in almost every room.

Gorgeous wood panelled staircase

Purchased from TKMaxx?

Cosily furnished lounge

Imagine sleeping in one of these

Or this bed?

Being an ardent book lover myself, cue a million photos of bookcases and close examination of the construction of these.

How did they make those bookcases?

More books than we've got

Anyone earwigging our conversations as we roamed from room to room would think we were interior designers rather than a couple of over-enthusiastic DIY duffers, our running commentary on decorative pelmets, the merits of dowelled joints or the durability of water colour prints no doubt an amusement to all.

Love that pantry

For outdoor explorers, the estate has numerous walks including a secluded Quarry Garden or paths leading down to the original castle building, a rather fairy tale structure surrounded by its own lily pad filled moat.

Lots of lovely walks around the estate

The picturesque old castle

I almost preferred the old ruined castle in terms of its dreamy, story-book exterior and beautiful setting but could see why the party-throwing poshos that previously owned this estate would have wanted a much bigger house with modern amenities.

Like a fairytale don't you think?

In a way, you’ve got to feel sorry for these aristos. Imagine being left an enormous estate because it’s been in your family for millennia only to find you haven’t a chance in hell sustaining the lifestyle because you’re as poor as a church mouse. If there isn’t a convenient ‘fire’ to justify an insurance payout, it seems there always comes a time in the life of the landed gentry when eventually they have to turn these properties over to the National Trust probably in settlement of death duties or because of the expense involved in maintaining these historical buildings.

Hand it over to the National Trust

Just imagine having to find the cash to fix leaky cast iron guttering or rebuild an original plaster cornice, not to mention the headache in respect of planning regulations as in this type of edifice even the toilets are Grade I listed. It’s bad enough scraping together enough pennies to buy timber for shelving.

Still, it's always interesting to see how the other half lived and these beautiful historical buildings deserve to be preserved for posterity.

Scotney Castle gets our thumbs up as they've created a shrine to their cats!