The stately homes you’ll see on screen in 2025 – from Downton Abbey to 28 Years Later
Next year we’ll see a number of historic UK properties on TV shows, such the real-life Traitors castle in Scotland and the imposing Burghley House featured in Frankenstein – Tamara Hinson has rounded up some the most magnificent, including many you can visit
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Your support makes all the difference.If you find yourself drooling over the spectacular (but often far-flung) settings that feature in the TV shows and movies you’re binge-watching this Christmas, we’ve got good news: numerous stunning stately homes right here in the UK will double as backdrops for blockbusters due out in 2025.
They join a long list of historic properties that have become just as famous as their A-list stars, whether it’s Blenheim Palace, which has appeared in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (among others), or Yorkshire’s Castle Howard, a setting for ITV’s Victoria and BBC’s Death Comes to Pemberley.
So, at a time when set-jetting – which refers to tourists who travel to locations that feature in TV series and movies – is being touted as one of the top travel trends of 2025, here are six stately homes which will soon be gracing our screens.
Broughton Sanctuary, North Yorkshire
Broughton Sanctuary, near Skipton, is one of the filming locations for Netflix’s House of Guinness series, airing in late 2025, and it’s also been a key filming location for All Creatures Great and Small. Owner and heir Roger Tempest has transformed it into one of the UK’s most innovative wellness retreats – a sprawling estate with a sixteenth-century manor house surrounded by walking trails that lead to hidden woodland saunas and wild swimming spots. The estate’s self-catering holiday homes include quaint cottages and two apartments in the manor house. It’s especially popular with stargazers – in 2025 its annual Broughton by Night astronomy evenings will be held in January, February and March, and it will host various events connected with Yorkshire Dales National Park’s tenth Dark Skies Festival in February and March.
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Highclere Castle, Hampshire
The third Downton Abbey film, due to air in September 2025, will thrust Highclere Castle, home of the 8th Earl and Countess of Carnarvon, into the spotlight once again. Just as impressive as this baroque country house is the wider estate – 2,000 acres of parkland designed by Capability Brown, who relocated the village of Highclere to make way for his rolling lawns and shimmering lakes. Today, it’s also a magnet for budding Egyptologists – the fifth Earl of Carnarvon financed Howard Carter’s mission to find Egypt’s Tutankhamun’s tomb. Many of the relics discovered there were donated to the British Museum but in the 1980s a Highclere Castle butler stumbled across cupboards stuffed with Egyptian artefacts (as you do), some of which are now on display in the castle’s Egyptian Exhibition.
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Fountains Abbey & Studley Royal, Yorkshire
This National Trust estate is one of the backdrops for 28 Years Later, the Danny Boyle-directed horror due out in June 2025. While we’re not exactly sure which areas will feature – the estate includes the ruins of an abbey, a Jacobean mansion and landscaped gardens – it’s a fitting backdrop for the movie. Resident ghosts are said to include a Victorian lady who stalks the mansion’s halls, while a ghostly choir has been heard chanting in the estate’s chapel. It’s also no stranger to camera crews, and has appeared in The Omen 3 and the slightly less terrifying All Creatures Great and Small.
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Burghley House, Lincolnshire
Guillermo del Toro’s re-telling of Frankenstein, due out in late 2025, is already being touted as one of Netflix’s biggest success stories, and Burghley House, built in the sixteenth century, is a key filming location. The Elizabethan manor house, which also has had starring roles in The Crown and the movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, is a true labour of love that took 32 years to build and has over 100 rooms. Previous tenants include the late Lord Burghley, an Olympic athlete who won the gold medal for the 400m hurdles at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics. You can see the running shoes he wore on display in Burghley’s Olympic Corridor during a walk (or run, if you’re so inclined) around the property.
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Ardross Castle, Ross-shire
This fairytale castle is the setting for the third season of The Traitors, which airs on 1 January 2025. Built in the 1800s on the site of a hunting lodge, its former residents include C. W. Dyson Perrins (the grandson of the creator of Worcestershire sauce) and Alexander Matheson, who founded of Matheson & Co and traded in rather different commodities – tea and opium. The bad news? The castle is currently privately owned, although it’s available for private hire and can accommodate up to 41 people. It’s now one of Scotland’s most popular wedding venues, although rates are on request which, we suspect means you’ll need a Traitors-sized windfall (last season’s winner Harry Clark bagged £95,150) to get hitched here.
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Hatfield House, Hertfordshire
Hatfield House has had starring roles in previous Bridgerton series (it’s doubled as the Featheringtons’ residence), so it’s highly likely it will be a key location in the next series, due out in December 2025. It’s also been a filming location for The Favourite, Enola Holmes, Rebecca and, believe it or not, the Jonas Brothers’ Sucker video. Built in the 1600s by Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury and chief minister to King James I, it’s open to the public and stuffed with reminders of its past, including suits of armour and priceless watercolours. In the beautiful gardens, a gnarled oak tree marks the spot where Queen Elizabeth I first heard of her ascension to the throne in 1558.
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Chatsworth House, Derbyshire
When this Derbyshire country house closed temporarily in July 2024, Chatsworth’s official Instagram feed stated this was due to its use as a “filming location by a major online streaming platform”. And while details are scarce, the accompanying image to the post – a film crew and ladies in period dress frolicking next to Chatsworth’s lake – hints at a period drama rather than the Jonas Brothers’ latest music video. Going by the roll call of hit films and series shot here we’ve got our money on another blockbuster – Peaky Blinders and the movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice were both filmed at Chatsworth. Planning a visit? A reminder of the latter is one of the film’s most recognisable props – a resin and marble bust of Mr Darcy, played by Matthew Macfadyen, which is now on display in Chatsworth’s Orangery shop (miniature versions are available to purchase).
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