Filming at Highclere Castle

Highclere Castle has become one of England’s most visited destinations. Thanks to the Emmy Award-winning Downton Abbey television series and film adaptation. Set in the fictional Yorkshire country estate of Downton Abbey. It depicts the lives of the aristocratic Crawley family and their intrepid servants in the post-Edwardian era between 1912 and 1926. Allen Leech played Tom Branson the chauffeur and later the estate manager in the series.

In 2011, Tatler referred to the area around Highclere as “Downtonia”.

On 19 April 2021 it was confirmed that Downton Abbey would return to Highclere Castle for a second feature film.

History at Highclere

Highclere Park is the earliest documented estate in Hampshire, having been given in 749 to the Church of Winchester as a deer park. The castle was built in 1679 before large renovations in the 1840s. Highclere Park was designed by Capability Brown in the 18th century.

In 1907, the 5th Earl of Carnarvon, an enthusiastic amateur Egyptologist, employed archaeologist Howard Carter in the search for the tomb of Tutankhamun. In 1914, Lord Carnarvon received the concession to dig in the Valley of the Kings. On 4 November 1922, their young water boy accidentally stumbled on the entrance to the tomb. In 2007, the Egyptian Exhibition was created in the cellars of the castle and tells the story of the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb.