Trains to Marble Hill House

Marble Hill House was built in the 1720s by the formidable Henrietta Howard, courtier and mistress of King George II. It has a compact Palladian design that became a template for other Georgian villas, as well as for plantation houses in the American colonies. Henrietta used the house to entertain the great and good of society, including the writers Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope.

The interior style reflected the increasing trade between Britain and China, and a western fascination with all things oriental - the house was furnished with 'chinoiserie' lacquer furniture, hand-painted Chinese wallpaper, and the blue and white porcelain that became a British national craze. A Chinese lacquer screen is one of the few remaining objects from Henrietta's own collection, as Marble Hill House's contents were broken up before the property came into public ownership in 1902. But in the 1980s a series of paintings by Giovanni Paolo Panini were restored to the Great Room.

Admission is by guided tour, and the knowledgeable guides are able to bring the courtly world of Henrietta Howard and her friends to vivid life. Marble Hill Park is a beautiful area of Thames-side greenery with a range of sporting and recreational facilities.