Lives & Loves of Letton Hall, Norfolk

This Biography by Peter Carrol sets out the living history of Letton Hall, Sir John Soane’s first full house commission. Letton Hall is an important house architecturally and it survives essentially as Soane designed it. However, it is the families who occupied the house that make the biography of Letton Hall such a fascinating and fully-documented story.

Brampton Gurdon Dillingham built the house, following a poignant love affair and marriage – and the Gurdon family, headed by Lord Cranworth, owned it for more than 130 years. The next squire, a ship-owner and racing man, was a 60-year-old bachelor until he brought a French wife, half his age, to be mistress of the estate. Following military use during World War II the house became the agricultural focus of a well-regarded East Anglian farming family.

Its presents use is as a residential conference centre, run by a Christian charitable trust set up by the author and his family 30 years ago. Lives & Loves of Lettton Hall brings the building, its past and its occupants very much to life.