Leeds Castle

Leeds Castle seems to float. Its pale stone ranges stand on islands in a lake formed by the River Len, and the water reflects them almost the whole way round. The lake was probably created under Edward I, who made the castle one of his favourite homes. The castle has nothing to do with the northern city of Leeds; it takes its name from the Kentish village beside it.

Tradition traces the site back to 857, when a Saxon chief named Led or Leed is said to have built a wooden hall on two islands in the river. In 1119 Robert de Crevecoeur replaced it with a Norman stronghold in stone. In 1278 it passed to Eleanor of Castile, Edward I's queen. Edward strengthened its defences and added a barbican spanning three islands, along with a gloriette, a compact block of royal apartments. In 1321 Edward II besieged it after Lady Badlesmere, left in charge by her husband, refused entry to Queen Isabella, and her archers killed six of the queen's party. Once widowed, Isabella made the castle her main home. Anne of Bohemia spent the winter of 1381 here on her way to marry Richard II, and in 1395 Richard received the chronicler Jean Froissart at the castle. In 1519 Henry VIII remodelled it for Catherine of Aragon. Much of what stands today, however, dates from a rebuilding in Tudor style completed in 1823, paid for by the sale of the family's estates in Virginia. The American link goes back to the seventeenth century, when the Culpeper family, owners of the castle, acquired vast lands in the colony. Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord Fairfax of Cameron, born at the castle in 1693, later settled in Virginia to manage them.

The castle's last private owner, Olive, Lady Baillie, bought it in 1926. She had the interiors redone first by the French designer Armand-Albert Rateau and then by the Parisian decorator Stéphane Boudin. In the 1930s she filled its rooms with politicians, royalty and film stars. During the Second World War it served as a hospital where burned Commonwealth airmen recovered. On her death in 1974 she left it to a charitable foundation so that the public could see it. Diplomacy has visited too. In July 1978 the foreign ministers of Egypt and Israel met the US Secretary of State here, a step towards the Camp David Accords, and in 2004 the castle hosted talks on Northern Ireland. In the grounds, a maze planted in 1988 with 2,400 yews leads to a raised centre.

Getting there

The castle stands just east of the village of Leeds in Kent, about 8 km southeast of Maidstone in a straight line. The nearest airport in a straight line is London Southend (SEN), about 36 km away, but it lies on the far side of the Thames Estuary. London Gatwick (LGW), reached directly by road, is about 58 km to the west.