Wollaton Hall | A spectacular Elizabethan mansion and park

Wollaton Hall is was designed by Robert Smythson and built by Sir Francis Willoughby between 1580 and 1588 for his family. Now a prominent Grade One listed building, the stunning Hall houses the city's Natural History Museum along with reconstructed room settings.

 

Standing on a natural hill three miles west of Nottingham City Centre, Wollaton Hall is set in five hundred acres of spectacular gardens and parkland. The hall was used as the setting for Wayne Manor in the 2012 Batman film, Dark Knight Rises

 

1580 – 1588 – Wollaton Hall is built by the Elizabethan architect Robert Smythson. This was the same year in which the Spanish Armada was defeated and William Shakespeare presented his first play in London.

 

1702 – The Hall is updated. Cassandra Willoughby, Duchess of Chandos recorded that the master masons, and some of the statuary, were brought from Italy including the decorative but ludicrous gondola mooring rings carved in stone on the exterior walls.

 

1801 – 1830 Fire damages the original interior of the house and is remodelled by Jeffry Wyattville. Wyattville was a prominent garden and architectural designer who worked on Chatsworth House in Derbyshire.

 

1881 – Willoughby’s leave Wollaton. The house was still owned by the head of the Willoughby family, Digby Willoughby, 9th Baron Middleton, but by then it was “too near the smoke and busy activity of a large manufacturing town”.

 

1924 – The Hall is purchased by the City of Nottingham. Two years later is opened as a Natural History Museum.

2005 – 2007- The hall reopened in April after being closed for refurbishment. The prospect room at the top of the house, and the kitchens in the basement, were opened up for the public to visit.

2011 – Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises was filmed here. 

 Recreated in the style of a 1930s natural history museum display, this gallery contains taxidermied Victorian birds and game heads, alongside more contemporary specimens. Many of the birds were collected in Ethiopia and Sudan by the 19^th century Nottinghamshire explorer Mansfield Parkyns. These include one of the first two specimens of the shoebill, or whale-billed stork, brought back to Europe in 1850. Other exhibits include a pelican, a bird-of-paradise, and a red kite.

 Since Wollaton Hall opened to the public in 1926, it has been home to the city’s natural history museum. On display are some of the best items from the three quarters of a million specimens that make up its zoology, geology, and botany collections.

Cassandra Room

 The Batman movie “The Dark Knight Rises” was filmed here in the summer of 2011. Filming took place over 2 weeks, mainly at night for the garden party scene with hundreds of extras who were sworn to secrecy. A number of daylight scenes were filmed for the movie too. At the time, the people of Nottingham did some star-spotting with Anne Hathaway, Christian Bale, Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman and Michael Caine all being seen around the city. Wollaton Hall was chosen as Wayne Manor because it resembles Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire in the UK which was used in the first Chistopher Nolan film, “Batman Begins”. In that movie, the plot saw the house destroyed by fire and Bruce Wayne then pledged to re-build the family mansion. This is the trailer for the movie which features a glimpse of Wollaton Hall…

 

About 80 Red deer and 120 Fallow deer roam freely in Wollaton Park and have done since the 14th Century.

The deer are very attractive to look at but it is important to remember that deer are wild animals and must be treated with respect.

 

THANKS TIM FOR TAKEN SOME PHOTOS FOR ME