Hever Castle in Kent is the moated childhood home of Anne Boleyn, offering visitors over six hundred years of Tudor history, antique treasures, and award-winning gardens, including a famous yew maze and tranquil lake, just thirty miles from London.
United Kingdom: Kent – Chartwell
🌿 A Slow Afternoon at Chartwell — Churchill’s Home in the Kentish Weald
We’d had a few testing days. Long hours, that particular kind of heat that turns your bedroom into a slow cooker, and the sort of broken nights where you lie there staring at the ceiling wondering why you didn’t just go to Scotland. So we did what any sensible person does when they’ve run out of steam — we declared a slow morning, had a proper breakfast without any guilt about it, and saved ourselves for an afternoon at Chartwell.
We rolled up at around half past two, which, as it happens, is a perfectly reasonable time to arrive anywhere. The car park was busy but not chaotic, and we went straight into the house without too much hanging about. First impressions: the place is tucked into the Kentish Weald just outside Westerham, sitting in that gentle, folded landscape that makes this corner of Kent feel properly rural even though you’re not far from the M25, a fact best not dwelt upon.
The land itself has been here in one form or another since 1362, when it was sold by a man recorded in the documents as William At-Well, which is the sort of name that makes you think medieval England had rather more charm than you’d given it credit for. The property changed hands quite a few times over the following centuries, going through various configurations and owners whose names have largely faded from view, before Winston Churchill bought it in 1922. He was forty-seven at the time, out of government, and by his own account the moment he stood and looked out over the Weald from the hillside, the deal was essentially done. He wasn’t a man who did things by halves, which is perhaps the understatement of the century.
Churchill handed the whole project over to the architect Philip Tilden, who spent the next couple of years reworking the existing Victorian house almost entirely — raising floors, rerouting staircases, adding the distinctive stepped gables that give the building its character today. By 1924, the family moved in, and Chartwell became the place where Churchill spent much of the next four decades of his life, which given the scale of what happened in those four decades is a remarkable thought to sit with.
The wartime years interrupted things, as they tend to. The house was mothballed for the duration, the Churchills living elsewhere for safety reasons, since a prime minister’s private home sitting in the Kentish countryside was not, you might imagine, an ideal target to leave lit up. They came back after the war, but by 1946 things were looking genuinely uncertain. Churchill was out of government again, his finances were complicated, and it appeared Chartwell might have to go. What saved it was a consortium of his friends and admirers — businessmen and supporters — who clubbed together, bought it quietly, and donated it to the National Trust, on the condition that Churchill and Clementine could continue to live there for the rest of their lives. It’s the sort of gesture that feels impossible now, and rather wonderful.
Churchill returned to power in 1951, then suffered a serious stroke in 1953, after which he retreated to Chartwell to recover. He finally resigned the premiership in 1955 at the age of eighty, though he remained an MP until 1964, which is the sort of staying power that makes the rest of us feel faintly inadequate. He died in January 1965, at his London home in Hyde Park Gate, aged ninety. Lady Churchill gave up Chartwell later that year, and the house opened to the public in the summer of 1966 — which means this year, as it happens, marks the sixtieth anniversary of that first public opening. A fact I mention not because anyone asked, but because it seemed the sort of thing worth noting.
🖼️ The House
The tour takes you round at your own pace, room by room, and it’s very much the kind of visit where you find yourself moving slowly because there’s always something else to look at. The rooms have been kept, as far as possible, as the family left them, which gives the whole thing a slightly peculiar atmosphere — not quite a museum, not quite a home. Somewhere between the two.
We started in what was Lady Churchill’s sitting room, which was done out in a cool duck-egg blue that looked exactly right against the light coming in through the French doors. Those doors opened onto the Pink Terrace and the view across the Weald that Churchill had first seen in 1922 and apparently never quite got over. You could see why. It’s the kind of view that makes you stand there slightly longer than you intended. Above the fireplace, a fine oil portrait of Churchill himself looked down at us, which felt appropriately authoritative, though also faintly as if we were being watched.
Adjoining the sitting room is a smaller annexe that was at various points a nursery, and later Sarah Churchill’s bedroom, and which now tells the broader story of the Churchill children. There were five of them — Diana, Randolph, Sarah, Marigold and Mary — and the room is hung with wallpaper recreated from a design Clementine originally chose for it in the 1960s. It’s a slightly quieter corner of the house, easy to move through too quickly, though the views from the window over the orchard and out towards the Weald are surprisingly good.
The drawing room comes next, and it’s a noticeably lighter, airier space than you might expect — windows on three sides, looking out over the garden, with a comfortable informality about it. This was where the family met with guests and where Churchill spent many evenings playing bezique, the card game, with the table still set up for a hand in the corner. The room also holds an inscribed book collection of nearly nine hundred volumes — presentation copies from friends, family and authors who moved in Churchill’s circle — and one painting that stops you in your tracks. Charing Cross Bridge by Claude Monet, painted from the artist’s balcony at the Savoy Hotel around 1902, left unfinished, and given to Churchill after the war by his friend and publisher Emery Reves. It hangs there looking rather pleased with itself, which seems reasonable.
The library follows, and it was one of the rooms I hadn’t expected to find so absorbing. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves on every wall, packed with the working collection Churchill used as a writer and historian — reference works, books bought or received as gifts, the tools of his trade as a man who produced an almost alarming quantity of words across his lifetime. A bronze bust of Franklin D. Roosevelt occupied one corner. The room has an easy, studious calm about it now, but it had a more anxious life in the 1930s, when it served as a waiting room for politicians and military men who came down from London — sometimes quite discreetly — to share intelligence with Churchill about the spread of Fascism in Europe at a time when the government was, to put it charitably, not especially interested in what he had to say. History would, of course, vindicate him entirely, though that must have been cold comfort at the time.
Just off the library is the secretaries’ office, which was opened to the public for the first time in 2020 and is dressed as it would have looked in the 1950s. It’s the operational side of Chartwell — the room from which Churchill’s staff fielded calls from political figures and turned out his correspondence in industrial quantities. There’s a telephone exchange in there you can have a go with, which is the sort of interactive feature that sounds slightly naff but is actually rather good.
From there you head upstairs to Lady Churchill’s bedroom, which is a different kind of room entirely. It has a high barrel-vaulted ceiling that gives it an unexpected sense of space, and the same duck-egg blue from the sitting room below, which makes the two rooms feel like hers in a way that the rest of the house doesn’t quite. Clementine spent a great deal of time here, handling correspondence and household accounts at her writing desk. On that desk, when we were there, stood one of the last photographs ever taken of Churchill, alongside a photograph of their daughter Marigold, who died in 1921 aged just two. It’s a small, quiet detail in a house that is mostly about a very public man, and it was all the more affecting for it.
Churchill’s own bedroom is not on the standard tour. For more than fifty years after his death it was closed to the public entirely, and it’s now accessible only on a separate guided highlights tour running on weekday afternoons at four o’clock. We hadn’t booked one, having turned up on the spur of the moment like the disorganised people we are. Something to go back for.
Also on the first floor, are three guest rooms which were converted in 1966 to a Museum Room and a Uniform Room. Churchill had always planned on creating a small museum at Chartwell to share his many pictures, gifts he’d received from around the world, other significant keepsakes, and memorabilia. Of course, a collection of his many hats and military uniforms.
The museum room held some of the most remarkable objects in the house. Churchill’s Nobel Prize for Literature was there, which he won in 1953 for his historical writing and his biographical work on his ancestor the Duke of Marlborough, among other things — it was collected on his behalf by Clementine, since he was otherwise engaged. Next to it sat the 1899 Wanted poster with a reward of twenty-five pounds on his head, from when he escaped from a Boer prisoner of war camp in Pretoria and was rather urgently not captured. There was also his Honorary American Citizenship — he was the first person ever to receive it, and one of only two to have been given it during their lifetime, the other being Mother Teresa, which is quite a pairing.
The Uniform Room has been recently restored and reopened with a new permanent exhibition, Churchill: Image and Power, which looks at how he used clothing to shape his public image across his long career. His various uniforms and ceremonial outfits are displayed on mannequins adapted to reflect his actual posture and build, which gives them a slightly unnerving presence. Archive footage runs alongside. It’s well done, and more thought-provoking than you might expect from what sounds, on paper, like a room full of old clothes.
The ante-room, which was originally Lady Churchill’s bathroom and dressing room, now holds an international collection of porcelain and memorabilia, including medals going back to Churchill’s schooldays. His Public School Fencing Competition Medal is in there — something he apparently cited in later life as one of his proudest achievements, which you either find endearing or mildly baffling depending on your mood.
Churchill’s study is where the real work got done. He used this room, apart from during the war years, for the best part of four decades. He preferred to dictate standing up rather than sitting, pacing around while a secretary worked at the large mahogany desk in the centre of the room. He wrote his budgets here when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1924 to 1929, and during the 1930s it was where he brought worried colleagues and advisers to discuss what was happening in Europe. A Union Flag is displayed in the room — the one hoisted over Rome on the night of 5 June 1944, the first British flag to fly over a liberated European capital.
Then down to the dining room, on the lower ground floor of Tilden’s extension, which was a good deal grander than I’d anticipated. Tilden designed the circular table and armchairs specifically for the Churchills, and they were manufactured by Heals. The arum lily fabric on the chair covers went with the vivid green curtains surrounding the room, which sounds as though it shouldn’t work but somehow did. Some of the most significant figures of the twentieth century sat around that table for lunch and dinner over the years, a fact that’s easy to forget when you’re looking at the upholstery. In the dining room there was also the Golden Rose Book, commissioned in 1958 by the Churchill children to record the roses planted in the Golden Rose Avenue to mark their parents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary — which we’d see later in the garden.
Just off the dining room, on the same lower ground floor, is the kitchen, and it’s worth a good look rather than just passing through. This was Mrs Landemare’s domain, and it has the feel of a room that was used hard and seriously. Georgina Landemare had started out as an under-kitchen maid before working her way up through the ranks under the French chef Paul Landemare, whom she subsequently married, and she came to work for the Churchills in 1930, initially for weekend parties at Chartwell before becoming their principal cook. Churchill was a man who took his food seriously — he had strong opinions about it in the same way he had strong opinions about most things — and Mrs Landemare kept up with him across nearly three decades, cooking at Chartwell, at Downing Street and at Chequers. The kitchen garden, as we’d see later, was a working garden in every sense: hampers of vegetables were sent up to London by car on Mondays and by train on Thursdays, delivering fresh produce to whichever residence the Churchills happened to be using at the time, including Downing Street throughout the war years. Standing in that kitchen, looking at the range and the shelves and the general working apparatus of it all, you got a proper sense of the domestic machinery running quietly beneath the grander business of the house above.
🎨 The Studio
From the house we made our way out to the studio, which sits apart in the garden and houses the largest single collection of Churchill’s paintings anywhere in the world. This is the part of the visit I’d been most curious about, and it didn’t disappoint.
It’s easy to forget, given everything else that was going on in his life, that Churchill didn’t pick up a paintbrush until he was forty-one. What happened was this: in 1915, following the catastrophic failure of the Gallipoli campaign — an operation Churchill had championed as First Lord of the Admiralty — he was effectively forced out of the cabinet. It was one of the lowest points of his life, and by his own account he was in a very dark place. His sister-in-law, Lady Gwendeline Churchill, noticed him staring at her children’s paint box one afternoon and more or less put a brush in his hand. He began painting that same day and, by his own description, felt something shift. He wrote later about the way painting occupied his mind completely, leaving no room for anxiety or regret. He called it his greatest hobby, which coming from a man who also bred butterflies, built walls, laid bricks, wrote a staggering quantity of books, and kept tropical fish, is saying something.
He went on to produce over five hundred canvases across the next five decades, painting in the South of France, in Morocco, in Italy, in the Caribbean, wherever he happened to be. He carried his equipment with him as a matter of course. In 1921, the Royal Academy held a Summer Exhibition and included two of his paintings under the pseudonym “Mr Winter” — he was embarrassed about exhibiting under his own name, which tells you something. In 1948, they gave him the title of Honorary Academician Extraordinary, a distinction created specifically for him because the existing rules didn’t quite accommodate an amateur of his particular standing. He was the only person ever to receive it.
The studio has been rehung in recent years to look much as it did when Churchill actually worked there — paintings stacked densely on wooden shelving around the walls, his easel in place, an armchair nearby for contemplating the work in progress. There’s an interactive touch-wall that lets you explore where and when individual pieces were painted, which was genuinely useful given how widely he travelled with his paints. We also noticed, in a corner, his one and only attempt at sculpture — a small head, made while the sculptor Oscar Nemon was at Chartwell working on a portrait of Churchill. Apparently Churchill watched Nemon working for a while, decided to have a go himself, and produced a small piece of Nemon’s head in return. The fact that he then kept it says something about the man.
🌹 The Gardens
After all that culture, which was beginning to accumulate quite pleasantly, we wanted some fresh air, so we headed out into the walled garden. The southern wall of this garden was built largely by Churchill himself between 1925 and 1932, a plaque on the wall says so with some pride. He was a keen bricklayer — he joined the Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers in 1928, which his political opponents found both baffling and irritating — and he apparently found the work meditative in the same way painting was. There is something rather appealing about the image of Churchill in his bricklaying clothes, building his own garden wall with considerable seriousness while the twentieth century carried on outside the gates.
Running through the centre of the walled garden is the Golden Rose Avenue. This was a gift from his children and grandchildren for his and Clementine’s golden wedding anniversary in 1958 — fifty years of marriage, which is quite enough time for anyone to get used to each other’s habits — planted with golden and yellow roses in long rows on either side. Sadly, by the time we got there in the afternoon, the roses were well past their best. Blowsy is probably the right word. They had a slightly apologetic look about them, as though aware they’d missed their moment. The avenue itself was still worth the walk, though, particularly once we found the small sundial at its centre. This marks the grave of Clementine’s pet dove, a bird she’d brought back from Bali in 1936 and which had presumably lived out a full and happy life in the Kentish countryside before ending up commemorated in the walled garden. It’s the sort of small domestic detail that no historical account would bother to record, and yet there it was.
We stopped in at the cottage café, named after Mrs Georgina Landemare, who served as the Churchills’ cook for many years and was by all accounts rather good at it. She started working for them in the 1930s and stayed through the war years and beyond, cooking at Downing Street and at Chequers as well as at Chartwell. Churchill was famously fond of his food, and Mrs Landemare kept up with him. The café that bears her name has good views across the open countryside, and we had a pot of tea and a very decent slice of cake while looking at them, which felt like the right sort of ending to an afternoon.
Our last stop was Lady Churchill’s Rose Garden, a more formal arrangement than the Golden Rose Avenue, laid out by Clementine herself in 1924 with some help from her cousin Venetia Montagu, who was a close friend of Asquith’s and a considerable figure in her own right. The garden is divided into four beds arranged around a pair of standard wisterias, and it’s kept to this day in Clementine’s preferred palette of white and soft pink roses. It was clearly her favourite part of the whole estate. Standing in it, it wasn’t hard to see why.
🪑 Reflections
We made our way back to Dormansland tired but in good spirits, which is exactly what an afternoon out is supposed to produce.
Chartwell is one of those places that manages to avoid feeling like a monument, which is harder than it sounds when the person who lived there has a face on a banknote. The rooms are human-sized. The garden walls were built by hand. The paintings were made by someone who needed something to do with his mind on difficult afternoons. For all the weight of history attached to the man, Chartwell itself feels, above all else, like a place where someone lived — properly, fully, and for a long time.
The sixtieth anniversary of its opening to the public is as good a reason as any to visit, if you need one. Though frankly, the view across the Weald on a clear afternoon is reason enough on its own.
Planning Your Visit to Chartwell
📍 Location Mapleton Road, Westerham, Kent, TN16 1PS
| 🕖 Opening Times | Mid-March to October: Wed–Sun, 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM. November to mid-December: Wed–Sun, 11:00 AM – 4:00 PM. Closed January to mid-March. | 🌐 Website | nationaltrust.org.uk/chartwell |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📞 Phone | 01732 868381 | chartwell@nationaltrust.org.uk |
ℹ️ Notes House entry by timed ticket. Gardens may be visited without a ticket on some days. Dogs welcome in the grounds on leads.
🎟️ Entry Fees
| Adults | Children (5–17) | Under 5s | National Trust Members |
|---|---|---|---|
| £20.00 | £10.00 | Free | Free |
🗺️ Getting There
🚗 By Road Chartwell is 2 miles south of Westerham off the B2026. Follow brown National Trust signs from the A25 or B2026. Sat nav: TN16 1PS.
🚌 By Bus Arriva route 401 runs between Bromley North and Sevenoaks, stopping at Westerham (approx. 1.5 miles from Chartwell). A seasonal shuttle may operate from Westerham — check the National Trust website.
🚆 By Train Nearest stations are Oxted (6 miles) and Sevenoaks (7 miles), both served from London Bridge and London Victoria. Taxis available from both stations.
🚶 On Foot Chartwell lies on the Greensand Way long-distance footpath, with waymarked walks connecting the estate to the surrounding countryside.
The Best Time to Visit Southeast England
🌸 Spring (March–May) – Best Time to Visit
Weather: Mild and pleasant (10–18°C)
Crowds: Moderate
Highlights: Blooming gardens, countryside walks lined with wildflowers, golden evening light perfect for photography
Why Go: Southeast England comes to life in spring. From the rolling South Downs to the woodlands of Kent and Sussex, nature bursts into colour. It’s the perfect time for gentle hikes, garden visits, and exploring heritage sites in comfortable weather.
🌿 Ideal for photographers, garden lovers, and relaxed walkers
☀️ Summer (June–August)
Weather: Warm to hot (18–28°C)
Crowds: High – school holidays and tourist peak
Highlights: Long daylight hours, vibrant coastal scenes, festivals in towns and villages
Caution: Popular destinations like Brighton, Canterbury, and the New Forest can get very busy, especially during weekends and holidays
🧴 Pack water, sun cream, and a sunhat
🕶️ Visit early or late in the day for a quieter experience
🍂 Autumn (September–November) – Another Excellent Option
Weather: Cooling down (10–20°C in September; 5–12°C by November)
Crowds: Quieter
Highlights: Rich autumn foliage in ancient woodlands, harvest festivals, and local produce markets
🍇 Pair your trip with vineyard tours, farmers’ markets, and seasonal menus
📷 Ideal for tranquil walks and cosy countryside stays
❄️ Winter (December–February)
Weather: Chilly and often wet (2–8°C)
Crowds: Very light
Highlights: Historic towns like Rye and Winchester offer quiet charm, with festive lights and wintry atmospheres
☔ Dress warmly, bring waterproofs, and check for seasonal closures
🔍 Great for history buffs and those seeking peaceful escapes
✅ Summary
| Season | Weather | Crowds | Experience | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🌸 Spring | Mild 🌤️ | Moderate | Colourful, great for walking | ⭐ Best |
| ☀️ Summer | Warm 🔆 | Busy | Long days, lively scenes | ⚠️ Plan ahead |
| 🍂 Autumn | Cool 🌥️ | Light | Peaceful, food-rich, scenic colours | ✅ Great |
| ❄️ Winter | Chilly 🌧️ | Sparse | Quiet, atmospheric | 🎯 Niche |
| Tranquil, atmospheric, cosy escapes | 🎯 Niche |
More to Explore
