Join us in celebrating The Rockstar of English Baroque, Sir John Vanbrugh
This year, we are proud to be part of VANBRUGH300, a nationwide celebration marking the tercentenary of Sir John Vanbrugh; an extremely important figure in Grimsthorpe’s history. Many of our visitors will be familiar with the majestic Vanbrugh Hall, the first and most impressive room of the Castle visitor route. However, this year we are excited to reintroduce Vanbrugh as one of the most original and influential figures of his age.
With talks, workshops, family activities and a brand new, personalised exhibition, we will explore how his extraordinary experiences as an architect, playwright, soldier, diplomat and spy, shaped a legacy that continues to resonate today, highlighting his influence as a man whose imagination helped redefine Britain’s architectural landscape. We will also be welcoming local schools in a Vanbrugh Schools Week, in which Vanbrugh’s story will provide material to support the national curriculum learning in schools and initiate exploration with local communities.
What’s On?
The Sir John Vanbrugh Exhibition
30 April – 30 September 2026
This year, we have a brand new exhibition celebrating the life and works of Sir John Vanbrugh, with a particular focus on his influence on and relationship with Grimsthorpe Castle.
Visit to learn about this legend of English architecture in what is referred to as ‘his finest room’.
Entry to the exhibition is included with a Castle, Park and Gardens Ticket.
Vanbrugh Open Weekend
19 June – 21 June 2026
This event will include lively storyteller performances, along with creative workshops for families and community groups alike to drop-in and try their hand at any number of activities, from paper costume making, creating Vanbrugh style cardboard buildings or even the opportunity to share in a mini performance based on Vanbrugh’s restoration comedies.
All activities will be included in a Castle, Park & Gardens Ticket
A Conversation with Charles Saumarez Smith CBE and Jeremy Musson
Friday 19 June 2026
We will be welcoming Charles Saumarez Smith CBE and architectural historian Jeremy Musson to Grimsthorpe this summer as part of VANBRUGH 300.
Don’t miss the chance to be part of this conversational insight into all things Vanbrugh.
Tickets Available Soon
Celebrating Vanbrugh Across the UK
VANBRUGH300 is a nationwide celebration, presented by The Georgian Group following a six – figure grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
Grimsthorpe will be joined by five other of Vanbrugh’s most significant buildings in providing a variety of events, educational programmes, volunteer training, lectures and exhibitions this year. The VANBRUGH300 partners include: Castle Howard (Yorkshire), Blenheim Palace (Oxfordshire), Seaton Deleval (Northumberland), Kimbolton Castle (Cambridgeshire) and Stowe House (Buckinghamshire).
A Fragment of History : Vanbrugh at Grimsthorpe
Vanbrugh and Robert Bertie, sixteenth Lord Willoughby de Eresby, were friends for many years, travelling together in France in 1683 and to the Hague in 1688. It is possible that Vanbrugh designed buildings for Bertie in the nearby village of Swinstead in the early 1700s, as a summer house there looks very much like Vanbrugh’s Belvedere Tower, a feature of Claremont Landscape Garden in Surrey.
In 1715 when Bertie became Duke of Ancaster he invited Vanbrugh to remodel Grimsthorpe. Vanbrugh demolished the classical façade built after King Charles II reclaimed the throne in 1660, replacing it with the boldly dramatic front we see today. The central portion, an arcade of arched windows on two levels set around a pedimented entrance door, is punctured by two pairs of banded Tuscan columns, and topped by the Ancaster crest and figures from classical mythology. At the outer edges, monumental three-storey towers reach forward giving the whole a grandeur of scale. You see it as you approach from a distance across the Lincolnshire wolds, majestic and unchanged.
