
Holkham is still very much a lived in, family home. Thomas Coke, the first Earl of Leicester, conceived the Palladian Hall as his vision of an Italian villa on the windswept north Norfolk coast. The present family have lived here continuously since the 1750s and take great pride in sharing the house and its treasures, the Deer Park and Holkham Beach, with visitors.
Holkham is still privately owned, and is the centre of a thriving 25,000-acre agricultural estate; which provides resources both to maintain the house, and to ensure that the social fabric of rural life remains intact.