Yahoo Finance 7 homes with links to famous literary figures
Launched in 1995 as a celebration of books and reading, World Book Day is now marked in over 100 countries.
This year it takes place in the UK and Ireland on 7 March, so what better time to peek at properties for sale that renowned novelists, playwrights and poets once lived in, visited or are otherwise associated with?
From rural retreats to a prime London mansion, all these homes have strong connections to leading wordsmiths.
1. The Stage, Shoreditch, London EC2, from £690,000
A new 37-storey tower containing 412 luxury studio, one, two and three-bedroom apartments, on the site of William Shakespeare’s Curtain Theatre. During the Elizabethan era this was part of a cultural village where Londoners gathered to watch performances of Henry V and Romeo and Juliet, eat, drink and socialise.
Screening rooms in the tower’s basement feature framed posters of screen adaptations of the Bard’s plays, and preserved ruins of the original theatre will be displayed in a new Museum of Shakespeare.
Interior designer Gabrielle Blackman of BBC's DIY SOS has decorated the 26th floor show home in shades referencing the dyes, fashions and theatreland costumes popular in Shakespearean times. By Galliard Homes, Thestageshoreditch.com.
2. Thomas Poole House, Nether Stowey, Taunton, Somerset, offers over £895,000
This Grade II-listed house is named after former owner Thomas Poole, a wealthy farmer, and carries a blue plaque commemorating his friendships with poets Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth, who were regular visitors.
In 1797 Thomas Poole helped Coleridge to find a cottage in the village – now managed by the National Trust – and built a gate connecting the two gardens. The restored Georgian house includes six bedrooms, a refitted kitchen/breakfast with an Aga, a barrel-ceilinged library and a partly-walled garden where Coleridge is said to have written This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison. Through Jackson-Stops.
Read more: 10 great conversions that breathe new life into old buildings
3. Longhills Hall, Branston, Lincolnshire, £1.45m
Dating back to the mid-18th century, this Palladian-style mansion inspired Richard Adams’ 1972 best-seller Watership Down. The author lodged in the Grade II-listed property during the second World War when serving with the 1st Airborne Division, and modelled many of the characters on his fellow officers – and the rabbits in the extensive grounds.
Freshly restored and interior designed by Elaine Penhaul at Lemon and Lime Interiors, it incorporates 10-bedrooms and period features such as working shutters, intricate plasterwork, ornate fireplaces and a cantilevered stone staircase. Available through By Design.
4. Cherrimans, Haslemere, Surrey, £1.65m
In 1871 George Eliot – who was writing her great novel Middlemarch at the time – and her partner George Lewes were living in Haslemere and stayed at this attractive Grade II listed tile-hung house.
It was built in the 1600s, has Georgian and Victorian additions and comprises seven bedrooms, four bathrooms, four reception rooms, a large kitchen/breakfast room, a library, study, cellar and attic space. French doors in the sitting and drawing rooms open on to a veranda, and there’s a self-contained two-bedroom cottage. Find out more from Hamptons.
5. Woodville Hall, Temple Ewell, Kent, £1.895m
He’s most famous for bringing us James Bond, but Ian Fleming also created Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, written for his son Caspar in the early 1960s.
Sadly he never lived to see the story published or the movie made. If you’re wondering where this handsome, mid-19th century house comes in, it’s because the flying car is believed to have been based on Chitty 2, a racing car fitted with an aircraft engine bought by the then owner, a Mr Hollis, in the early 1920s.
The 8,600 square foot house includes seven bedrooms, four reception rooms, games and cinema rooms, 12 acres of land and – very useful for petrolheads - a four-bay garage block. Contact Strutt & Parker.
Read more: 9 eye-catching homes with sumptuous bathrooms
6. Hogarth House, Richmond, Surrey, £2.95m
Leonard is a four-storey townhouse on the left hand side – as you face it – of a meticulously restored, Grade II-listed Georgian building.
A kitchen/dining room, family room and laundry room occupy the lower ground floor, with a drawing room and study at ground level and four bedrooms and three bathrooms on the upper floors.
In 1915 Virginia and Leonard Woolf of the Bloomsbury Group moved into Hogarth House and two years later founded the Hogarth Press publishing studio. The house on the right is called – you’ve guessed it – Virginia. On the market through Savills.
Read more: 11 cosy cottages to hunker down in for winter
7. Mayfair, London W1, £29.5m
One of Mayfair’s most illustrious private palaces, overlooking Green Park. Among its previous owners were Lord Byron, who moved in with his new wife Lady Annabella in 1815 and left when they divorced a year later, and French heiress Baroness Catherine d’Erlanger who, between the world wars, established a famous salon hosting poetry readings attended by William Butler Yeats and Hilaire Belloc.
Other distinguished guests include Winston and Clementine Churchill, the Duchess of York (who became the Queen Mother), Cole Porter and society photographer Cecil Beaton. In recent years the 14,600 foot property’s been used as an office but has planning permission to be converted back into a single family house. Once refurbished, it could be worth as much as £70m. Find out more from Wetherell.
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