What you’ll see
Once essential repairs are underway we can start to think about opening them up to visitors. In 2019 you'll be able to come inside the Great Hall. This will give you a fantastic view of the garden as it was meant to be seen from inside the house. In 2019 we'll be creating a garden inside the ruined Great Hall. Designed by our garden team, the project will be realised with collaboration from local community groups. If you’d like to know more please contact lisa.davies@nationaltrust.org.uk.
After opening the Great Hall we'll then be able to open the Balcombe Room. Once a pleasant sitting room looking over the valley to the village of Balcombe, the room is now a shell. To make it safe the room needs a new floor and a new roof too, which in itself will cost £120,000.
Eventually the Balcombe Room will be the place where visitors will be welcomed into the house and will discover the different things they can see and do. All the ruined spaces will be opened up and although we can never return them to their former magnificence visitors will learn the stories that will bring them to life.
The rooms that are currently accessed from the main lawn will once again be joined up with the ruined Drawing Room, Library and Great Hall. Access to these rooms will be via a passage beyond the ruined Library, as it was before the fire of 1947, and the whole house will feel less fragmented.