The Servants' Quarters

A photograph showing copper saucepans on shelves

Explore life below stairs and the Servants' Quarters and see all aspects of servant life. Discover the different jobs carried out below stairs such as housekeeping, cooking methods and the technology available to the staff at the time.

Discover how this essential. and often undervalued, hive of activity supported the Anson family and their estate throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Getting there

The Servants' Quarters are located to the left of the mansion, 15 minute walk away from reception. All areas can be access by wheelchair users, except for the wet laundry.

The Kitchen

Visit the enormous original eighteenth century kitchen largely fitted out with nineteenth century mod-cons of the time and see the vast collection of copper bearing the Lichfield mark.  Talk to our volunteers about the goings on in the kitchen, the dishes of the day and see if you can spot the wooden ice-cream maker.

Do you think that our cooks had much time to rest?
Chair in the kitchen at Shugborough
Do you think that our cooks had much time to rest?

The Laundry Room

See the vast size of a laundry area that is made of two halves; one half was for the washing, and the other for drying. This shows the scale of the operation and need for a smooth operation of the washing of linen, clothing and other items needed for cleaning on the estate.

Would you swap out your washing machine for this?
The laundry room at Shugborough
Would you swap out your washing machine for this?

The Hall

Enter the Servants' Hall and see where the majority of the servants gathered to eat, only once they had done all their chores and seen to their master and his family first though of course!

The Courtyard

Take a wander through both of our courtyards. This where the Anson family’s transportation would have been kept, and the midden yard is where you will see the central stone circle that would have held a large pile of midden (household waste).

Stroll at your own pace through these extensive Servants' Quarters, which is something the real servant staff of the time would not have had the luxury of time to do.

Then be sure to come back to 21st century and delight over a cup of tea in the café about how times have changed for the better!