Easton Neston house

Following Fermor's marriage in 1692 to the wealthy heiress Catherine Poulett, he decided to resurrect the idea of a new mansion, and subsequently Wren's pupil Hawksmoor received the commission in about 1694.

[4][5] In May 2011, BBC broadcast a programme on Easton Neston, The Country House Revealed, narrated by British architectural historian Dan Cruickshank.

[7] The house Hawksmoor built at Easton Neston can best be described as a miniature palace that owes the colossal order of pilasters and crowning balustrade to the proposed design by Gabriel of the Petit Trianon at Versailles, which building was not completed until about 50 years after Easton Neston, engravings of which design were published in Vitruvius Britannicus.

These designs, never fully executed but published in Vitruvius Britannicus, would have flanked the existing rectangular house with two wings, one containing stables and the other service rooms.

The massive main staircase, with its wrought iron balustrade in the style of Jean Tijou, comprises two long, shallow flights ascending to the first floor gallery which is decorated with grisailles painted by Sir James Thornhill.

Hawksmoor's great hall, with its two-storey high, bare walls and flanking vestibules and Corinthian columns, was sub-divided in the 19th century by Sir Thomas Hesketh, who inherited the property from his uncle, to create an upper storey containing three bedrooms.

The principal drawing room, the only heavily decorated room in the house, has also seen change in the form of decorative plasterwork carried out by Artari in the mid-18th century for Thomas Fermor, 1st Earl of Pomfret (1698–1753), comprising a high-relief ceiling matched on the walls by huge scrolled panels and picture surrounds, with trophies containing hunting emblems.

In the park, Hawksmoor also designed a canal to complement the house, known as the Long Water; this is on an axis with the entrance door at the centre of the garden façade.

In March 1876, Empress Elisabeth of Austria visited England and rented Easton Neston House, using its fine stables for her horses.

[10] In 2004, Alexander Fermor-Hesketh, 3rd Baron Hesketh, a descendant of the builder via a female line, put the house, and the surrounding estate including Towcester Racecourse, up for sale for an asking price of £50 million.

A part of the estate, including the main house, some outlying buildings and 550 acres (2.2 km2) of land, were sold for about £15 million to Leon Max, a retail businessman and designer.

[12] The library at Easton Neston was formerly the home of a substantial collection of rare books and manuscripts, largely created by Frederick Fermor-Hesketh, 2nd Baron Hesketh.