[2] It was founded in 1924 and set up at its current location in Eartham, near Chichester, West Sussex, England, in 1961.

The school's main building, Eartham House, was originally built in 1800 and was occupied by the poet William Hayley.

[3] The house was subsequently purchased by William Huskisson, a prominent nineteenth-century politician who was a member of parliament for Chichester and served in the governments of Lord Liverpool and the Duke of Wellington.

Huskisson, despite his high-profile political career, is best remembered for the tragic manner of his death – he was run over by George Stephenson's locomotive engine The Rocket at the opening of the Liverpool to Manchester railway line in 1830.

[4] Eartham House was entirely rebuilt in 1905 to designs by the architect Edwin Lutyens, but some Regency decorations and fireplaces are still retained in one room.