There was a time when an invitation to stay at Blenheim Palace would have called for extreme wardrobe upgrades, servants on best behaviour and maybe a crash course in sounding clever at dinner.
That’s because Blenheim, the biggest and most audacious private palace in the kingdom – in any kingdom, probably – is a lavish English Baroque affair set in Capability Brown grounds that has, since it was built in the early 1700s, welcomed everyone from John F. Kennedy to Anthony Eden. Winston Churchill was born here, Brideshead Revisited was based on it, Mission: Impossible and Spectre filmed here (it is actually the number one film and TV location when it comes to stately homes) and pretty much every social climber has dreamed of being allowed to come.
Well, now, thanks to Blenheim’s spanking new Lodge Retreat by Darwin Escapes, anyone with a couple of hundred can stay at Blenheim. OK, so you won’t be in the palace itself but then those beds do look a bit musty and dusty when you do the tour of the house so maybe that’s a good thing. But you will be on Blenheim property with ‘the big house’ just over a fence, a twenty-minute walk away or no time at all in a car.
Your Luxury Lodge is waiting
Blenheim Lodge Retreat, for your information, is a little village – a sort of Brookside-style estate – sitting in Blenheim’s 12,000 acres made up of prefabricated lodges. That’s what they’re calling them, though you could get away with ‘cabins’ if you wanted.
Cosy and homey and a perfect base for your Oxfordshire adventure, you have pretty much what you need in your Lodge. The room you walk into is kitchen, dining space and sitting room rolled into one with contemporary furniture and an amazing view through floor-to-ceiling windows onto your outdoor space and across to the grounds of Blenheim. Take your dog and you can walk him in the grounds.
With two bedrooms each with its own bathroom off the main room, you can easily fit a couple of couples or a group of friends, while the outdoor space is just private enough not to have to worry about too much giggling over your wine glass.
Location, location, location
But perhaps the best thing about Blenheim Lodge Retreat is the location… quite apart from the neighbouring palace. Well, it’s just a short taxi ride from the glories of Oxford, one of the most beautiful cities in the world. We had our own anniversary special edition Bentley GT Continental to play with but we weren’t going to take that when drinks were going to be served, so we called an Uber and the app put us through to a great little taxi firm that did the job perfectly, driving us through picture-perfect countryside and into town.
And what a treat Oxford is! First there are the amazing pubs: ours, The Turf Tavern down a very winding back alley, was a superstar favourite that, since the 1300s, had attracted everyone from Liz Taylor through Tony Blair to Margaret Thatcher and had featured as The Slaughtered Lamb in Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure. Then there are newly rinky-dinkied up hotels like The Graduate (graduatehotels.com), where you can have some great vodka martinis in the Inspector Morse Bar (told you it was a good idea to leave the Bentley at the lodge!) or have dinner in Alice, a cheerful brasserie with bright pink banquettes and a youthful atmosphere. Then there’s the decent selection of supermarkets just around the corner for stocking up your fridge back at your lodge (don’t forget to take a couple of dishwasher tables from home, by the way, as there weren’t any in our lodge).
Our other excursion from Blenheim Palace Lodge Retreat was to nearby Soho Farmhouse (you need a member to get in, mind) out past the Beckham’s Cotswolds hideaway, where you can have lunch, a spa pamper, a swim in the pool, a laze in a deckchair on the grass, then go back in for dinner. Again, we left the Bentley… because we know what we’re like.
That Palace over the fence
But the highlight of staying at the Blenheim Palace Lodge Retreat has to be the proximity to Blenheim Palace, so gorgeous you’ll want to go back and back. The house itself, with its Churchill Exhibition and the room he was actually born in included in the tour, is impressive enough and then there are incredible Capability Brown grounds to explore, a lake, gardens, stables, kitchens, a maze, concerts and festivals in the summer, while the restaurant defies any expectations you might have about stately home hospitality.
Just an hour and a half from London (or thereabouts, depending on which side of London you’re coming from), Blenheim Palace Lodge Retreat is staycation gold, the perfect weekender whether you just want to potter around the countryside and that gorgeous house or make more of an adventure of it. Just be careful with that Bentley is all we’ll say.
To discover more, visit blenheimpalace.com
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All imagery courtesy of Blenheim Palace Lodge Retreat