How to run a stately home

More than 200 years ago, Elizabeth, 5th Duchess of Rutland, tore down the draughty Belvoir Castle in Leicestershire to build a brand-new home. Unfortunately, the project took 30 years to complete and the duchess did not live to see the splendour of the 150,000sq ft property she began.

The castle continues to rise up magni…ficently over the surrounding countryside, boasting a view that spans 35 miles. Lady Elizabeth would be thrilled to know that Belvoir continues to be looked after by the Manners family and the chatelaine is a very modern duchess.

Emma Manners, née Watkins, met David Charles Robert Manners (son of the 10th Duke of Rutland) at a dinner party in London and, within two years, they were married and living in a converted stable block on the Belvoir estate. ‘I was terri…ffied by the prospect of what I was taking on,’ con…fides Emma. Having grown up on a farm in Wales, she reveals: ‘I hadn’t met an Honourable before I met my husband. I thought they were rather dusty, old creatures that wore tiaras and sat in ivory towers.’

Emma, the 11th Duchess, hosts a shooting party at a CLA Game Fair

David, Emma and their family moved into the castle in 2000 after David’s father died and it has been a steep learning curve. ‘I feel that I don’t know anything, so I have to really study it.’ Sometimes this is quite literal: while penning her recent book about shooting, the ‘countryside pursuit at the root of Belvoir’, she would often stay up all night just to teach herself about the history of the sport. Despite her humility, one gets the impression this diligent lady was always going to be a success in the role. She ran an interior design business before her marriage – a useful skill set when you oversee hundreds of rooms – as well as sampling myriad other careers, all of which helped to prepare her.

‘I trained as an actress and opera singer, which certainly helps when it comes to public speaking,’ she muses. ‘Running Belvoir is a very varied job. Flexibility is key, as well as a lot of energy.’ I note that Her Grace is wearing trainers and leggings, denoting a distinct air of activity, and is virtuously munching on an apple.

‘My role is like putting on a play. When the curtain goes up, you float around and pretend to be a duchess. But behind the scenes, you’ll be working like hell.’ In fact, she sees herself as more of a ‘brigadier’ than a duchess: ‘You’ve got to motivate your team, point them in the right direction and show them the way.’

Emma’s team comprises 14 full-time staff at Belvoir – dramatically pared down from the castle’s heyday when there would have been 40 people working in the kitchen alone. Her typical day starts eye-wateringly early.

The ancestral home of the Duke and Duchess of Rutland for 1,000 years, Belvoir Castle boasts a view spanning 35 miles

‘I get up between 4am and 5am, so I can get things done before the children wake,’ she explains. By the time most people are gasping for their first morning cup of coffee, Emma has just about fitted in an entire working day.

‘I run the estate as chief executive and it’s important to carry on in the holidays, but not to lose the role of being a mum.’ Does she mind having to work so hard?

‘No,’ she says, without hesitation. ‘It’s a wonderful job and it is a great privilege to be part of this heritage.’ There is real reverence in her tone when she says this – she is not just delivering a line.

‘It never feels as if it’s yours, of course. It’s just a parcel that you’re going to try and wrap up in a different way and hand it on to the next generation.’

Unlike many stately homes, the division between the public and the private is not so severe at Belvoir. It is touching to note that, for every looming portrait of nobles past, there are just as many ordinary snapshots of Emma’s own family, propped up in simple photo frames. And yet the reality of ‘living above the shop’ can sometimes be a little tricky. The house is open to the public for more than 30 days a year and there is a regular stream of shooting parties, weddings and other guests.

‘It is very much a party castle – it was built to entertain,’ says Emma. ‘That’s not such a problem for me because I’ve become accustomed to it, but it does mean that my children’s home is often filled with strangers.’

She recalls one night when fireworks were set off after a wedding and her youngest children came running into her room in fright. ‘It was one o’clock in the morning and they thought we were being attacked. It’s difficult, but they just have to get used to it, because it pays the bills.’

Left: Enjoying a restorative pint of Guinness to end the day. Right: Pattie Wilson, a gooseflight guide, and Emma, with decoy bird on her lap

Another source of income is renting out the space for film productions. The Young Victoria, penned by Downton Abbey’s Julian Fellowes, was shot within the walls of Belvoir. Every monarch has stayed at the castle (excluding our present Queen, although she has visited), so when actress Emily Blunt played out a scene on one of the beds as Queen Victoria, she was doing so on a bed that the monarch had actually slept in. It’s the kind of authenticity location managers dream of. ‘Someone asked me if Downton Abbey made me cross,’ Emma laughs. ‘Not in the least. We love it when other homes get things.’

Lord Fellowes’s celebrated television drama is filmed in the environs of Highclere, on the Hampshire/Berkshire borders. ‘As a house owner, you can never plan for it, but it’s the icing on the cake. And you put the money directly back into a bit of the roof, the structure, or a few new windows.’

From estate manager to mother, it seems the life of a modern-day duchess is less towers and tiaras, more hard graft. ‘I honestly don’t think of myself as a duchess. I think of myself as a person. It’s just the rank that I’ve married and it’s not mine necessarily… You have to earn respect and that’s all about leading from the front.’

Her Grace then bounces up. She is dashing off to the supermarket, armed with a list for more party supplies.

Shooting: A Season Of Discovery by the Duchess of Rutland (Quiller Press, £30).