Chatsworth

Chatsworth and the Devonshire Collection are rare survivals. Both represent a rich and diverse history of taste built and accumulated by the patronage and collecting of 14 generations of one family over five centuries. They represent the changing fashion for objects and works of art ranging from ancient Greece to the present day. The collection includes over 3,000 Old Master drawings from the Renaissance and 17th century, incunabula and printed books nearing 40,000 in number, paintings, princely decorative arts and objects of vertu of the highest quality, modern British paintings including family portraits by Lucian Freud and contemporary works of art such as the digital computer portrait of the Countess of Burlington by Michael Craig Martin.

All of this has survived, and subsequently grown, wholly due to the family’s determination to secure Chatsworth and its treasures for the future. This was underpinned in 1981 by the establishment of the Chatsworth House Trust, a registered charity. In recent years, a true renaissance has occurred at Chatsworth with an ambitious project of restoration and conservation.

In this publication, part of the Director’s Choice series, the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire highlight a few of their favourite treasures and aspects of Chatsworth that they live with every day.