Travel

The Saltburn estate’s owner grapples with trespassing fans

Do the party crashers descending upon 700-year-old Drayton House know that Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan aren’t shacked up there?
Saltburn still featuring Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan sitting by pond estate in background
As part of the agreement to film at there, no one involved in Saltburn was allowed to disclose the actual estate’s name.Photo: Courtesy of Prime Video

“Drayton is one of the best-kept secrets of the English country-house world,” architectural historian Gervase Jackson-Stops wrote in AD’s January 1991 issue. “Where the atmosphere of other great British houses has been marred by tourist buses and shops, Drayton has remained hidden, mysterious, rarely open, guarding its privacy.” That same level of concealment shrouding the circa-1300 Northamptonshire estate has remained mostly intact—until it was outed as the filming location of Emerald Fennell’s popular 2023 dark comedy, Saltburn.

Fennell chose the 127-room house (which has sold exactly once in its long history, way back in 1361) to serve as the film’s location in part because it wasn’t well-known to the public: “It needed to be something that hadn’t been used before. This hadn’t been photographed even, let alone put on film,” she told AD. “We always wanted the exact sense that it is a real place.” (Clearly “hadn’t been photographed” is an exaggeration, but this home flew under the radar when compared to popular filming locations like Hatfield House.)

Read More
Saltburn house: Inside the enchanting mansion where the madness all goes down
Saltburn movie; Drayton house; front entrance of a home
Dark dining room with lit chandelier over long dining table surrounded by people fireplace in background

“Usually in National Trust and English Heritage properties you’re not allowed to paint anything or move pictures or augment or change anything,” production designer Suzie Davies told AD. “This family let us do quite a bit to the house and gave us free rein.”

Photo: Courtesy of Prime Video

Everyone involved in Saltburn’s production was required to keep the location’s identity a secret, but in August, Tatler identified the historic manor from the film’s trailer. Since then, fans of the thriller have traveled to the site in droves.

Dark still from Saltburn of mist over pond Barry Keoghan in foreground with back to camera estate in background lotus...

Many of the estate’s existing rooms were used in the film, as was the square pond, the chapel, and the gardens. The production team added topiary and contemporary art and sculptures.

Photo: Courtesy of Prime Video

According to the Daily Mail, “hundreds” of visitors continue to flock to the home each weekend. “I never envisaged the amount of interest there would be. It’s quite weird,” Drayton House owner Charles Stopford Sackville told the outlet. “I don’t take it as flattering. How would you feel if people were taking pictures outside your house? I’d prefer the interest to blow over but I can’t make it blow over.”

He noted that while “most people are fairly good,” some of the visitors “get a bit inquisitive, let’s say.” Stopford Sackville explained that he had to ask staff to patrol the property after “more than 50” people deviated from the nearby public footpath and onto the private grounds.

This article originally featured on Architecturaldigest.com