Explore

Nowhere is that history richer or more accessible to the general public than in the many heritage estates and sites of significant cultural interest that dot Torstow’s landscape.

Darnseley Manor is a Grade 1 listed building and stately home under Trust management. Set on the gorgeous Hinde Island, itself an area of special scientific interest for its rare marshes and unrivalled birdlife, Darnseley Manor is the jewel in Torstow’s crown.

The Manor has been kept pristine, just as it was left when academic and adventurer Wrayburn Darnseley disappeared in 1911, while (according to local legend) searching for the Lost Seal of Cassivellaunus. All of the home’s contents and furniture have been returned to their proper places after careful archeological examination.

The grounds are open to the public year-round as a catered garden park, with the manor itself being open to the public 9 - 5, Monday to Friday.

Come and enjoy this wonderful glimpse into the past!

An abbey has stood on the grounds of Fothill for more than a thousand years, with the current building having survived Cromwell's Dissolution of the Monasteries, the site having been pivotal during the English Civil War.

The ruins today bear the marks of those momentous events as well as some of the best preserved examples of 13th Century monastic architecture in the British Isles.

Fothill Abbey and its museum are open to the public 9 - 5, Monday to Friday.

Heberston Palace was built in the late 19th Century as a combination residence-Opera House for the world famous soprano, Anastasia Vellin, by her patron and lover, the naturalist Adam, Lord Heberston, whose many philanthropic and charitable ventures characterise much of Torstow’s more unique architecture.

Lord Heberston’s unusual predilections, thought of as ugly and insane in his own time but now widely understood to have been ahead of their time, has been said to predict and predate the Art Deco movement by 40 years. A fascinating structural oddity with an apparent disorder to its floorplan, Heberston Palace is one of our city’s stranger and more characterful sites. It can only really be experienced in person!

A city of history, a city of stories… Steeped in the history of the West Country, of England and of the British Isles.

Torstow’s Victorian Cemetery presents a truly unique example of both contemporary and traditional British funeral and burial practices. The oldest of the headstone monuments here date back to the 15th century. The cemetery may be familiar, even to those who have never visited it before, as it has been a filming location for a number of well-known film and television productions.

The cemetery boasts of many unique monuments and several famous inhabitants, including the seminal gothic author, Carra Calstock, who made Torstow her home having been inspired by the eerie Darnseley Manor and Fothill Abbey. Indeed, it is said by many that the themes of gothic literature were nurtured in the cradle of Torstow’s heritage.

Another famous monument within these hallowed grounds is that of Anastasia Vellin who famously said of the graveyard she would be buried in:

“What a wonderful place to spend forever.”