More Yorkshire locations due to appear in the new Downton Abbey film have been revealed
Hovingham Hall is the Ryedale seat of the Worsley family
Grace Newton
Published: 10:49 Friday 16 August 2019
Yorkshire looks set to take centre stage when the new Downton Abbey feature film is released this autumn.
The cast and crew of the movie, directed by Downton creator Julian Fellowes, have already been seen shooting scenes at two of Yorkshire's grandest stately homes, Wentworth Woodhouse and Harewood House, both of which appear in the official trailer.
Castle Howard was also used for filming
And now a source have revealed a much longer list of Yorkshire locations that have hosted filming this year.
The 1912 royal visit to Wentworth Woodhouse that inspired the new Downton Abbey movie
Oscar-winning screenwriter Fellowes even admitted that he has based the storyline for the new film - a spin-off from the popular ITV period drama, which ended in 2015 - on a royal visit by King George V, Queen Mary and their entourage to Wentworth Woodhouse, near Rotherham, in 1912. In the film, the royal couple stay at the fictional Downton Abbey in 1927 as guests of the Crawley family.
The Marble Saloon at Wentworth, where the ball scene that features in the movie trailer was shot, was where ballerina Anna Pavlova danced for the King and Queen in 1912.
Ripon Spa Baths, built in 1905, are a popular filming location
The locations include Ampleforth College, the prestigious Catholic boarding school in the North York Moors which Fellowes attended.
The film hits cinemas on September 13.
Thirsk and Ripon
Both towns have been used for filming street scenes, although it's not known which buildings will feature. Thirsk and Ripon both have a wealth of period buildings available to film producers - Ripon Cathedral and the city's Spa Baths have both appeared on screen before.
Pickering Station on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway is a confirmed Downton filming location
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Famous as the main location for two adaptations of the novel Brideshead Revisited, Castle Howard is one of several stately homes to feature in the movie. It is likely that the house stands in for the stately home of friends of the Crawleys.
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Pickering Station
Filming is believed to have taken place at Downton creator Julian Fellowes's old school, Ampleforth College
Film crews can't get enough of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, perhaps the country's best preserved heritage line. Pickering Station is where filming for Downton took place.
Several of the NYMR's restored carriages have also appeared in episodes of Downton Abbey when it was an ITV drama series.
Hovingham Hall
This 18th-century house in Ryedale is slightly off the beaten track for filming, and it's still privately owned by the Worsley family. It's home to a cricket pitch thought to be the oldest in England - the fourth of the Worsley baronets was captain of Yorkshire - and is open to the public for a limited period each year.
Hovingham has connections with royalty - it was the childhood home of Katharine Worsley, whose nephew is the current baronet. She is married to the Duke of Kent, who is a cousin of the Queen and a grandson of King George V.
Ampleforth College
The inclusion of Downton creator Julian Fellowes's old school may be purely sentimental - but there's no doubt that the country's leading Roman Catholic boarding school had some stunning listed buildings on its campus. It's on the same site as Ampleforth Abbey, and many of the monks teach at the school. Both institutions were founded in 1802.
Ampleforth has been labelled 'the Catholic Eton'.
Little Germany
This Conservation Area of Bradford was founded by German Jewish merchants who built beautiful neoclassical warehouses in the 19th century.
New Wentworth Woodhouse tours will reveal unseen areas of the stately home
It's been a magnet for film and TV productions in recent years - ITV's Victoria, Peaky Blinders, Gentleman Jack and Agatha Christie adaptation The ABC Murders have all been shot here.
The Downton cast were pictured on the Harewood estate, between Leeds and Harrogate, last autumn shooting a party scene.
All was revealed in the trailer released earlier this summer, which showed a couple dancing on Harewood's terrace.
Harewood had close links to the Royal Family in the 1920s, when the film is set.
Princess Mary, King George's daughter, was married to Henry Lascelles, heir to the Harewood earldom - he would inherit the title in 1929. They had two sons.
The marriage meant the King and Queen were regular visitors to both Harewood and the couple's first marital home, Goldsborough Hall, near Knaresborough.
Julian Fellowes told Vanity Fair that the plot for the movie was inspired by the royal visit to Wentworth Woodhouse in 1912, and the production hired the Marble Saloon at the stately home near Rotherham, to shoot a ball scene. Hundreds of extras and a band were hired and the shots appear in the trailer.
The cast and crew stayed at Tankersley Manor Hotel during filming.
Back in 1912, the Marble Saloon, with its sprung dancefloor and galleried landings, was the focal point of the programme of entertainment laid on for King George V and Queen Mary when they were guests of the Fitzwilliam family. The most famous ballerina of the age, Anna Pavlova, was invited to perform.
King George V had apparently been considering spending the summer of 1912 visiting his cousins in the various royal houses of Europe - but was persuaded to undertake a tour of the Yorkshire coalfields instead, in an effort to connect with the industrial working class.
Realistically, there weren't many stately homes that were large and grand enough to host the King and Queen that were also within reasonable travelling distance of collieries, foundries and factories - Wentworth was the obvious candidate. Nearly 80 of the bedrooms were required to accommodate the party.
Among the local aristocracy and gentry invited to join the Fitzwilliams for the visit were the Earl and Countess of Harewood, whose son and heir would later marry the King's only daughter, Princess Mary.
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