Poldark at Chavenage House: visiting Trenwith

Chavenage House, an Elizabethan manor about 2 miles (3km) north-west of Tetbury, played Trenwith, the Poldark family house owned by Charles Poldark, in the BBC's Poldark. The house says so on its own website (opens in a new tab), and the series ran for five series from 2015. Chavenage is still a family home and opens only by reservation, and its notice of 11 August 2026 warns that filming leaves few chances to tour the house.

What follows is what the house itself says, on its website and in its owner's interview with the Wilts and Glos Standard when the first series went out in March 2015, with the visiting details from its notice of August 2026. The dramas you will see linked to Chavenage elsewhere but which the house does not name are in the section on myths at the end.

Trenwith on screen

Chavenage was Trenwith, the grander house of the Poldark family, where Charles Poldark, played by the late Warren Clarke, lived with his son Francis and, after her marriage, Elizabeth. In the Wilts and Glos Standard's tour of March 2015, Rona Lowsley-Williams named two rooms on screen: the great hall, where Ross Poldark learns that Elizabeth will marry his cousin, and the Oak Room. The crew filmed in April and again in September of the year before the first series aired.

The house had to lose two centuries for the part. The crew covered light switches, cables and radiators, painted the guttering black, put lead lattice on the windows, changed the wallpaper and hung period curtains, and they took up the gravel in front of the house twice, once for each visit. They also hung a 30-candle chandelier in the great hall, and left some of it behind. The BBC suggested removing the organ in the great hall; the family persuaded them to cover it instead. The reason they came, Mrs Lowsley-Williams said, was the view: from the windows you can see no buildings and no wires, only country.

The house's own Poldark page lists the stars who have been through its doors, Aidan Turner and Warren Clarke among them, and says the series ran to five series. It is the most famous thing Chavenage has done on screen, and the family's tours still make the most of it.

The house beyond Poldark

Chavenage would be worth a tour without the television. Edward Stephens bought the estate in 1564 (opens in a new tab) and rebuilt the medieval house he found as an Elizabethan manor, with two wings, a porch and large windows of glass salvaged from the churches and monasteries round about; the date 1576 is carved over the front door with his and his wife Joan's initials. The Oak Room's panelling is dated 1627, and the great hall's chimney-piece was made between 1625 and 1630.

In the Civil War the house belonged to Colonel Nathaniel Stephens, who raised a regiment of horse for Parliament. Henry Ireton, Cromwell's son-in-law, came to stay at Christmas 1648, sent by Cromwell to win his support for the king's execution. The house keeps relics of the war, and one of its rooms is still called Cromwell's Room. From that visit comes the house's ghost story: the story goes that the Colonel's daughter Abigail cursed him, and at his funeral a headless coachman, who became the king himself, carried him away. Our story on the ghost of Charles I tells it in full.

The Lowsley-Williams family bought Chavenage in 1891, and Emma and James Lowsley-Williams now run its 2,000-acre estate, which has been in James's family for six generations. The family leads the tours, which is a large part of their appeal.

Other dramas filmed at Chavenage

The house's own Films page (opens in a new tab) names five other productions. In BBC One's Tess of the D'Urbervilles, it notes, a love scene was filmed in Cromwell's Room. Lark Rise to Candleford filmed there for BBC One in January and February 2008, In Love with Barbara, the drama about Barbara Cartland, was part filmed there in August 2008, and BBC One's The Pale Horse, the Agatha Christie mystery, is on the list too. In the BBC sitcom Grace & Favour, the staff of Grace Brothers take over a manor house hotel, and the manor was Chavenage.

In the 2015 interview Mrs Lowsley-Williams added Wolf Hall and Poirot to the house's credits. Its films page leaves them out, but the house's own visitor leaflet names both, crediting the Poirot story The Mysterious Affair at Styles and scenes from the BBC's Wolf Hall. Chavenage is a working location, and the notice of August 2026 shows filming still comes before visitors.

How to visit Chavenage

Chavenage opens only by reservation, and there are no open days. The house's notice of 11 August 2026 says filming commitments leave little opportunity to tour, and that visits continue subject to availability. In 2026 the house charged:

• £12 a head for groups of 21 or more
• a base rate of £250 for a group of fewer than 21
• £12 an adult and £6 a child to join a group already booked, plus a £5 administration charge
• a base rate of £250 for a private tour on a date to suit you

Book through the office on 01666 504696 or by email to [email protected], and ask whether a pre-booked group has room for you; it is the cheapest way in for one or two people. Allow about two hours.

There is no wheelchair access: the house has steps and uneven floors throughout, and the garden has uneven surfaces, low branches and stone steps that are slippery in the wet. Children must be accompanied. No bus serves the house; Tetbury is about 2 miles away and Kemble the nearest station, so take a taxi from either.

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Tetbury and nearby

Tetbury is the town for lunch and the night. The Snooty Fox faces the Market Place and the pillared Market House of 1655, the Priory Inn on London Road has a family room, and the town walk takes 45 minutes on paved paths. Beverston Castle, west of the town, is the Royalist stronghold that Parliament's troops besieged from Chavenage in 1644, a story the house tells on its history page; the ruin is part of a private house, seen from the lane and the churchyard.

Westonbirt, the National Arboretum, is a short drive south-west and the place to go in autumn, and Highgrove, the King's garden, opens for booked tours only. Our guide to country houses and castles of the Cotswolds has the houses that open without an appointment.

Myths and half-truths

You can turn up and look round. You cannot. Every visit is booked through the office, and in 2026 filming has made dates scarce.

Trenwith is in Cornwall. Only in the story. The house on screen is in Gloucestershire, chosen, the family says, because nothing modern can be seen from its windows.

Chavenage was in Emma (2020). Press and travel coverage say so, but the house does not list it and we have not found the production confirming it, so we leave it as reported.

Chavenage is a National Trust house. It is privately owned by the Lowsley-Williams family, who have owned it since 1891, and Trust membership does not get you in.