The Real Lady Of Downton Abbey
Meet the Countess who lives, works and cooks in the UK’s best known stately home
With the beautiful backdrop of one of Britain’s finest stately homes interwoven with the stories of an oldmoney aristocratic family and the servants who work for them, Downton Abbey has, without a shadow of a doubt, become one of the most popular TV dramas ever.
And with a spin-off movie launching this week, Downton Abbey fans are on tenterhooks as to how the plot will pan out for the Crawley family and the backroom staff who loyally tend to their needs.
But for the real lady of Downton Abbey, life is very different. Countess Fiona Carnarvon and her husband, the 8th Earl of Carnarvon, work around the clock to
make sure Highclere Castle runs smoothly after inheriting the house in 2001 when his father died. So much so, she can’t even remember the last time she had a fortnight’s summer holiday.
“I would love to be away for two whole weeks,” says Lady Carnarvon. “I haven’t ever had one and I would love to go to somewhere like Greece and collapse and swim! I do work pretty hard. It is full-on all day. But I do love what I do.” Set amid a spectacular 6,000-acre estate, the house has 300-plus rooms. The couple live in part of the house and let out the rest for tours and events. A team of 180 staff work over the summer months to cope with the 1,400 or so visitors coming every day from all over the world to get a glimpse of the “reallife Downton Abbey”. And unlike the Crawley family, who leave everything to loyal servant Carson and his team, Lady Carnarvon is only too happy to roll up her sleeves and help with the day-to-day running of the castle, whether that is doing a coffee run in the morning, planting flowers, tending to the resident pigs, Thelma and Louise, writing a blog about life in the castle or filtering business documents through to her husband.
She also loves nothing more than popping to the kitchen to rustle up a family
“We are tenants for our lifetime… it is our duty to look after it and pass it on”
meal – something you wouldn’t see in Downton!
“DowntonAbbey has taken us on a very different pace,” she confides. “We don’t benefit financially from the film but it has given us a marketing platform. And we want to make the best of it.
“It’s an amazing house and it stands for so much of the heritage Britain can offer.
“We (my husband and I) do enjoy working together. We take different responsibilities. I married a lovely man.”
As she chats about life at Highclere, it’s clear she is very proud of what they have achieved and she does not take anything for granted.
And just as we have mortgages and bills to pay, so does she – albeit they run to quite a few more millions than the average household.
“We do have to support Highclere,” she stresses. “Every single day and month we are trying to pay everyone’s salaries. That money doesn’t grow on trees
and there is no secret fund.
“We are tenants for our lifetime at Highclere. It is our duty to look after it and then pass it on.”
Like any good businesswoman, she is thrifty too. “I am not of the throwaway generation,” she says. “If I buy a pair of shoes, I hope they will last quite a long time. I might wear trousers I’ve had for 15 years too. I’ve just bought a dress that I hope will be useful for the next five years! And after Christmas, I don’t like throwing things out. I hate waste and I am always looking at how we can use things up. Any leftover vegetables go to the pigs too!”
Many of the team at Highclere have worked for the family for years.
So is she like any of the characters in the drama? If you look at the family’s own history, there have been plenty of twists and turns. She is the Earl’s second wife after his first marriage to Jayne, with whom he has two children – including a son who will inherit the castle – ended in 1998. Marrying him a year later, they have a grown-up son together too. She roars with laughter. “Downton is great fun. I enjoy it and I watch it because it is not like us,” she insists before admitting, “But there is quite a lot of drama from time to time (in our own family)!”
And she dashes off to prepare for supper in the setting of one of Britain’s best-loved dramas.