Longleat House wedding map print

His first house burned down in April 1567. The one that replaced it, built from 1568 and effectively complete by 1580, was largely his own design, with Robert Smythson as the main architect. Later generations reshaped the grounds: Capability Brown swept away the formal gardens for the 1st Marquess of Bath, and Humphry Repton advised the 2nd.

In 1949 Longleat became the first stately home in Britain to open to the public on a commercial basis, a way for the 6th Marquess to keep the house going after heavy death duties. Seventeen years later came the safari park, the first drive through safari park outside Africa, and a hedge maze followed under the 7th Marquess.

On the artwork the house sits at the head of a string of water: Half Mile Pond to the north, and Ford Pond and the ponds below it running away to the south, with the hedge maze to the north west. Just beyond the bottom edge lies Horningsham, whose Congregational chapel is believed to be the oldest Free Church in England still used for worship.