One Woman, Three Houses, and the Garden That Became Her Legacy

Sissinghurst is a garden set within an ancient ruin, surrounded by a working farm. If the spaces we create reflect our inner worlds, then to begin to understand this place, we must first know Vita Sackville-West; and to understand Vita, we must first know Knole.

Knole has been the ancestral home of the Sackville-West family since the mid-15th century. It is one of the largest homes in England, with the structure itself spanning four acres within a 6,000-acre estate in Kent. A former archbishop’s palace, Queen Elizabeth I gifted the estate to her cousin, Thomas Sackville. There, his descendants have lived for fourteen generations.

The house is brimming with Old Masters and Stuart-era antiquities. Leopards, a symbol of status and power from the Sackville family crest, adorn Knole everywhere you look. They appear on heraldic shields, as finials on the balusters, and gleaming in the stained glass (images below courtesy of the National Trust.) As historic houses go, Knole is nothing short of breathtaking.