Pencarrow House & Gardens

Pencarrow has been the family home of the Molesworth-St Aubyns for almost 500 years, and the 50-room Georgian mansion remains privately owned. The house sits just off the A389 between Bodmin and Wadebridge, surrounded by 50 acres of formal and woodland gardens.

Inside, rooms display a collection of antique furniture, oriental porcelain, and family portraits including works by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Raeburn, and Sir Oswald Birley. The library has a concealed “jib” door that blends into the shelving, and the inner hall features marble busts dressed in a rotating collection of hats - bowlers, top hats, and a fez among them. Period bedrooms, reception rooms, and collections of family prams and dolls give the house a lived-in character distinct from more formal heritage properties.

The gardens hold over 400 varieties of rhododendrons and camellias, which put on their main display from March onwards. A Victorian rockery built from Cornish granite boulders, an Italian garden, a lake, an icehouse, and a grotto are all linked by paths through mature woodland with specimen conifers. At the far end of the grounds, a 2,000-year-old Iron Age hill fort marks one of Cornwall’s earlier chapters of habitation. A cafe, gift shop, plant sales area, and children’s playground are on site, and dogs are welcome in the gardens and woods.