The Chatsworth estate

Chatsworth is the home of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire, and it has been the home of their family, the Cavendishes, since December 1549.

More than 650,000 people visit every year and see its public face; the house and its collection, the garden and its waterworks, the park, the farmyard & adventure playground. There are shops and a restaurant, and there is free access to miles of footpaths in the park and some woods. However, the
Chatsworth estate extends much further, covering 14,000 hectares (about 35,000 acres) of Derbyshire and Staffordshire, encompassing farms, woods, moorland, rivers, villages, quarries and other industries, large and small.

The estate plays an important role in Derbyshire as an employer, a place of recreation and a contributor to good causes. It is estimated that more than one million people use the estate in some way every year and several thousand depend on it for all or part of their annual income. Between 1949 and 2004, Chatsworth welcomed more than 18 million paying visitors.