Longleat House

In 1541, Sir John Thynne bought the priory at Longleat together with its lands and, as so many of his contemporaries were doing, set about converting the property for family use. However most of the house was destroyed by fire in 1566 and Thynne took the opportunity to rebuild, in a completely new design, on this property. The building marks a radical change in the development of the English country house. Although it smacks of Sharington's Tower at Lacock, with its division of the elevation into horizontal bands and with the absence of pitched roofs, the design, which was begun in 1567, shows a complete departure from the Gothic otherwise.