Leighton is a model estate on a stupendous scale, laid out in the 1850s by John Naylor, a Liverpool banker with a great deal of money to spend. Besides magnificent housing for all kinds of livestock, the estate had its own aqueduct and cable railway to take water, manure and feed to outlying farms.

The Poultry Yard was added in 1861, complete with fowl house, storm shed, pond and scratching yard, and the poultry-keeper’s cottage in which you can stay, set in the large and secluded grounds from which the chickens have long gone. The architect was probably W. H. Gee of Liverpool, who was also responsible for Leighton Hall and Church. The designs may have been inspired by Her Majesty’s Poultry Houses at Windsor, much praised in Dickson’s Poultry of 1853.

Each species, whether large or small, ornamental, water or humble hen, had its own meticulously designed quarters in the Fowl House: a thorough attention to detail, which is typical of the whole estate.

Another of Mr Naylor’s interests was forestry (the Leyland Cypress was first propagated here).

Near the Poultry Yard is a grove of giant redwoods, which now belongs to the Royal Forestry Society. Across the Severn Valley are the green hills of Montgomeryshire. There, too, is Powis Castle with its hanging garden, the nearest thing that Wales has to a royal palace.

View our history sheet for this Landmark

Sleeps: 4