Ledston Hall: Grade I-listed Yorkshire country house removed from Heritage at Risk register thanks to £10million conversion into homes

Ledston Hall, near Castleford, is Grade I-listed but had become something of a curiosity, as although the surrounding estate remains a thriving concern with tenanted farms, cottages and even a pub, the mansion had been mostly empty and deteriorating since the 1960s.

The hall is known for its associations with Lady Betty Hastings, a pioneering heiress who lived there in the 18th century and made many improvements to the house and grounds. The social reformer never married, but the charities she set up are still active today and the estate passed to the Wheler family in 1789.

Ledston’s decline came because it wasn’t the Whelers’ only seat; by the early 20th century, they favoured Otterden in Kent, spending only part of the winter in Yorkshire. By World War Two, it was unoccupied, and when the last of the line, Granville Wheler, inherited in 1948, he immediately leased the mansion to a school.

In the 1960s, the south wing was converted into five flats for estate tenants, but the remainder of the house was in a state of decay and becoming increasingly unsafe. There were no funds for repairs and after his death in 2004 its future was still uncertain, and public access to the grounds was ended over fears about the building’s condition.

It was only when a parcel of land in Kent was sold to developers that the renovation project could go ahead, and its owners, the Wheler Foundation – set up with trustees appointed by Granville in 1992 – are now in sight of the finish line.

Ledston Hall will now become four houses and six apartments, all let to tenants who will have access to the extensive gardens. The dining, meeting rooms and lecture hall will be available for hire by the public.

One of the trustees is Mark Granger, who said: "It has cost us about £10million. All of the houses and apartments will be rented out by the Foundation; they vary from one-bedroom flats to four-bedroom vertical conversions with ground, first and second floors. Each house has its own lift and we have futureproofed them for all age groups.

"We think the tenancies will appeal to people who are fairly local – and who don’t want to do their own gardening any more! They will have access to the gardens, without having to do the weeding themselves. We are also creating imposing new gates at the North Park entrance for access. All the grounds will be accessible and they are quite extensive. It will be a really nice little community.”

The restoration also included a refurbishment of the 12th-century chapel that once belonged to Pontefract Priory – its lands became the Ledston estate after the Dissolution of the Monasteries – that acted as the village of Ledston’s parish church. The chapel has been closed during the building work, but will re-open for services once again.

The project’s completion will be marked by an open day for the residents of the estate villages of Ledston and Ledsham, who will be the first members of the public to step inside the mansion for generations.

"We are really keen to have an open day once the contract is completed, and it will be the first time in many decades that people have been inside the hall; it just wasn’t safe before. We used to open the grounds in summer, but that hasn’t happened for some time now. We will have to balance the fact that people will be living there, but there will be some public access”, added Mr Granger.

"Country Life featured the hall in 1938 and we are going to invite them back again – it seems like a neat thing to do.”

The Ledston Estate

The Whelers always retained an income from the 3,000-acre estate – there are seven tenanted farms and 34 cottages and other residential properties in the nearby villages. The old stable block is leased to a livery yard and riding school, and The Chequers Inn in Ledsham is a quirky survivor, having been estate-owned for centuries.

The Chequers has been trading since 1540, and became famous for not opening on Sundays until 2012, thanks to a rule put in place 180 years before by the lady of the manor when she was verbally abused by a group of drunken farm labourers outside the pub on a Sunday. The estate refused the licensee’s request for Sunday opening back in the 1980s, but reconsidered their stance once the Foundation had entirely taken over its running.

The estate passed through several families, often via the female line by daughters’ marriages. Granville Wheler and his siblings, Charles and Margaret, were Lady Betty Hastings’ last direct desendants.

One of the Wheler Foundation’s main roles is the education of children about the countryside, and there is a schoolroom on the Ledston Hall estate which is available to hire.