Christmas at Chatsworth 2026: 'It's got to be special. That's why families come back every year'

“It has been a feat of engineering,” says Susie Stokoe, Chatsworth’s Christmas Design lead. “We really wanted visitors to have that sense of walking into the Painted Hall and thinking, how on earth did that get in here?

“It has had lots of people scratching their heads … there's so many things to think about. Floor weights because it's on the beautiful marble floor. We also don't have very big doors going into the Painted Hall, strangely. They're all quite small.”

So Whitby-based willow sculptor Emma Stothard had much to consider, not least in terms of logistics, as she created her massive willow tree. “The idea is you will be able to look up through the pear tree branches at the beautiful painted ceiling,” Susie says.

She and the Chatsworth team have also worked with Wakefield-based paper artist Andy Singleton, who made the partridge and and the Eight Maids’ installation. He works to different scales, on large installations, but also small, such as the delicate Four Calling Birds. Meanwhile, artisan woodworking business Waney Grain, based in the Peak District, has made the giant tree’s beautiful gilded pears.

These are just some of the highlights of The 12 Days of Christmas experience staged within the Grade I-listed Chatsworth House and its glorious gardens.

This remarkable stately home, the jewel of Derbyshire, is located four miles north-east of Bakewell and nine miles from Chesterfield. For almost five centuries, it has been home to 17 generations of the Devonshire family, and has appeared many times on screen, for example, as Pemberley in the 2005 film adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, also in 2013’s Death Comes to Pemberley, and 1998’s The Duchess.

The 12 Days of Christmas 2026 experience allows visitors to step into the verses of the much-loved carol, told with a decidedly opulent and clever Chatsworth twist as the days play out through the house. It features some of the State Apartments, open to the public for the first time since 2020.

“I really wanted to use the State Apartments this year because they bring something special,” Susie says. “It's where we have our historic tapestries and the state bed. The state bed is where Ladies Dancing falls, which is very beautiful.

“We open them very rarely for Christmas because they are such fragile spaces for the collection, but they are the most rich in collection and atmosphere, so for Christmas they have that wonderful feeling.”

In the Great Chamber, exotic birds and butterflies taken from some of Chatsworth’s distinctive Chinese wallpaper take flight across the walls. In the State Music Room, there is a dramatic reinterpretation of Eight Maids A Milking by Andy Singleton, who has made waves of milk from white paper, with gilded milkmaids’ buckets and three-leg stools.

Susie says: “Andy has been wonderful, he's come up with these incredible ideas.”

Visual storytelling experts Orpheo have created a spectacular animated light and sound projection on the side of the house, as well as other striking installations on the route, including the light trail in the garden.

“They have a French design team and one of their animators is Elodie (Poidatz). She has been doing some animations to go in the house, as well as the side facade. She has done some really, really beautiful pieces.

“We are projecting in the State Drawing Room and the Great Chamber. What's wonderful about Elodie is that she has spent time going round the house during the main season. She has been really inspired by the house and the collection.”

When darkness falls, the new light and sound trail comes into life in the garden, through the Rock Garden, the Maze, Bamboo Walk and the Broad Walk, culminating in a spectacular light show projected onto the South Façade. It takes 45 to 60 minutes, with the opportunity to stop off for refreshments.

The projection references the Great Conservatory that stood at Chatsworth until it was demolished and blown up in 1920. Susie says: “It was out in the garden but it was so expensive to run and it fell into disrepair. It’s where the maze is now, the footprint of it.”

American illustrator Lukas Palumbo and Danish installation artist Sophie Nielsen are among the other artists reinterpreting The 12 Days of Christmas, along with Wirksworth Pottery, sculptors Everdene’s, and Wiltshire marbling artist Jemma Lewis, who has made gorgeous baubles to match the colour schemes in the house.

“It's been wonderful having these artists come back with ideas to twist the theme and stretch it and make it more surprising. Scale is so important to Chatsworth because it shrinks things, these big spaces,” says Susie, who works on Christmas all year round and will start buying for 2027 next month.

Susie joined Chatsworth in 2009, and began working on the Christmas experiences around 2012. “I've got a mixed background. I'm conservation, but I'm also trained as a designer,” she says.

“My job is a little bit schizophrenic because on the one hand I'm looking after quite a fragile collection, because textiles do struggle with the environment, but on the other hand I'm working with Christmas which is big numbers and big demands.

“I've got the luxury of this extraordinary house and extraordinary collection to celebrate.”

But Christmas has to deliver what the visitors want and need. “Bringing that extra layer of richness and warmth was quite important this year,” she says.

“It's got to have that emotional thing at Christmas. There are people that come and visit Chatsworth every year, and they have done for generations.

“Chatsworth has built its own tradition and its own nostalgia, and I think that is incredibly special. People look forward to Christmas. Now we find that people come with their family and friends every year to Chatsworth, and that is the start of Christmas, and that is really special and something to be really treasured. It's really respected by us because there is no greater compliment than people going, ‘It's not the same unless we all go to Chatsworth’.

“It's an expensive ticket, it's a visit, but wow it's special. When I stand incognito on the route and I see three generations of a family, if not four, and they come every year, that is priceless, it's just magical.

“I want people to make those memories and that is why a sense of place is so important, because I want them to say ‘do you remember when we went to Chatsworth with Granny?’.

“That's also very much embedded with the staff. It's the end of the season, the guides stop when Christmas closes.

“Everybody is focusing very much on the same thing, and it brings that Chatsworth family closer, to celebrate the end of the season.”

The 12 Days of Christmas at Chatsworth runs until January 3. Pre-booking is essential. Tickets: Adults (17+): £40 (£36.36 without donation); Children (3-16 years): £12 (£10.90; 0-2 years free (no ticket required)

The farmyard and adventure playground entry is included with the Christmas at Chatsworth ticket. The farmyard has decorations and lights, farm animals and cuddly guinea pigs and Christmas crafts. The Christmas market closes December 13.