Visiting Floors Castle with Victoria

A Visit to Floors Castle
Floors Castle in Scotland from Morris's Country Seats, 1880.

Victoria here, lucky enough to have visited Floors Castle twice, once with a group of friends from Wisconsin, the other time with Kristine and our North Road Tour Group.  It is the seat of the Duke and Duchess of Roxburghe. Within the estate are the ruins of Roxburghe Castle, founded by King David in the 12th century.


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Floors is often described as a fairy-tale castle and indeed it is nothing like a real fortification other than the fanciful towers and crenellations.  As the exterior appears now, it is the result of a Victorian renovation to the structure altered in 1721 by Robert Adam.  He made it into a symmetrical Palladian mansion in the neoclassical style.  In 1837-47, the Edinburgh architect W. H. Playfair turned the building into a neo-Gothic pastiche for the 6th Duke of Roxburghe.


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Floors Castle stands beside the River Tweed and in the shadow of the Cheviot Hills in the Borders region of southern Scotland.  Its grounds contain beautiful gardens which are popular tourist stops.



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The first time I  visited, our group was shown around the gardens and forests in a small vehicle driven by a charming Scot...when we were almost finished with the outside and ready to enter the inside, he stopped suddenly and warned us to be very quiet.  The Duke had just driven, and he did not want us to fall within the peer's field of vision, in order, I suppose to preserve his dignity.  We had a hard time suppressing our laughter.  The Duke was dressed in jeans and driving a Land Rover, far from the sort of robes and oak leaves we might have expected.



[image error] The Dining Room, Floors Castle, 1858,  ©National Trust
Many of the treasures on display in the castle's sumptuous rooms were acquired by the American born wife of the 8th Duke, the former May Goelet, a New York heiress who brought a fortune of $20 million to the estate.  Among the finest possessions she brought with her is a series of Gobelins tapestries.

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[image error] Mary (May) Goelet, daughter of Mr. And Mrs. Ogden Goelet of New York City

On my second visit with the North Road Group, led by Kristine, Floors was the umpteenth stately home we visited in two weeks on our trip from London to Edinburgh (via Gretna Green).  Now don't get me wrong -- there are NEVER too many stately homes on my agenda, but we were pretty tired and jaded by then.  We'd seen dozens on homes with sumptuous furnishings, priceless art, brilliant antiques, etc. etc.   For some of us, one more Georgian knife-box or gilded sconce was ENOUGH on that day.  So imagine our surprise, when the volunteer Docent tried to tell us we were looking at a portrait painted by the famous American artist Sir Thomas Lawrence.  As one, we rose up in rebellion.  Sorry, we exclaimed, Sir Thomas was not an American, nor had he ever graced our shores.  The Docent, to her credit, immediately withdrew the identification,  and we proceeded -- only to find right around the corner was an excellent portrait by Gilbert Stuart.  AHA! we exclaimed, here is the American!  She adjusted her notes.  I hope we did not seem rude, but after all --


[image error] The Hall, Floors Castle
Much more about the castle and the estate -- complete with golf course, fishing, shooting and a hotel is available here.