Summary

An Elizabethan prodigy house in Derbyshire, National Trust-owned, with exceptional grid windows — used as Malfoy Manor in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (2010).

About this location

Hardwick Hall is an Elizabethan prodigy house in Doe Lea, near Chesterfield in Derbyshire, built for Elizabeth Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury (known as Bess of Hardwick), between 1590 and 1597. It stands as one of the best-preserved Elizabethan houses in England. The building is famous for its extraordinarily large windows relative to the wall mass, giving rise to the historic saying “Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall.” The six towers are prominently topped with the initials E.S. (Elizabeth Shrewsbury) in stone fretwork. Bess was the wealthiest woman in England after Elizabeth I at the time of construction. The National Trust has managed the property since 1959.

The interiors retain many original features including the long gallery, one of the finest surviving Elizabethan long galleries in England, and the high great chamber. The surrounding estate of parkland, walled gardens, and herb gardens provides additional outdoor shooting environments.

The most prominent film credit is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (2010), in which Hardwick Hall served as the exterior and some interiors of Malfoy Manor — the seat of the Malfoy family in the wizarding world. This required relatively minimal dressing given the house’s existing dramatically severe Elizabethan character. Earlier television use includes the ten-part BBC drama Mistress of Hardwick (1972), which dramatised the life of Bess of Hardwick and shot extensively on location here.