UK travel Charles Darwin

Looking for a UK travel idea, why not visit Down House in Kent, the home of Charles Darwin and his study for 40 years, is open to the public.

UK travel Charles Darwin
Down House (www.english-heritage.org.uk), Downe, Kent BR6 7JT. Wed-Sun 11am-4pm (daily in summer), adults £8.80, children £4.40, family ticket £22. It is a 15 min/£10 taxi ride from Orpington railway station.

With Greenwich only 11 miles away we have some superb UK hotel deals for you.

Visiting the House
Suggested time needed: 1-2 hours

Immerse yourself in Darwin’s world with an audio tour of the atmospheric family rooms, narrated by Sir David Attenborough. Be inspired as you stand in the very study where he researched and wrote his most famous work, On the Origin of Species.

GardensSuggested time needed:1 hour

Wander the extensive gardens at Down House and explore what was for Darwin a landscape of discovery. With a new handheld video guide, discover the many ways in which the surrounding landscape inspired Darwin’s research, a landscape he cherished as his ‘outdoor laboratory’.

See some of Darwin’s famous experiments recreated in the gardens, alongside a vast array of Victorian varieties of fruit and vegetables in the kitchen garden

Darwin studied worms, as he studied the origin and meaning of life itself, in his house in Kent. For 40 years Down House and its gardens and greenhouse were a laboratory in which he pored over the minuscule in order to understand the infinite.

New exhibits bring to life his life-changing five-year voyage aboard HMS Beagle.

There are child-friendly spaces and interactive consoles explaining his theory of natural selection, and some personal belongings are being displayed for the first time, including his wife’s wedding ring and manuscript pages of The Origin…

“Visitors said they needed more information about his theory and his working practices,” explained the curator, Cathy Power, “so that’s what the new material addresses.”

Darwin moved into Down House, near Biggin Hill, in 1842. He had been married three years – to his first cousin, Emma, of the Wedgwood pottery family – and had two children, with another on the way. The house was a rather boxy Georgian villa – he called it “ugly” – but its location and extensive gardens won them over and Darwin remained here till his death in 1882.

The ground-floor rooms were reassembled with the original furniture more than a decade ago when English Heritage took the house over. Here you imagine Darwin the man and father, scooting about his study in his wheeled armchair, taking on his sons at billiards and sprawling on the blue couch in the drawing room while Emma plays her grand piano (with “vigour and spirit, but not passion,” recalled their daughter Henrietta).

Upstairs, in what used to be the bedrooms, nursery and schoolroom, Darwin’s working life is illustrated in a series of new installations of which the most significant is a life-size reconstruction of his cabin aboard the Beagle.

As a young and keen naturalist, Darwin was invited to join the survey ship HMS Beagle at the end of 1831 for a voyage around the world.

Which English Heritage Properties are nearby?

Lullingstone Roman Villa, Kent
Distance: 11.4 miles
One of the few excavated villas fully open to visitors, Lullingstone provides a unique opportunity to trace Roman domestic life over three and a half centuries. Marvel at the amazing mosaics and fascinating artefacts, travel back nearly 2,000 years with a film and light show, and enjoy a range of hands-on activities.

Eltham Palace, Greenwich Distance: 12.2 miles

Built in 1936 next to the remains of a medieval royal palace – once boyhood home to Henry VIII – this art deco mansion is a stunning masterpiece of twentieth-century design. Enjoy an audio tour narrated by actor David Suchet guiding you through the extravagant and sumptuous rooms, before exploring the 19 acres of beautiful gardens.