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We will not only have the chance to see some famed quilt collections such as in the American Museum in Bath and the Quilters’ Guild showpiece museum in York but you’ll discover Sulgrave Manor and the Lucy Boston quilts collection by special appointment. We’ll also enjoy a private workshop with a local quilter.
This tour includes some beautiful English countryside, from the thatched cottage villages of the Cotswolds to the magnificent Pennine Hills; explore charming market, mining & spa towns, country parish churches, traveling off the beaten tourist track and meeting the locals. You’ll stay in a range of quality, historic accommodations and have the ‘small group touring’ experience not available to those herded on large, impersonal coaches. This is a tour that is sure to be a delight for everyone!
Tour Date: 1 - 9 September, 2012
Tour Cost: $3599 USD per person; $500 USD single supplement
What your tour price includes: Your accommodation for 9 nights in 3-4 star properties while on the tour including breakfast daily and most dinners, as listed. Your price also includes all entrance fees to attractions while with your guide, mini-coach transportation, exclusive services of your driver/guide-companion throughout, all taxes, tolls and tips other than those you may wish to give your guide.
Airport transfers, accommodation pre and post tour, London transport and/or attraction passes and other London day tours are not included but can be added to your package as you wish. Ask us for details.
Member of a Quilting Guild/Club? We have the Welsh Quilts and Malvern Quilts UK Show in May visiting Bath, Cotswolds, South Wales, Pembroke, Jen Jones Quilts, meeting the ladies of the Welsh Quilting Guild plus a full day at the Malvern Quilts UK Show available for private groups.
This tour begins in London and ends in London.
TENTATIVE ITINERARY
Day 1, Saturday
Welcome to London! Today is free so you have the chance to relax, recover from your international journey and go sightseeing in the Capital as you wish.
Those interested in antiques may want to head to the Portobello Road Market in Notting Hill. Certainly an experience!
Alternatively, the easiest way to see the main icons and get orientated in London is the “Big Bus.” Hop off when you want then hop back on - a fun way to start your holiday.
Also possible, Henry VIII’s treasure Hampton Court Palace. The Great Hall is the palace's largest and most impressive room featuring a collection of Flemish tapestries that date back over 500 years. The tapestries originally cost £2,000 in 1537, a cost equivalent of a modern-day battleship! Each took at least three years to be completed by master craftsmen who made cloths from wool and silk, interlaced with gold and silver thread. The restored tapestries were unveiled to the public in April, 2009 so a treat even for the return visitor.
Spoilt for choice for what to see and do in the Capital!
ON London, BB (accommodation is included in your package)
Day 2, Sunday
This morning, our first port of call will be the 17th century town of Hungerford. This one street town boasts more antique shops than any other comparable sized town in the UK! There is a very interesting ‘mall’ (everything from old guns and swords to Victorian snuff boxes) plus a number of individual shops specializing in agricultural and garden statues.
Following a tea or lunch stop at Polly’s Tea Room in Marlborough, we’ll make our way to Bath, the city of Georgian splendor and Roman antiquity. Your guide will be on hand for a walking tour of the city’s highlights.
We will spend some time in the American Museum to see the collection of early American quilts. This is the finest collection of American quilts located outside the United States. There are also several Navajo rugs, early arts and craft items and woodworks to admire. During our time in Bath, you will have some free time to explore as you wish, choose the Roman Baths and Pump rooms, the Jane Austen Centre or just wander the tea and antique shops, the choice is yours.
ON Burford/Woodstock area, DBB
Day 3, Monday
Today sees us visiting Blenheim Palace. This incredible treasure house was given to Winston Churchill's ancestor John, 1st Duke of Marlborough. The superb collection here includes fine paintings, furniture, bronzes and the famous Marlborough Victories tapestries. In addition to the palace itself, with its opulent splendor, you'll also have some time to wander the amazing gardens, designed in part by Capability Brown.
We’ve the rest of our day to meander through the Cotswolds, the old market towns and scenic thatched roof villages famed in this region. Each is unique and pretty in its own right and there are opportunities for a stop in a tea shop or wandering the antique shops as we wish. With our small vehicle, we'll get where larger coaches can't and avoid the commercialized 'honey-pots,' discovering the best.
On our theme, we can include a visit to the Cotswold Woollen Weavers Mill, an 18th Century still working mill and museum. Here, you can smell the wool oil as you watch the looms turn fleece into fabric. We may also choose a shopping stop in the Burford Needlecraft Centre. Spoilt for choice!
ON Burford/Woodstock area, as above, DBB
Day 4, Tuesday
We will spend time in Stratford-Upon-Avon. Our visits can include time in the local church, burial place for the Bard, his mother Mary Arden’s home with its bird of prey centre as well as the iconic Birthplace. Many of the properties house original and re-created Tudor era furnishings and textiles. The “Birth Room” in Shakespeare’s Birthplace displays walls dressed with traditional 16th-century wall-cloths and green and red textiles.
Sulgrave Manor, the ancestral home of another famous leader, George Washington, is also included in our day’s focus. This Tudor manor house features an “astounding collection of textiles” including the New Elizabethan Embroideries, embroidered fire screens, items of costume and furnishings from 17th – 21st Century. The collection illustrates a variety of textile art techniques including sampler making, canvas work, stumpwork, quilting, weaving and surface embroidery.
ON Matlock area, DBB
Day 5, Wednesday
We have a full day to explore in and around the Peak District. This region was part of England’s textile industry; there are an abundance of lovely spa and mining towns in addition to mills, potteries and stately homes on offer. Along our route, we’ve the chance to meander around some of the lovely local villages and countryside.
During our day, we’ll enjoy time in the town of Macclesfield, famous in Great Britain for silk and home to the Silk Museum collections, which include a large variety of textiles from local manufacturers. Here we’ll discover what life was like for the workers in a Victorian era mill, silk weaving techniques on historic machinery plus the history of silk production, “from cocoon to catwalk.”
Nearby is Stoke-on-Trent, the heart of ‘china clay country’ and names such as Wedgwood, Royal Dalton and Royal Worcester can be found in The Potteries. We will have a visit to a factory shop, seeing demonstrations of the potters’ craft and have the option to search local antique outlets for remainder and historic pieces.
ON Matlock area, as above, DBB
Day 6, Thursday
Some further time in the Peak District offers the opportunity for even more lovely attractions. We’ll see the World Heritage Site of the Arkwright Mill Museum. Sir Richard Arkwright is known to many as the “world’s first industrialist”, having developed the factory system that turned Britain into a cotton manufacturing capital. Sir Arkwright is also credited for inventing the first water powered cotton mill.
Our day is certain to include time in the Duke of Devonshire stately home of Chatsworth. This really is a treasure house, real life home to “The Duchess” Georgina, said to be Jane Austen’s inspiration for “Pemberley’ and, on our theme, porcelain collectors will particularly enjoy the Duke’s own magnificent private collection.
Later, we will make our way north to the historic city of York, our night stop location.
ON York, DBB
Day 7, Friday (ND)
York is a fabulous walled city that has much to offer its visitors, such as the splendid Minster, the city centre castle, the Roman museum, the National Railway museum, the Jorvik Viking centre, the medieval shopping 'Shambles' and you’ll time this afternoon to explore as you please. Your guide will be on hand for advice, assistance and a walking tour of the city.
An undoubted highlight of our time in York will be the Quilt Museum in St Anthony’s Guildhall, operated by the Quilters Guild of the British Isles. There is a wide array of styles and ages of quilts, from hand stitched, century old classics to contemporary machine works of art. Historic highlights of the museum include a silk coverlet from 1718, noted as one of the earliest known patchwork pieces and regarded by many as the Guild's ‘star item.’ Our small group will have a private quilting workshop together with a local quilter in the Quilt Museum.
Dinner is not included tonight for flexibility’s sake.
ON York, BB
Day 8, Saturday
Departing York, we will make our way south via “Robin Hood Country” to the unspoilt Georgian town of Stamford, often used by film makers as a perfect location for period dramas, and the Tudor masterpiece Burghley House.
Built by Queen Elizabeth’s Lord High Treasurer, Sir William Cecil, Burghley House remains as one of the largest and grandest buildings from the Elizabethan Age. This gem is still a family home for his descendants to this day, with eighteen state rooms currently opened to the public. Inside is one of the finest assemblies of 17th century Italian masterpieces, an exceptional collection of Oriental and European ceramics, textiles, porcelain, art and furniture.
ON Huntington/St Ives area DBB
Day 9, Sunday
The finale for our quilters is set near the pretty riverside village of St Ives, Hemingford Grey Manor where we’ll enjoy a private viewing of Lucy Boston’s quilts. The house was made famous as ‘The House of Green Knowe’ by Lucy Boston in her classic series of children's books.
Lucy Boston made many exquisite patchworks, most of which are on display. Rarely can such an important collection be seen in the house in which the exhibits were made. The upstairs hall here is a room full of atmosphere and the echoes of nearly nine centuries of family conversations. It was used by Lucy Boston during World War II to give gramophone record recitals twice a week to the RAF. The 1929 EMG gramophone is still in use in this room, lending great character to our visit.
Later, we’ll stop in the university city of Cambridge. In this sleepy, easily-walked medieval city, we'll see one of the colleges and possibly students punt on the backs of the River Cam. There's the excellent Fitzwilliam Museum and great shopping available too, as time and interest will permit.
Dinner is not included tonight so you have the option to attend the theatre.
ON London BB
Why not extend your stay in London? In addition to all of the city’s iconic sites and well known museums & gardens, on our theme you may choose to visit the Museum of Fashion and Textiles or The Museum of London, telling the tales of the capital from Roman times through today. Collections include textiles, fashion and dress as a social historical record. There is also the option to meander through some of the city’s many antique shops. Your guide will be able to recommend the best choices to you!
Please Note: All attraction opening times are correct at time of printing this website. While we do our utmost to include all properties, we reserve the right to change an attraction should it become impossible to visit due to change in opening times, days.
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