Aston Hall
is a Jacobean-style mansion in Aston, Birmingham,
England, completed in 1635.
The house was severely damaged after an attack by
Parliamentary troops in 1643; some of the damage
is still evident. The house was built for Sir Thomas
Holte and remained in the family until 1817 when
it was leased by James Watt Jr, son of the world-famous
industrial pioneer James Watt. The house
was then purchased by the Birmingham Corporation
in 1864.
It was also
visited by Washington Irving, who wrote about it as
Bracebridge Hall, taking the name from Abraham Bracebridge,
husband of the last member of the Holte family to
live there.
The house is now a museum, managed by Birmingham
City Council, and is open to the public. It boasts
a series of period rooms which have furniture,
paintings, textiles and metalwork from the collections
of the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery. Every
2 years the house hosts a Christmas celebration
called "Aston Hall by Candlelight", in
which actors help bring the period setting alive
with mock 17th-Century festivities, and the house
is lit up by 500 candles.
The grounds
are now bisected by the A38(M) motorway, also known
as the Aston Expressway.
