Howards End, 1992
Director
Cast
visit the film locations
London: Flights: Heathrow Airport; Gatwick Airport
51 Buckingham Gate, Buckingham Gate, SW1 (tel: +44 02 (0) 7769.7766)
Renaissance Chancery Court London, 252 High Holborn, (tel: +44 02 (0) 7829.9888)
Simpson’s-in-the-Strand, 100 Strand (tel: +44 (0)20 7836 9112)
Fortnum and Mason, 181 Piccadilly
Trivia
Simpson’s-in-the-Strand was a favourite haunt of Alfred Hitchcock, who set a scene for his 1936 film Sabotage here, though it was – in line with the standard practice of the day – recreated in the studio.
Howards End filming location: the country cottage ‘Howards End, in ‘Hilton’: Peppard Cottage, Rotherfield Peppard, near Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire
The ‘Porphyrion Insurance Company’, where Mr Bast initially works, is the Visit: Renaissance Chancery Court London, 252 High Holborn, housed in the magnificent old Pearl Assurance Building, which was also used for the offices of Wilcox’s Rubber Company. Having stood empty for years, the grandiose marble interior saw frequent service as a film location in such films as Richard III and The Saint.
The bank where Bast subsequently applies for a job was the Baltic Exchange, St Mary Axe off Leadenhall Street, EC3, severely damaged by the IRA bomb attack on the City. Plans to restore the building to its former glory – using footage from Howards End as a visual reference – ultimately proved impractical. The Swiss Re building (the ‘Gherkin’) now stands on the site.
Howards End filming location: the country cottage Margaret and Ruth buy tickets to ‘Hilton’: St Pancras Station, London
More venerable landmarks abound: Margaret Schlegel and Ruth are driven from the Mall through London’s Admiralty Arch at the southwest corner of Trafalgar Square in a gasp-inducing money-shot, which seems to include every horse-drawn period carriage in the British Isles. The station in which they buy tickets to ‘Hilton’ is the beautifully restored ticket office of St Pancras Station, Euston Road, NW1.
Howards End filming location: Henry takes Margaret to lunch: Simpson’s-in-the-Strand, Strand, London
Margaret takes lunch with Henry Wilcox at Visit: Simpson’s-in-the-Strand, 100 Strand. Its in the West Room of this London institution that Wilcox advises Margaret to try “roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, and cider to drink. So thoroughly old English.”. And who could argue? The restaurant’s speciality – Scottish beef on the bone – is carved at your table from silver-domed trolleys. The practice, for which Simpson’s is world famous, began over 150 years ago to avoid disturbing the chess games traditionally played in the restaurant.
Howards End filming location: Margaret meets her brother at Oxford University: Magdalen College, Oxford
Out of London, Margaret’s brother studies at Magdalen College, Oxford where he meets Margaret on the bridge over the Cherwell. You can see the bridge again in the 2008 film of Brideshead Revisited.
The country cottage to which she retreats is at Blackpool Sands, where it overlooks the English Channel near Dartmouth, Devon.
Howards End filming location: Ruth expires in the nursing home: Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, Englefield, Surrey
In Surrey, south of Englefield Green on the A30 west of Egham, you can’t miss the chimneyed and turretted outline of the Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, which was used for the nursing home in which Ruth Wilcox expires. Built in 1887 as a women’s college for pill manufacturer Thomas Holloway, and now part of the University of London, its elaborate design was inspired by France’s Chateau de Chambord.
The college turns up on screen again as the institution in which Catherine Trammell (Sharon Stone) visits David Morrissey at the end of Basic Instinct 2.
‘Howards End’ itself, the country retreat in the fictional village of ‘Hilton’, is Peppard Cottage on Peppard Common just off the B481, in the village of Rotherfield Peppard just to the west of Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire. Not nearly as remote as it appears in the movie – it’s only a couple of doors from the village pub – the cottage was once owned by Lady Ottoline Morrell, who entertained members of the Bloomsbury group here around the turn of the century. It is a private home, so I don't need to remind you not to disturb the residents..
The village of ‘Hilton’ was filmed in Worcestershire: the ‘George Tavern’ can be found in the village of Upper Arley, west off the A442 about six miles northwest of Kidderminster, and ‘Hilton Station’ is Bewdley, a couple of miles to the south, on the Severn Valley Railway.
Wilcox’s country mansion, where all the chickens come home to roost at the nightmarish wedding reception, is Brampton Bryan, on the A4113 about twelve miles west of Ludlow, Shropshire.
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