"Spencer" Explores the Significance of Princess Diana's Childhood Home, Park House
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
Spencer follows a three-day period from the perspective of Princess Diana (played by Kristen Stewart) at Christmastime in 1991, the last time she would spend the holidays with the royal family before separating from her husband the following year. While many may associate Princess Di with regal residences such as Buckingham Palace or Kensington Palace, her early childhood home, Park House—which is located on the Sandringham Estate, just west of Sandringham House, a frequent holiday spot for Queen Elizabeth II and her family members—is the one place where she truly belonged.
Princess Diana was born at Park House and lived there until the age of 14, when she and her family moved into Althorp House (a 100,000-square-foot mansion with 90 rooms) after her father, John Spencer, acquired his title as Viscount Althorp.
Throughout Spencer, we see Diana consistently trying to return back to her abandoned childhood home in an attempt to relive a time in her life when she wasn’t confined to the constraints of being a royal.
The film’s production designer, Guy Hendrix Dyas, reveals to House Beautiful that another historic property was used to recreate Park House for its starring role in Spencer: “an old mansion called Marquardt Palace—[located] north of Potsdam, near Berlin.” He adds that the design team scouted this location in late summer of 2020 after only seeing pictures of it. “The building, now a popular filming destination, was once a grand estate dating back to the 14th century, although the current structure dates from 1879,” Hendrix Dyas says.
Another site that helped bring Park House back to life was the park grounds of Schloss Nordkirchen—a castle in Nordkirchen, Germany—reveals set decorator Yesim Zolan. This structure acted as the exterior of Princess Di’s childhood home; although, in real life it actually serves as an office space for the nearby North Rhine-Westphalia University of Applied Sciences for Finance.
Of course, the Spencers had their own royal ties prior to Diana’s marriage to Prince Charles—so growing up on a royal estate was only customary. “Diana and her two siblings mingled with the royal family [including the children] as they grew up,” explains Hendrix Dyas. “The Spencer family had descended from a long line of aristocrats and had been closely associated with the royals for decades, and had been renting Park House from the Queen’s estate.”
Naturally, it’s not difficult to imagine the withstanding impact Park House had on Princess Diana, as her carefree childhood proved to be a stark contrast from her later years. Kristen Stewart’s take on the royal “is filled with fond memories of life at Park House,” says Hendrix Dyas. And yet, the dwelling becomes a place that eventually haunts the princess in the film, reminding her of fond childhood memories “and a life that could have been, had she not married into royalty.”
While Diana went on to live at far grander houses later in her life, nothing ever compared to Park House. “After her years at Althorp House, she lived independently in a smart apartment in the Earls Court and then Kensington, both in London before she was moved to Clarence House after Prince Charles proposed,” adds Hendrix Dyas. After their wedding, she resided at Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace. But, “despite all their finery, none of these homes ever truly replaced Park House,” to the point where “close friends [of Diana] often talked about [her] nostalgia for the life she led there.”
Today, Park House is used for charity work, as Queen Elizabeth left the property to Leonard Cheshire Disability in 1983, after it was left to decay following the Spencers’ move to Althorp House in 1975.
By the end of Spencer, Diana is finally able to return to her one true home, although it can never again be what it once was. It’s now devoid of everything it was filled with when she was a child—family, friends, and even familiarity, as it became dilapidated over time, to the point where Kristen Stewart’s Diana nearly falls through the decaying staircase. But the one place where Park House remains as it was is in Diana’s memories, in which she has flashbacks of playing on the sprawling property with her siblings as children—proving that the lasting impact of our homes never leaves us, and a house is not always a home.
Follow House Beautiful on Instagram.
You Might Also Like
