22-05-2025
Estate home to Button House from Ghosts gets Lottery funding
The Surrey estate which includes the manor house featured in the BBC sitcom Ghosts at its centre has been awarded Lottery funding for its green Horsley Place Trust, which owns and looks after the 400-acre estate near Guildford, has been given a grant from The National Lottery Heritage Grade I listed manor house appeared as Button House in Ghosts, and rooms there have also been used as sets for Enola Holmes, Vanity Fair, and Howard's grant of £233,000 will be used for pilot schemes including testing how the estate could be used to support local people's mental health, the trust says.
The schemes will include archaeology on prescription, nature-based volunteer roles, and a project in partnership with nearby Howard of Effingham school helping students to develop their self-confidence, resilience and positive mental director Ilona Harris said: "This grant will allow West Horsley Place Trust to develop our organisational expertise, nurture new relationships, devise a strategic direction for the estate's future and offer people in our community a beautiful landscape to connect with and enjoy."
The University of Surrey's Institute for Sustainability will also research who currently uses the estate's green spaces, who is not accessing them, and how people could enjoy them estate, which is made up of pasture, parkland and ancient woodland, includes 72 plant species with conservation status and a wide range of rare species, as well as archaeological features including medieval trust runs a "Buttoneer" fundraising programme, to support conservation of the manor house.
