Christopher Ridgway, Curator at Castle Howard, discusses the general history of Castle Howard, the great Yorkshire mansion built by Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor for the Howard family, familiar to many through the TV version of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited. This illustrated talk will consider the early building of the house, begun in 1600, and the gardens, as well as some nineteenth-century developments, and finally a review of what Castle Howard is today as heritage attraction and business, following the catastrophic fire of 1940.