Resides in her original holiday home, Hill Top is a house museum dedicated to the life and work of the notable children’s author and illustrator Beatrix Potter, best known for her Tales and the character Peter Rabbit.
Helen Beatrix Potter (1866-1943) was born to an upper-middle-class family in London. Educated at home by governesses, Potter was isolated from other children and found company with nature and animals, which she expressed with paintings of landscapes, fauna, and flora.
During vacations in Scotland and the Lake District, Potter sent illustrated letters to her friends. In one of those letters, she wrote a short story about four little rabbits named Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter.
In 1901, after editing the story into a book, she self-published it under the title The Tale of Peter Rabbit. The following year, the book was published commercially and gained immediate success. It was the first out of 23 Tales that Potter wrote and illustrated.
In 1905, with the profits from her books, she bought Hill Top Farm, a 17th-century farmhouse in Ambleside in the Lake District. Potter came there for artistic retreats and inspiration for many of her stories, including The Tale of the Pie and the Patty-Pan, The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck, and The Tale of Tom Kitten.
In 1913, at 47, she married William Heelis, and the couple moved across the road to Near Sawrey, where she continued to write and nurture her love of breeding sheep.
She died at the age of 77 after publishing more than 60 books; many adapted into films, ballet, songs, and animations.
Upon her death, Potter left Hill Top house and the rest of her properties to the National Trust to open it to the public.
The house became a museum displaying Potter’s belonging, such as kitchen plates painted by her father, paintings of her brother Bertram, the detailed doll’s house, and the dolls’ house food she painted for The Tale of Two Bad Mice.
Every room of the house contains references to one of her books, such as the staircase depicted in The Tale of Tom Kitten and the rhubarb patch in the garden where Jemima Puddle-Duck laid her egg.
Other places in the area commemorating Potter and her legacy are the Beatrix Potter Gallery at Hawkshead, Castle Farm, where she lived with her husband, and The Armitt Museum in Ambleside, which preserves her scientific mycological drawings.
Several options to explore the area with a local guide:
- Beatrix Potter: Afternoon Half Day All-Inclusive Tour with an Expert Guide
- Beatrix Potter’s Half Day Lake District Tour Including Lake Cruise
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