Chawton House

The Old Kitchen Tearoom is open 7 days a week all through summer for you to come and enjoy a lovely cup of tea or coffee and your choice of a selection of our delicious homemade cakes, like this Lemon and Raspberry cake!

Interested in booking an afternoon tea with us? Head to www.tickettailor.com/events/chawtonhouse/2209128

You can still buy tickets to join Jane Austen’s family for a Regency picnic at Dyers Barn, in the grounds of Chawton House, hosted by Caroline Jane Knight, Jane Austen’s fifth great-niece, on Sunday 21st June!

🧺Caroline will share a special artefact from the family’s private collection and the story behind it – a glimpse into The Austen Knights of Chawton Family Archive she’s creating to preserve these irreplaceable memories for future generations. She’ll also share a childhood memory of growing up at Chawton House, bringing Jane Austen’s world to life through family eyes.

Tickets are £15pp, including homemade lemonade (bring your own picnic), or £30pp including a Regency picnic box by Chawton House! To book, just head to https://chawtonhouse.org/whats-on/the-knight-family-picnic-at-chawton-house/

Janine Barchas is the Chancellor's Council Centennial Professor in the Book Arts, a professor of English at The University of Texas at Austin, and a specialist in Jane Austen. This wonderful video celebrates her receipt of the President’s Research Impact Award, which honours researchers whose work has fundamentally changed lives and perspectives.

You can watch the video here:

2026 President’s Research Impact Award: Janine Barchas Janine Barchas brings Jane Austen to new audiences through projects...

If you're looking for some Sunday afternoon reading, why don't you check out the Brian Southam Archive!

This archive gives an overview of the life of pioneering Austen scholar Brian Southam (1931-2010) and provides a comprehensive record of his publications, including essays, lectures, and his editorial work on Jane Austen and related texts.

You can find the archive here: www.brian-southam.com/.

The Brian Southam Archive - Publications & Books "Throughout his career, Southam was the best kind of literary critic. A generous, witty and humane scholar" — The Guardian

Journalist, writer, traveller, translator, abolitionist, feminist and social reformer. Harriet Martineau may be the most famous Victorian woman you’ve never heard of.

Her friends and fans (and sometimes foes) included Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Queen Victoria, Charles Darwin and George Eliot. Despite being deaf since childhood, she rebelled against the restrictions on contemporary women’s lives. Martineau travelled to America, Europe, Egypt and the Middle East, rejected traditional religion and was a radical free thinker.

Join as speakers Molly Maslen (Assistant Curator at Chawton House), Kirsty Parsons (Curator at the Charles Dickens Museum) and Jane Mathieson (former Librarian and now volunteer gardener/speaker at Elizabeth Gaskell’s House) discuss why exactly she was so significant as we celebrate 150 years of Harriet Martineau , a woman ahead of her time, in an online talk on Wednesday 15th July.

To find out more, head to https://chawtonhouse.org/whats-on/online-talk-harriet-martineau-readers-are-plentiful-thinkers-are-rare/

Today, The Tea Group are celebrating National Tea Moment at 2pm to "take a moment from the pace of daily life. To share something simple. To participate in a ritual that belongs to everyone" and to celebrate our late Queen.

In our Old Kitchen Tearoom, we sell more cups of tea than any other food and drink, and our Courtyard is the perfect place to take a moment to enjoy a peaceful cup of tea!

Join us for a Curator's Tour of our current exhibition HomeMade Histories: Letters, Art & Embroidery on Tuesday 16th June.

Explore letters, journals, artwork and embroidery from our remarkable manuscript collection. Discover the intimate, hand-crafted traces that illuminate women’s lives in the 18th & 19th centuries.

Tours also available on Wednesday 15th July and Saturday 15th August.

To book a ticket, just head to https://chawtonhouse.org/whats-on/curators-tour-homemade-histories-june16/

We have three more exciting outdoor performances coming up as part of our Summer of Shakespeare!

Saturday 11th July - The Lord Chamberlain's Men - Othello

Friday 7th August - British Touring Shakespeare - Romeo and Juliet

Tuesday 25th August - 440 Theatre - A Midsummer Night's Dream

Find out more about each play and get your tickets here: https://chawtonhouse.org/whats-on/

Sunday 21st June marks the beginning of Regency Week, and we are celebrating with a series of exciting events!

Sunday 21st June - Kicking off proceedings is our Knight Family Picnic at Dyers Barn, hosted by Caroline Jane Knight, Jane Austen’s fifth great-niece.
Monday 22nd June - Regency Week Special: A Day in the Life of Jane Austen.
Spend a summer’s day at Chawton House immersed in the rhythms, routines and inspirations of Jane Austen’s world, with a mixture of tours, Regency-inspired food, and creative activities.
Friday 26th June - Regency Week Jane Austen Garden Tour. Explore the beautiful grounds of Chawton House, walking in Jane Austen’s footsteps.
Friday 26th June - Regency Week Tour: Jane Austen at the Great House. Join a special guided tour highlighting Jane Austen’s connection to the ‘Great House'.

For more information on all these events, and to book your tickets, just head to https://chawtonhouse.org/whats-on/