The Country Man: Nick Ashley-Cooper, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury

THE COUNTRY MAN For Nick Ashley-Cooper, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury, an unexpected twist of fate led to a commitment to reviving and sustaining his ancestral estate. With the help of a merry and talented band of kindred craftsmen and creatives, he continues to transform his family’s house into a home.

a retrospective from

D O R S E T,

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ST. GILES HOUSE

ENGLAND

3/12/20 7:09 PM

THE COUNTRY MAN For Nick Ashley-Cooper, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury, an unexpected twist of fate led to a commitment to reviving and sustaining his ancestral estate. With the help of a merry and talented band of kindred craftsmen and creatives, he continues to transform his family’s house into a home.

a retrospective from

D O R S E T,

75170_112-169_COUNTRY.indd 130-131

ST. GILES HOUSE

ENGLAND

3/12/20 7:09 PM

Afternoon light at St. Giles House.

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When we arrived on a gloriously sunny morning

those voyages. The unique pattern of the shells, coupled

recording and organizing the thousands of volumes that

such as the whale vertebrae embedded in the floor, sets

last September, the volunteer librarians were nearly done

with Easter egg appearances of other oceanic delights,

make up the vast collection of written works in the library

St. Giles’ grotto apart, as does its condition. Philip Hughes,

at St. Giles House. The bibliophiles were oblivious to the

the surveyor who has supervised much of the restoration

geese on the pond or the mist rising in puffs of vapor off the

efforts on the estate, called the 2013 rehabilitation of the

green lawn outside the library’s floor to ceiling windows,

grotto the most difficult job of his career.

consumed instead with the leather and paperbound parcels

It’s impossible to overstate how emblematic this

stacked in front of them. Or more specifically, consumed

structure—and, indeed, all of the places we encountered

rarefied presence and place in history. The personalities of

with one parcel.

throughout the course of our visit—is of St. Giles and its

It’s a diary, a commonplace book of notes according

to one of the veteran researchers, and while they had

previous inhabitants are ever-present, and the structures

been able to date it to the time of William Makepeace

and the landscape they populate are the connective tissue

Thackeray (the author of the novel Vanity Fair, among

keeping their contributions alive.

other works), this morning found them investigating its

origins and authorship with the kind of single-minded concentration more typically associated with forensic

the grotto to recount with a group of visitors the tale of

scientists. The diary’s author remained a mystery, at least

Alexander Pope, one of the first Englishmen to build

for the moment.

A few days before we arrived, a renowned storyteller,

from The Society for Storytelling no less, had come to

a grotto—along the bank of the River Thames. These

This type of scene is just part of daily life at St. Giles

are the kind of moments Nick relishes sharing with the

House, a Georgian masterpiece set on the expansive

widening community he’s now cultivating at St. Giles, the

Shaftesbury Estate in the lush, rolling Dorset countryside,

past-meets-present experiences that keep him pushing his

roughly two hours by train from London. Constructed

family’s legacy forward.

circa 1651, with subsequent architectural additions and demolitions over the ensuing centuries, it is a family

house filled with secrets and treasures, many of which had languished forgotten or overlooked for decades, centuries

even, before Nick Ashley-Cooper, the current and twelfth earl, and our host, embarked upon a massive restoration

“THERE WAS A COMING TO TERMS

effort in 2010.

But this is no time capsule. Under the stewardship

WITH THE WHOLE THING AT FIRST,

of Nick and his wife, Dinah—officially Lord and Lady

BUT ACTUALLY WHAT MADE IT

Shaftesbury—St. Giles is now filled with life and vibrancy.

Thanks to their forward-looking vision and innovative

SUDDENLY SEEM ACHIEVABLE

preservation efforts—not to mention the energetic infusion

WAS GETTING MY TEETH INTO THE

of three children and a range of domesticated animals—the

modern iteration reflects the estate’s past glory without

HOUSE AND ESTATE. IT WAS A

reducing it to a relic and reminds us that change is often a

COMPLETELY NEW PROJECT AND A

necessary part of survival.

The grotto, an eighteenth-century folly filled with

WHOLE NEW KIND OF FUTURE.”

exotic shells arranged in a freestyle pattern, located a short distance from the main house, is a case in point.

Work on the grotto began in the 1740s at a time when

budding exploration of the Caribbean and the Americas manifested in shell-lined structures bearing the fruits of

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The shell-lined interior of the grotto, an eccentric eighteenth-century folly on the grounds of St. Giles.

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The Green Room in the main house.

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Though we had met Nick through various friends and

fellow makers, it was during these four goldenrod autumn

days together that we came to understand him on a deeper level, as a natural storyteller with a philosopher’s mind, an artist’s heart and an entrepreneur’s spirit.

“THIS WHOLE ENDEAVOR . . . HAS SINCE GROWN TO BECOME AN EVEN BIGGER TESTAMENT TO THE POWER OF CREATIVITY, BOTH AMONG INDIVIDUALS AND AS A COLLECTIVE WHOLE. WITHOUT THEIR HELP, WE WOULD BE LOST.”

A once reticent family head who has become its most

impressive modern archivist, Nick began his adult years spinning vinyl as an aspiring DJ in New York City. He never

envisioned himself taking over the family estate. “To the

contrary, I imagined the closest I’d get to the country was a little place in Upstate New York,” he jokes. But fate has a way

of making some decisions for us, and he assumed the helm of

the family seat in 2005 following the tragic death of his older brother, Anthony.

“Growing up seemed so far away to me when I inherited

St. Giles,” Nick says. “There was a coming to terms with the whole thing at first, but actually what made it suddenly

seem achievable was getting my teeth into the house and the estate. It was a completely new project and a whole new kind of future.”

That’s where what Nick describes as his “live mission”

comes into play. For, in all of his efforts to restore and revive

the estate, he also realized something that, while less concrete,

was no less vital: The key to the future of St. Giles lay not just in the craft of preservation but also in the preservation

of craft. And, as it turned out, the area surrounding St. Giles House and nearby Dorset is an under-the-radar hotbed of

artists and makers with the kind of creative community Nick

was craving—and needed to mobilize in his efforts to restore St. Giles.

Fortunately, those creatives were feeling the same

way, and one by one they have brought their unique, uncompromising talents and exacting standards to bear on the estate—from Jane Hurst, whose landscape design

expertise and historical knowledge of local flora and fauna inspired the current vision for the grounds and gardens, to her husband, Edward, whose insight and inroads into the

world of antiques and antiquities is unparalleled, to sculptor Stephen Pettifer and rug and textile master Luke Irwin.

Friends, admirers and sources of mutual inspiration, they frequently share knowledge, anecdotes and an appreciation of things made well and with intention.

That’s not to say the project has been easy. And, during

our visit, as he introduced us to these collaborators—or, as

they like to say, co-conspirators—over lunch, drinks, dinner and a late-night trip to the subterranean club (from whence

Nick carries on his passion for music from the DJ booth),

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we heard first-hand how invested they each were in the

any of them ever expected. To an outsider, it all appears

St. Giles, its past, present and future, continues to reveal

entire process.

seamless. But the work here is ongoing, and the story of

“Making things is like a nasty addiction,” says Francis

Russell, a fellow lighting designer, whose studio is housed

itself one day at a time because of everything they are

on the greater Shaftesbury Estate, and the one who first

doing now.

introduced us to Nick. “We’re all obsessed with quality

As the vision for St. Giles has evolved so, too, has

and history and perfection, and that is all-consuming.

Nick’s approach to the actual running of the estate, where

our business. He’s also a pretty damn good friend and

the ability to both modernize the existing landscape and

But Nick is an excellent partner to have for anyone in

future survival depends on a keen business acumen and

champion. And this project has seized a part of our souls

disrupt the current model of Downton Abbey-driven

and none of us could ever imagine walking away or being

tourism for the traveling voyeur.

involved any less deeply.”

Connection is truly at the heart of the matter at St.

Giles, and as we wrapped the evening with this tight-knit

up a collection of impeccably appointed buildings farther

group over multiple courses of an impeccably prepared

out on the grounds for overnight accommodations: the

dinner—including trout raised on the estate—it was clear

Riding House, restored seventeenth-century stables with

that they just enjoy and feel inspired by each other.

eight bedrooms, a communal living and gathering room

“This whole endeavor began in the spirit of

and a dining hall; and the Pepperpot Lodges, an intimate

collaboration—with the esteemed National Trust docents

pair of stone dwellings. He has also introduced a concert

as well with our other partners in restoration and

series that speaks to his first love, music.

archiving—and has since grown to become an even bigger

testament to the power of creativity,” Nick says, “both

Other initiatives are sure to follow—in addition to

shepherding St. Giles’s public legacy, Nick is constantly

among individuals and as a collective whole. Without

coming up with ways to bring the house to life for his own

their help, we would be lost.”

In addition to hosting scheduled cultural events like

the storytelling session in the grotto, he has also opened

young family, something that was lost on his generation.

From the volunteer librarians to the journeymen

“My children get to interact with St. Giles in a way that

storytellers to the people whose daily efforts make St. Giles

was wholly anathema to my brother and me,” Nick says.

a viable and accessible destination for the world to visit and

“We rarely visited and, when we did, we felt totally and

appreciate up close, the tireless group works symbiotically,

completely alien to the place. We were not at all at home

sharing ideas and insights to create something bigger than

here. My children are. And now, finally, I am too.”

C e n t u r i e s - o l d t re a s u re s p o p u l a t e t h e m a i n h o u s e .

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Leaning on the past: Nick in the attic with his old records and DJ equipment.

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