The Biltmore Estate in Asheville North Carolina

I have wanted to see The Biltmore Estate for as long as I can remember. We even debated about tacking a day onto our Smoky Mountain trip and taking a side trip (about 5 hours) to head there. I was all for it but the rest of my family thought that was a bit much. So when I heard our blogging weekend was going to be in Asheville I was hopeful that I might finally make it there... and I did! 

Some fast facts about the Biltmore;

• it encompasses 8,000 of the original 125,000 acres
• the gardens take up 75 of those acres and there are 22 miles of trail to explore 
• the house is 175,000 square feet of living space with 250 rooms
• those 250 rooms include 35 bedrooms, 43 bathrooms (with indoor plumbing- not usual at the time of construction), & 65 fireplaces
• it was built with 288 electric light fixtures, 2 electric elevators
• there is a gym, a swimming pool, a bowling alley and more
• it is the largest privately owned home in the United States 

Construction of the house took 6 years and was commissioned by George Washington Vanderbilt. He used the fortune his grandfather made through shipping and railroad monopolies. When he passed away unexpectedly his daughter Cornelia inherited the house but as she was still young yet her mother took over managing the property until Cornelia was grown. 

I could not help but take note of all the tiny details! Ornamentation was HUGE during the gilded age and this house shows that off in the extreme.  

The tour starts in the winter garden... and oh my! I just fell in love with this space! I mean look at that glass ceiling and we were told that back in its heyday the plants would have been much, much larger/taller giving it complete privacy from the rest of the house.  

While I always look around at all the details you'll see I was quite taken with so many of the ceilings in this house. They were incredible. I also loved that nearly everything was arched or curved or rounded... doorways, windows, walls, ceilings. 

These billiard table weigh more than a ton each and were made specifically for this room. And again, check out that intricate ceiling! 

The banquet hall features tapestries woven in the 1500's, a large fireplace made up of 3 smaller fireplaces (called a triple fireplace) with the Vanderbilt crest carved over them. Most guests would enjoy a 10 course meal served in this room but we were told that good wages were paid to their staff and that the house felt like a luxury resort when you were visiting. 

later on we got to see the workings behind that large pipe organ (though I didn't think to snap a photo of it)

The breakfast room has large windows that overlook the mountains and would allow lots of light to shine into this room during the morning. There were Renoir paintings and works of art by other famous artists found throughout the home (sadly my Renoir photo was really blurry). 

I loved that the carvings from the fireplace were carried onto the ceiling and around the crown molding

Cornelius Vanderbilt (the one that made all the money) had a portrait on display in the breakfast room

The salon had a Monet painting, George loved landscapes and that is a big part of why he chose to build his house in the area that is is since you will see in just a bit that many of the rooms and areas open up to these gorgeous landscape views. George wanted to create a self- sustained estate with the Biltmore and it sounds like he mostly succeeded (during its time anyway).

the Monet paintings

The music room was completed by George's grandson in 1976. This room was used to store hidden national treasures during World War II-- there were steel vault doors added & armed guards stood watch 24/7 to protect the 62 paintings and 17 sculptures protected there.  

again with the amazing ceiling-- look at all that stenciling detail.

The views! 

The tapestry gallery has 3 tapestries and walls that open right up to the outside making it more of an open air gallery during the warmer seasons. 

Oh I just coveted this library! The ceiling was disassembled, moved and reassembled here all the way from Venice. The library houses 1/2 of George's 22,000 books. It is said that he read about 81 books a year. I just loved the two floors and the wall to wall books everywhere. One of the shops we popped into later (a bookstore fittingly enough) used to house the old bookbinders room. 

You can see this grand curved staircase from the front of the house but inside it might be even more impressive. Pictures are forbidden ON the stairs (I'm sure they don't want to risk anyone falling!) but wow, the views were lovely. The wrought iron rails and chandelier were pretty neat too. 

The second floor opens to the family living hall where the family would gather before heading downstairs together for formal events. There is a painting of the current Vanderbilt family members on the wall above the desk. 

Mr. Vanderbilt's bedroom has walnut carved furniture that was shipped over from Portugal but I noticed that even the doors had carvings on them. 

Have you ever noticed or wondered why beds in old historic homes tend to be much shorter? It's not because people were shorter back then but rather they did not believe it was healthy to sleep lying down flat and often slept in a semi-reclined position (not something I learned on this tour but in other historic home tours). 

There is a small sitting room between George's and his wife's bedrooms that they used for taking breakfast together, a private family room, a more intimate gathering space. 

another fancy ceiling! 

painting of their daughter Cornelia 

this couch a few chairs in the room have articulated arms like this they were English Knole- style. The articulated arms could be raised to keep in the heat and lowered to allow air flow, conversation, or even just a place to rest your book. 

Edith's bedroom (George's wife) was decorated in the French style with lots of velvet brocade and deep purple. She was very active in the running of the house and estate and even started a school for all the workers to attend so they could read and write. 

It was never recorded where Cordelia's bedroom was so that is not on the tour.  

Once we moved to the 3rd floor we encountered guest spaces; many of them were less adorned than the lower two levels (but not all guest spaces were). Below is the guest living hall where guests could gather before dinner. It was a bit darker and hard to see details here. 

More photos of that same curved staircase.. I just could not get enough! We walked by the staircase to get to set of guest rooms and suites.

even the ceiling is adorned

Remember if people were invited to visit they usually stayed for a long stretch of time and could have brought their own maids & servants too. 

The Louis XV suite is the grandest set of guests suits at the Biltmore. Made for literal royalty these 4 guestrooms are located on the 2nd floor of the house and consist of the 

the Damask room: so named for it's Damask draperies and wallpaper with views of the deer park and mountains

The Claude Room: named for the french painter Claude Lorrain who's prints are on display, once again, in this room. 

The Tyrolean Chimney room: so named for the focal point of the room- the overmantel made from tin- glazed earthenware tiles that were hand painted (and lovingly restored by hand)

This is actually Marilyn's photo as mine didn't come out

The 4th and final room making up the suite is called the Louis XV room since many of the motifs and colors in the room were picked specifically to mimic the design elements of the time period that Louis XV was king of France. Cornelia was born in this room. It's also where Cornelia gave birth to both her sons George and William (despite hoping to have a more modern birth with William outside of the home).

From there we headed into the recreation area of the house. 

The bowling alley:

The women's dressing area-- was a huge hallway with small rooms where women could change into their recreational clothing for swimming or other "fun" pursuits as they were not to be seen walking through the house in those clothes. 

a peek inside the changing room

Men had separate dressing rooms areas as well but the tour does not go through them. At the time men and woman would NOT have used the pool at the same time. 

The pool holds 70,000 gallons of water and was last filled in the 50's... when all the water leaked overnight into the basement below and hasn't been used since. The ropes on the side walls were to help people (though it sounded like primarily woman) stay upright in the heavy wool swimwear they wore.  

There was no chlorine or anything like that so the pool was drained and scrubbed by servants between uses. It even sounded like between each individual used it!

The basement also housed a state of the art gym.  

From there we moved more into the kitchen/pantry rooms. There were separate storage areas for dry goods, refrigerated goods, canning, etc. I didn't snap a photo of them all but I did snap a few. 

This is also a look at one of the maid/servants rooms. There were 28 women's quarters in the house and 32 men's quarters in the stables. 

Pastry kitchen

The rotisserie was housed in its own room since it put out tremendous amounts of heat. 

Main kitchen; it even had views of the mountains from two large windows over the sink. 

This room housed dinner ware and had 2 dumbwaiters; one electric and one manual to send food up to the dining areas. 

The servants had their own dining room and would eat in shifts, served by other servants. Instead of the 3 courses house guests often enjoyed servants would get 3 usually including a dessert too. Those that worked to serve the family and guest meals would eat first to ensure they weren't hungry while serving dinner. 

They had a couple rooms dedicated to laundry

We then saw what was called the Bachelor's wing: Smoking and Gun rooms.  

That concluded our tour and we headed into the courtyard next door. We walked through a few of the shops set up in the old carriage house (though most of the rooms had plaques with old photos explaining what each area was used for-- like the book binder's room).

We grabbed some snacks-- I picked ice cream-- and rested for a bit before deciding to tackle the gardens. 

moose tracks flavor

We did NOT see all 75 acres but what we did see was quite pretty. There are 6 formal and informal gardens, a conservatory and 20+ miles of nature trails. 

There is a tiny garden off the library that is often overflowing with wisteria with a lovely pergola but it was mostly just branches with a few tiny green shoots starting.   

The Italian garden is comprised of pools of koi, water lilies, statues and more. 

We checked out the shrub & spring garden but many were past blooming. The azalea garden was in full bloom though!

The walled garden/rose garden was very green but none of the roses were blooming and the tulips were a bit past their prime. 

The conservatory (not sure why it's called conservatory as it seemed to be made up of many small conservatories- a series of room after room [the hot room, the hot hot room, the cold room, etc] that were brimming with plants and flowers of all kinds. 

They do sell just a grounds/garden pass and honesty I bet I could spend an entire day walking around taking photos of flowers and statues and all the garden things! 

Once we felt like we had seen all the major areas of the garden we took a shuttle/trolley back up to the main parking level and found Marilyn's car. She drove us over to the Antler Village for the free wine tasting that is included with each ticket. It was really cute but we were all getting a bit tired from the sun and being on our feet to explore any more of these shops/restaurants and we think we even spotted a small museum too.  

 I have zero desire to drink wine but it was still neat to enter in through the wine cellar and see the old barrels, some old wine bottles, and more. Plus it was nice and cool in the "cave." We went up and into the tasting room. I mostly tuned out what was said but I know they are the most visited vineyard in the United States (thanks to the house, of course). 

iconic clock tower custom made in 1901 and was used/displayed in the hopes of keep workers on pace with their daily work. 

I had been so afraid the house wouldn't live up to my expectations but it did! 

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