House, Gardens & Cafe Open Tuesday - Sunday 10.30 - 17.00

Creative Footsteps: Family Walk & Poetry Writing

Part of the Creative Footsteps Festival

An outdoor ramble with activities along the way to help connect with nature and find inspiration in the natural world, followed by a guided session at the museum creating poems from the sights, sounds, smells and textures of the walk. No previous poetry writing experience necessary! 

We will be outside for the first half of the session, please come dressed appropriately for the weather with walking boots or wellies. 

Suitable for ages 5 and up. Children must be accompanied by an adult 

10.30am-12 noon 

1.30-3pm 

£5 per adult

£2 per child

Between 2 and 10 October the area’s first Nature and Literary Festival will celebrate local literary greats and their love of the East Hampshire countryside. Follow in the footsteps of author Jane Austen, our first ecologist and naturalist Gilbert White, the wartime poet Edward Thomas and more. You can enjoy short guided nature walks, writing and poetry workshops, garden tours, trails, Yoga and more. https://www.easthants.gov.uk/creative-footsteps

    Gilbert Whites House

    Gilbert White was aged 7 or 8 when the White family moved from the Vicarage on Selborne’s Plestor, to this house, called ‘The Wakes’ (named after the Wake family who had lived here previously). At that time the property would have been no more than a ‘two up, two down’  but over the subsequent years lots of extensions and additions have been made, creating the long sizeable house you see today.

    The rooms have been restored following descriptions in White’s own correspondence and include a chair he used at Oriel College, Oxford (loaned from the College), items of contemporary furniture, family portraits and bed hangings embroidered for him by his aunts.

    On display is the original manuscript of his book, The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, which was purchased with generous help from English Heritage and others.

    Learn more