“If I’m honest, I thought it would be really boring. However I really enjoyed looking around!!” It is always a pleasure at the end of the year to look back through the public visitor’s book that’s kept in the entrance hall of Knebworth House. For 2009 there are 12 pages of lovely comments from visitors of all ages and all nationalities. Most are about how good our guides are – “the warmth and enthusiasm of our guide made it the best tour we’ve ever done!” I notice the ones praising Matt Allison are mostly female! There are two negative comments in the 12 pages – one about plastic pots in the garden and the other about signs to the entrance – and we are content to have constructive criticism along with the positive reviews. Perhaps most rewarding, are the ones in large erratic joined-up letters – for instance, Jemma, aged 8, from Cheshunt writes, “Wonderful house (I WOULD LOVE TO LIVE HERE.)”; and unsigned, “fabtastic day I loved it so much I don’t want to go” (or maybe that was one of the guides!). We wonder how many historic houses the Knight family from Ipswich have visited when they say Knebworth House is “the best preserved historical building we’ve seen”, but we’ll take praise where we get it!
Also pleasing is the number of comments from foreign visitors. We seem to have almost every American state represented, and I see Thailand, Hungary, Norway, Brazil… of course, for all I know, some of these comments could be damning – or obscene! – but “Muchas gracia” and “Es ist wunderbar” sound promising. Recognising the interest we receive from abroad, this month we’ve put our first foreign guide on our website – Jasmine from Lille shows you our key pages in French at http://www.knebworthhouse.com/index_fr.html. Goodness, there’s even somebody in the visitor’s book from “Park Lane, Knebworth”! And there it is, my favourite comment of 2009: “Fanks!”
Martha joins me in wishing all our neighbours a very happy Christmas.
Henry Lytton Cobbold
www.knebworthhouse.com