Wollaton Hall, Nottingham (must see)

In a "core period" stretching from 1570 to 1620, many "Prodigy" English country houses were built. They were built by nobility and wealthy families as "palaces of an awesome scale." The biggest and the best were built with the aim of attracting visits of Elizabeth I and her entourage as she made her royal progresses through the Midlands.

Wollaton Hall is one such house. Located on a hill in Wollaton Park, Nottingham, it is the home of the quirky Nottingham Natural History Museum. The Nottingham Industrial Museum is housed in outbuildings of the Hall. The Hall is amidst the 500 bucolic acres of Wollaton Park with its tailored woodlands, meadows and free-roaming deer.

The Hall was built between 1580 and 1588 for Sir Francis Willoughby. The architect is thought to have been Robert Smythson. Smythson is credited with having designed the similar houses of Longleat and Hardwick Hall. The style is extravagant Elizabethan with Jacobean elements. The Willoughbys' wealth was based on "lucrative coal pits."

The Building is a block of structures with a central hall of three stories. There is a stone screen facade and galleries on either end. Towers are on each corner of the top floor. At each corner also is a pavilion of three stories. The pavilions have ornate decorations projecting well above the roofline.

Ancaster stone was used from quarries in Lincolnshire. The master masons were imported from Italy. Gondola moorings on the exterior are testament for the Italians. Audacious French and Dutch elements are not absent. Carvings are extensive, in and out. Window tracery evokes the Middle Ages. The whole thing might be called "fantasy-Gothic."

The Hall was featured as Wayne Manor in the film, "The Dark Knight Rises." The hall is only five miles from Gotham, Nottinghamshire. Gotham, in the story, was Batman's hometown.