Holiday rentals news - Agatha Christie's Devon holiday home opened to the public

Agatha Christie's Devon holiday home opened to the public

Agatha Christie's holiday home is being opened to the public. Greenway House was given to the National Trust, which has spent £4.5m restoring it to its 1950s heyday.

The crime novelist's Devon holiday cottage was given to the National Trust in 2000, according to the BBC. However, until now only the 278 acre estate was open to the public as Christie's daughter and her husband were living in the property until their deaths in recent years.

The National Trust will open Greenway House, near Dartmouth, this Saturday. The organisation wanted to restore the house to its 1950s heyday and allow visitors to experience it as Christie would have done. For the first few weeks, visitors to the house will be able to watch staff in the final stages of the restoration, as the trust wanted people to be able to see the process rather than have to wait longer for the finished product.

Among the rooms to be opened to the public will be the drawing room, where Christie would read her novels to friends and family. Visitors will also be able to access the author's bedroom, where all her novels will be on display. Due to limited parking and traffic restrictions in the lanes leading to the property, visitors are being encouraged to arrive at Greenway House in "green ways".

Christie's relatives are keen for visitors to experience Greenway House: "What I wish most is that the people who visit it feel some of the magic and the sense of place that I felt when my family spent so much time there in the 1950s and 1960s," said the author's grandson, Matthew Prichard. "If they do, then our gift of Greenway will be worthwhile."

The National Trust said that restoring the house has been a huge and expensive undertaking. The work was carried out with the help of a £800,000 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund. Devon Renaissance also contributed £95,000 towards the building of a new visitor centre on the site. A further £1m was raised through a public appeal.

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