Biltmore House, Asheville, NC

Blog Entry For March 17, 2016

And so it was. After having breakfast and jumping into the truck we were off for the 52 minute ( by GPS ) drive to the Biltmore House. Amazed isn’t the word for the number of people milling about the visitor center, the cars waiting in line for the estate personnel to check passes, the parking attendants placing vehicles exactly where they wanted which reminded us of Disney World, the number of shuttle buses ready to take people from parking lot to the front of the house more than 2 miles away but it is the word I would use to describe the feelings when I caught my first look at the Biltmore.

George Vanderbilt was a single man who planned for his future and took 6 years to build the more than 244 room family home which officially opened on Christmas Eve, 1895. George and Edith’s daughter Cornelia was married to the Honorable John Francis Amherst Cecil in 1924.

The Cecils opened the Biltmore to the public in 1930, responding to requests to increase area tourism during the Depression, and to generate income to preserve the estate. Today, fourth and fifth generations of the Vanderbilt family are involved with the day to day operations along with a staff of more than 2,000 employees.

Showcased in Biltmore House, this season, are centuries of wedding fashions consisting of movie costumes and family heirlooms. The exhibit is entitled “Fashionable Romance: Wedding Gowns In Film” and has been paired with exquisite floral designs complimenting each film’s era.

The tour encompasses several rooms on 3 floors of the residence along with the basement recreation area and servant’s quarter. Our tour began with the Entrance Hall, continued along the outside of the Winter Garden, a short detour through the Billiards Room and into the Banquet Hall complete with a sampling of music from the Organ Loft. This room has a triple fireplace on one end of the room, cathedral ceilings which support two massive chandeliers which I can only describe as looking like birdcages.

Other rooms on the tour were the Breakfast Room, Salon, Music Room, Tapestry Gallery, Library, Second Floor Living Hall, Both Master and Mistress Bedrooms with a joint Sitting Room, Third Floor Sitting Room, Van Dyck Bedroom, Morland Bedroom, Madonna Bedroom as well as a view of state of the art bathrooms, at that time.

I could go on about the wonderful lunch we had in the Stable Café or the immaculate gardens we wandered through but a friend once told me the shorter the blog entries, the more likely someone will read them. And yes, the Stable Café is situated in the most beautiful of “barns”. Even the horses lived like royalty.