This blog post was written based on research during the ‘Interpreting Kiplin for 400’ project, a National Lottery Heritage Fund project with thanks to National Lottery players.  Published 8th April 2025 . Find out more about the project at history.kiplinhall.co.uk/kiplin-400/

Running a large country house like Kiplin Hall was a complex operation. Many different jobs had to be done to make sure that clothes were clean, fireplaces were lit, and food was on the table. The service wing was a hive of activity, providing spaces for staff to live and work. 

The service wing at Kiplin was built by Christopher Crowe the Elder at some point after he bought the hall in 1722.1 Prior to this, there may have been an older building that housed the kitchens, and it is likely that the staff slept in the hall itself. By the 1720s, changing needs and fashions called for staff to be moved into separate and dedicated service areas. Further additions were made to the building as time went on and staff roles changed. 

The new wing contained all the spaces needed to care for the hall and the family.  Connecting corridors between the hall and service wing at all levels allowed the staff to be close when needed but separate when not. Staff were supposed to be invisible, completing their tasks without being seen or heard by the family.  

While we do not know the layout of the service wing, an inventory list from 1887 gives us an idea of the types of rooms it contained.2 The kitchen was an essential feature, providing meals for both the family and the staff. The staff would have eaten their meals in the servants’ hall, perhaps spending what little free time they had there too. Alongside the kitchen would have been other food preparation areas such as a still room to prepare items like jams and chutneys.  

Without modern fridges or freezers, the kitchen space itself was designed to keep food cool and fresh for longer. The service wing was on the north side of the Hall, away from the heat of the sun. The food store rooms were probably lined with cold stone shelves too. Fresh food would have been coming into the kitchens daily, with much of the produce being grown in the gardens. Food that could not be eaten straight away would have been preserved by turning them into delicious jams, chutneys and pickles.  

Near the service wing, but likely in a separate building, a dairy and a bakehouse provided bread and dairy products, like milk, cheese and butter. A wash house stood nearby to tackle the large quantity of washing produced at a house like Kiplin.  

Upstairs in the service wing would have been sleeping quarters for the staff. There were separate sleeping areas for the male and female staff, with a locked door between to prevent fraternisation. Census records show that not all the staff would have slept in the service wing, with some living in cottages on the estate or in local villages.3 Only senior staff members like the butler and the housekeeper had their own private sitting rooms and bedrooms. The butler would have also had responsibility for the butler’s pantry and the safe that stored the valuable silver. 

Large sections of the service wing were demolished in the 1970s. By this point the hall and service wing were both in a state of disrepair. The trustees of Kiplin Hall made the difficult decision to demolish some of the wing in order to prioritise saving the rest of the hall. Without a tangible space to represent them, many of the stories and people who lived and worked at Kiplin have been lost. In 2020, Kiplin acquired the Annie Marchant Kitchen and Dairy Collection to help tell some of these stories. The domestic objects in this collection provide a link to the people and jobs that kept Kiplin running for hundreds of years.