Kenwood House

No ramble over Hampstead Heath is complete without a stop at Kenwood House, the fine Georgian manor that sits on its edge. It's free to visit its collection of Old Masters, and to wander through its pretty, flower-filled formal gardens.

Kenwood House was first built in the late seventeenth century. Then, this modest brick building was transformed by celebrated architect Robert Adam between 1764 and 1779 to become a neoclassical villa suitable for William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield. After centuries at the centre of London's high society, the house fell on hard times. Shortly after World War I, the 6th Earl came extremely close to flogging off Kenwood to developers. The plots were already pegged out when the brewing magnate Edward Cecil Guinness, 1st Earl of Iveagh, bought the estate. He never lived there, but left the estate to the nation, along with a superb collection of 63 Old Master paintings, acquired during a remarkably astute four-year spending spree between 1897 and 1891.

Now, English Heritage are the custodians of the buildings and its internationally important collections, which include masterpieces by Gainsborough, Reynolds, Turner and Rembrandt.