Downton Abbey: From Highclere to the Royal Parade

The series begins the day after RMS Titanic sank, 15 April 1912, as news reaches Downton Abbey that James and Patrick Crawley have perished. The Downton on screen is Highclere Castle in Hampshire, which supplies the exterior shots and most of the interiors: a Grade I listed house built in 1679 and largely renovated in the 1840s, seat of the Earls of Carnarvon. Series 2 turns the fictional house into an officers' convalescent hospital, echoing history: in the First World War Highclere opened a hospital for the war wounded, with Lady Carnarvon helping to organise it and nursing there.

Visitor guidance: Open to the public for self-guided tours in the summer months; the Egyptian Exhibition lies in the cellars.

Bampton's St Mary's plays St Michael and All Angels', the church of the fictional village of Downton. In series 3, covering 1920 to 1921, preparations are underway for Mary and Matthew's wedding, but it is Edith's day that goes wrong: at the altar, Sir Anthony Strallan announces that he cannot go through with the wedding, devastating Edith, and flees the church, never to be heard from again. The real building is a Grade I listed church, founded as an Anglo-Saxon minster in the 10th or 11th century.

Bates's prison scenes in series 3 were filmed at Lincoln Castle. By then he has been found guilty of murder and sentenced to death, commuted to life through Lord Grantham's influence. Inside, his cellmate plants a small surgical knife in his bedding, but a fellow prisoner's warning gives him time to find and hide it, until Anna uncovers evidence clearing him of his wife's murder and he is released. The real gaol was built within the castle in 1787 and extended in 1847; the castle itself was founded in the late 11th century by William the Conqueror.

Visitor guidance: Open most days; parts of the prison are a museum, including a 19th-century chapel with an enclosed seat for each prisoner.

Inveraray Castle in Argyll doubled as "Duneagle Castle" in the 2012 Christmas special. In the story the family visits Violet's niece Susan, her husband "Shrimpie", the Marquess of Flintshire, and their daughter Rose in Scotland, with Matthew and a very pregnant Mary in tow. There the Marquess confides to Robert that his estate is bankrupt and will be sold, making Robert recognise that Downton has been saved by Matthew and Tom's efforts to modernise. The real castle stands on the shore of Loch Fyne and has been the seat of the Dukes of Argyll since the 18th century.

Visitor guidance: Open to visitors.

Downton's whole below-stairs world is a set: the kitchen, servants' quarters and working areas were built and filmed at Ealing Studios, not Highclere. Researchers visited nearly 40 English country houses to get the kitchen right, and production designer Donal Woods said that probably about 60 to 70 per cent of the stuff in there is from that period. In series 4 it hosts a love square between assistant cook Daisy, kitchen maid Ivy and the footmen Jimmy and Alfred. Ealing, founded as a film base in 1902, is the oldest continuously working studio in the world.

Alnwick Castle in Northumberland was the filming location for Brancaster Castle in the 2014 and 2015 Christmas specials, with cameras in its State Rooms, in its grounds and at the nearby semi-ruined Hulne Abbey. In series 5 the Crawleys are invited to Brancaster, rented by Lord and Lady Sinderby for a shooting party; there Lady Rose defuses a near-disaster for Lord Sinderby and secures his approval. In series 6 Bertie becomes 7th Marquess of Hexham and moves in. In life, it is the second largest inhabited castle in England.

Visitor guidance: Open to the public throughout the summer.

Bampton's public library served as the entrance to the cottage hospital. In series 6 the hospital sparks a quarrel: Violet and Isobel draw battle lines over a government take-over, and Violet, upset when Cora replaces her as hospital president, leaves on a long cruise. Robert resents Cora's frequent absences, then comes to admire her after watching her chair a hospital meeting. The building began as a free school, endowed by wool merchant Robert Veysey in 1635 and completed in 1653; Isobel's house is the old rectory in the same village.

Visitor guidance: The building is Bampton's public library, in Church View.

In 1927, King George V and Queen Mary plan to visit Downton during a royal tour of Yorkshire. Chairs for the parade seating arrive in heavy rain and Lady Mary leads a messy group effort to position them. In the village Tom meets a mysterious man calling himself Major Chetwode, who at the parade prepares to assassinate the King but is thwarted by Tom. Lacock supplied the royal parade, shot in late 2018 with horses from the Royal Artillery; in 2015 it had also played a 1920s livestock market.

Location precision: The sources say the film's scenes were shot in Lacock but name no exact spot; the pin marks the village.

Visitor guidance: The village is almost entirely owned by the National Trust and draws many visitors for its unspoiled appearance.

Exterior scenes set in York were filmed at Beamish Museum, complete with operational trams. In the story Barrow and the King's valet, Richard Ellis, make a trip to York: Ellis visits his parents while Barrow waits at a pub. A man there invites Barrow to an underground gay nightclub, but police raid the venue shortly after they arrive and arrest the attendees. Ellis, also a closeted gay man, uses his position in the royal household to get Barrow released from custody.

Visitor guidance: An open-air museum in County Durham; its 1.5-mile tramway circles the site.