CASTLE OWNER'S BOOK ON HOSTING DOWNTON ABBEY

Lady Carnarvon shares 15 years of memories of period drama

- BY MARC BAKER

TO countless fans all over the world Highclere Castle is Downton Abbey. To Fiona, the 8th Countess of Carnarvon, it is simply home.

For 15 years, six series and three films her magnificent Hampshire country house hosted a small army of actors and crew, creating one of Britain's most beloved historical dramas.

So were the aristocratic Crawleys, their friends and the domestic servants good house guests?

Lady Carnarvon has written about the experience in A Year at Highclere: Secrets and Stories from The Real Downton Abbey, which is out tomorrow. She chatted to the Daily Mirror ahead of the third and final movie - Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale - released on September 12.

Fiona, 61, moved to the castle with husband George, 68, the 8th Earl, after his father’s death in 2001. It has been the family seat of the Earls of Carnarvon since 1679.

She recalled on the first day of filming, in March 2010, their photos were replaced by ones of Lord Grantham (Hugh Bonneville) and family, and the crew were mortified when a lighting boom dropped on an antique green lacquered box.

Lady Carnarvon remembers giving a crew member a ticking off. He was speeding through the front hall with a long pole balanced on his shoulder. She writes: 'I said, 'Excuse me. Could you go a little slower and more carefully? You nearly hit the painting!' He said: 'All right, love. A van Gogh, is it?' I said 'No, it's a van Dyck actually.'