* Holkham NNR, Norfolk

* Holkham NNR

Holkham National Nature Reserve is England's largest National Nature Reserve ( NNR ).

It is on the Norfolk coast between Burnham Overy Staithe and Blakeney, and is managed by Natural England with the cooperation of the Holkham Estate.

The Holkham estate has been owned by the Coke family, later Earls of Leicester since 1609, and their seat at Holkham Hall is opposite the reserve's Lady Anne's Drive entrance.

In country house building, major commissions for Kent were designing the interiors of Houghton Hall ( c. 1725 – 35 ), recently built by Colen Campbell for Sir Robert Walpole, but at Holkham Hall the most complete embodiment of Palladian ideals is still to be found ; there Kent collaborated with Thomas Coke, the other " architect earl ", and had for an assistant Matthew Brettingham, whose own architecture would carry Palladian ideals into the next generation.

The Tundra Bean Goose has no regular wintering sites, but is found in small groups among other grey goose species – among the most regular localities are WWT Slimbridge, Gloucestershire and Holkham Marshes, Norfolk.

The beach is known for its long flat terrain, abstract sand dunes, varied unique beach huts and a naturist area situated to the west at Holkham.

The beach is backed by dense pine woods which are part of the Holkham National Nature Reserve.

The family seat is Holkham Hall, near Wells-next-the-Sea, Norfolk.

* Holkham Hall, England, is completed in the Palladian style by William Kent, after thirty years of building work.

Compared to its Palladian contemporaries, such as Holkham Hall, Woburn Abbey and Ragley Hall, it is quite small, yet it is architecturally important as it encapsulates a period of 18th century English social history, when young men, known as dilettanti, returning from the nearly obligatory Grand Tour with newly purchased acquisitions of art, often built a country house to accommodate their new collections and display in stone the learning and cultivation they had acquired during their travels.

The cause of Thomas's death is not certain, although there are chances it was a duel, but the result was that upon the death of Thomas's wife Margaret, Wenman would inherit the estate, including Holkham Hall, a " Palladian masterpiece ".

Holkham is a village and civil parish in the north-west of the county of Norfolk, England.

The village of Holkham is located on the coast road ( the A149 ) between Wells-next-the-Sea and Burnham Overy Staithe.

Holkham Hall is one of the principal Palladian houses of England, built for an ancestor of Thomas William Coke, noted agricultural innovator and later 1st Earl of Leicester of Holkham.

Holkham Pines is the name of the large belt of pine trees which runs west to east inland from the beach ; the eastern end is known as Wells Woods.

Holkham Freshmarsh is the name which refers to the series of wet meadows which sit inland from the pine belt, and north of the A149.

This is the first reference to Holkham.

This is found almost nowhere else in Europe, the cold grandeur of England's finest palladian mansions such as Kedleston Hall or Holkham Hall could not be further removed from the joy and movement of the interiors of one of Richard Cassels's Irish Palladian interiors.

He is particularly noted for commissioning the design and construction of Holkham Hall in north Norfolk.

" Brettingham's engraved publication of Holkham credited Burlington specifically with ceilings for the portico and the north dressing-room.

His stately furniture designs complemented his interiors: he designed furnishings for Hampton Court Palace ( 1732 ), Lord Burlington's Chiswick House ( 1729 ), London, Thomas Coke's Holkham Hall, Norfolk, Robert Walpole's pile at Houghton, for Devonshire House in London, and at Rousham.

After completion of the villa in 1729, Burlington later provided inspiration to other architects for numerous other buildings, such as Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester at Holkham Hall, Norfolk Charles Lennox, 2nd Duke of Richmond, at Goodwood House, and the Mansion House, nicknamed the " Egyptian Hall " for its columns.

Nearby villages include Blakeney ( famous for its bird sanctuary ), Burnham Market, Burnham Thorpe ( the birthplace of Horatio Nelson ), Holkham ( with its famous stately home Holkham Hall ), and Walsingham ( a major medieval pilgrimage site ).

The Berkeley family held it for generations until it passed by marriage to the Cokes of Holkham in Norfolk.

Kent picked it up in his designs for the Houses of Parliament, and it appears in Kent's executed designs for the north front of Holkham Hall.

* A number of beach scenes for the Avengers episode " The Town of No Return " ( 1965 ) were filmed at Holkham Gap.

In 1728 he was raised to the Peerage of Great Britain as Baron Lovel, of Minster Lovel in the County of Oxford, and in 1744 he was created Viscount Coke, of Holkham in the County of Norfolk, and Earl of Leicester, also in the Peerage of Great Britain.

William Kent designed Holkham Hall in 1734 in the Palladian manner ; Thomas Archer was also a contemporary, although his work tended toward the baroque style that had been popular in England prior to the Palladian revival.

It was extirpated from the United Kingdom but sporadic breeding attempts in the early 21st Century culminated with the formation of a colony at Holkham in Norfolk in 2010.

In many cases his ideas were informal: at Holkham Hall the architect Matthew Brettingham recalled that " the general ideas were first struck out by the Earls of Burlington and Leicester, assisted by Mr. William Kent.

In England, the terms " country house " and " stately home " are sometimes used vaguely and interchangeably, however, many country houses such as Ascott in Buckinghamshire were deliberately designed not to be stately, and to harmonise with the landscape, while some of the great houses such as Kedleston Hall and Holkham Hall were built as " power houses " to impress and dominate the landscape, and were most certainly intended to be " stately " and impressive.

Holkham Beach in autumn

Francesco travelled to England to 1752, where his decorative talent resulted in diverse work, including the design of tapestries with the weaver Paul Saunders at Holkham Hall.

File: Holkham Hall-geograph. org. uk-206890. jpg | Holkham Hall

The Vikings navigated the creeks to establish Holkham village, but access to the former harbour was stopped by drainage and reclamation of the marshes between the coast and the shingle ridge which started in the 17th century, and was completed in 1859.

The National Nature Reserve was created in 1967 from 1, 700 ha ( 4, 200 acres ) of the Holkham Estate and 2, 200 ha ( 5, 400 acres ) of foreshore belonging to the Crown.

File: Holkham Hall 20080717-01. jpg | Holkham Hall North Front

File: Holkham Hall 20080717-03. jpg | Holkham hall Marble Hall

File: Obelisk, Holkham Hall-geograph. org. uk-206887. jpg | Obelisk, Holkham Hall