GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – There’s been a growing interest in people researching their family ancestry. Many have learned some interesting facts about their heritage. That includes Holland’s Hopwoood DePree. Many of us are familiar with him as the filmmaker who brought us the Waterfront Film Festival.
His latest adventure takes him across the pond to England where he is renovating his 600 year old family estate called Hopwood Hall.
It all started with one black and white photograph that changed Hopwood’s life. He discovered the photo late one night while researching his family’s ancestry.
He remembered his grandfather telling him about a grand castle on the English countryside.
“It seemed like all these stories he had told me as a boy that I always thought we were bedtime stories or a fairy tale, was actually a real place.”
So, he had to go see it. In 2013, he booked a trip to Manchester, England and traveled seven miles to Middleton and Hopwood Hall.
“And I was absolutely mesmerized to know that it was real and to walk into the doors.”
For hundreds of years, Hopwood Hall stood strong but now, the castle is beginning to crumble under years of neglect. Hopwood is working to save it.
“It’s really amazing to me to walk through the halls and know that my ancestors walked down the same steps and they touched the same doorknobs and ran their hands up and down the same banisters. That’s really something that inspires me on a daily basis.”
It’s hard not to get lost in the fairytale, but Hopwood is quickly brought back to reality.
“I’m in a hardhat, and work boots every day,” he said.
He’s chronicled his adventures of restoring the 600-year-old castle on his YouTube channel.
“Probably my most exciting adventures are when we find a secret room or a secret doorway, which has happened a number of times. Even a few weeks ago, I was in there and found a new room I’d never been in.”
And while the Hall dates back 600 years, historians think it could go back even further.
“We timber-dated the trees that were used to make the timbers in the wall. So we know it goes back to the 1420s. But historians think that it goes back much further than that.”
Hopwood isn’t alone in this work to restore the castle. Many of the residents of Middleton have a special connection and are helping in the restoration efforts.
“I met one woman whose grandfather had been the chauffeur another whose grandfather had been a gardener another, his great, great grandmother had been one of the cooks. And these big houses weren’t just family homes, they were places that the community came to, there were places that guests came to visit, they would have concerts and artists come and visit.”
From Lord Byron who wrote his poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage at Hopwood Hall, to Fredrick Chopin who played there and Queen of England who visited, Hopwood Hall hosted it’s share of famous guests and elegant parties over the centuries.
Hopwood doesn’t just want to restore the castle, he wants it to once again be a place of music, art and life.
“I’d like other people to be able to experience it to the same way that I have.”
He’s already begun to doing that. Sections of Hopwood Hall are schedule to open for tours in June.
But work to restore the castle is far from over. In fact, Hopwood admits it could take a lifetime.
“It just feels like it has sort of been meant to be. And if I can save the hall and leave it behind for future generations, for many people to enjoy and experience it, then I think I’ll be happy with that.”
Hopwood wrote a book about renovating Hopwood Hall, appropriately called Downton Shabby. There’s a part where he talks about Holland where he grew up and how much a part of his life here in West Michigan has an impact on what he’s doing now.
Hopwood is in town if you’d like to meet him. He has a book signing Wednesday, June 1 at 7 p.m. at Schuler Books on 28th Street in Grand Rapids.
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