Quick Trip to the Biltmore Mansion in North Carolina

Kent and I took a three-day trip to Asheville, North Carolina at the beginning of April to go to the Biltmore.

 We've been to see Biltmore in December to see the largest private residence in America all decked out for Christmas, but I wanted to see it in the spring with the gardens in bloom.

There was also an exhibit of clothing worn during the Gilded age, which I thought sounded interesting.

When we visited the house at Christmas time there were huge crowds and lines to get in, but this time it was very quiet and not busy at all.  The picture on the right is the atrium just inside the entryway.

              
On the sign above it explained how they recreated clothing from old photos, and below is an example.

When we toured the house at Christmas time we weren't allowed to take photographs, so it was nice that we were able to take them on this visit.

 The rooms and furnishings were all magnificent.

 It was also cool to see the mannequins dressed in period clothing.

 
Of course they had several lovely old pianos.

 We loved seeing all the fresh flowers used to decorate throughout the house.

 The dining room was enormous!

 This is the same group of mannequins seen from different perspectives.

 I put this picture in to show the height of the room and to give a scale of how huge the room is.

At the end there was a photo spot so we could pretend we were the Vanderbilt's house guests.

                         
After touring the home we went out to walk through the gardens.

 I had hoped that Spring would have been further along, but they were definitely not at their peak.

 The tulips were blooming, but you can see the trees are still bare.

 We were just a few weeks too early for most of the gardens, but maybe that's also why it wasn't so busy, which was nice.

This picture was taken in the green house, which is why it looks so lush. Kent always enjoys looking at gardens to get ideas for his yard at home.