A new rising: the County Durham castle undergoing a transformation

Lord and Lady Barnard are converting buildings across the estate into places for dining, events, hospitality and retail. Photograph: Mark Pinder/The Guardian

“It is Walt Disney meets Buckingham Palace,” says Lady Kate Barnard in the spectacularly showy Octagon drawing room of Raby Castle. “Barbie would love it.”

You get a sense Barnard is not such a fan. “It would have been so beautiful,” she sighs. “It would have been a round room and unfortunately when [the Victorian architect William] Burn came in 1840 he did … this. It was the height of good taste then.”