Luke Montagu
Luke manages Mapperton Estate with his wife Julie after taking over from his parents, the Earl and Countess of Sandwich in 2016. After graduating from Columbia University, Luke founded a series of technology, education and media businesses. In 2003 he co-founded the Met Film School, which he led as CEO until 2009. Luke has since worked to develop Mapperton alongside a number of pro bono activities, including the All Party Parliamentary Group for Prescribed Drug Dependence, as chair and trustee of the Dalai Lama Centre for Compassion and more recently chair of the charity West Dorset Wilding. Not your archetypal Viscount, Luke is wonderfully down to earth and authentic in his passion for enabling nature to thrive alongside modern land management, as well as promoting compassion in western society.
Julie Montagu
Julie, Viscountess Hinchingbrooke, is America’s favorite viscountess and host of the American Viscountess and Mapperton Live YouTube channels. She was previously the presenter of ‘An American Aristocrat’s Guide to Great Estates’ on the Smithsonian Channel. In her YouTube series, Julie visits many of the UK’s finest historic homes and castles, some of which belong to family friends and distant relatives.
Julie is also one of London’s top yoga instructors. According to Cosmopolitan: ‘Julie Montagu is talked about with the sort of reverence reserved for the Dalai Lama.’
Julie is married with four children, and divides her time between London and Dorset, where she works with her husband Luke managing and developing Mapperton Estate.
Samantha Hannay
Sam will be your Tour Manager for the duration of the tour and is looking forward to showing you this wonderful corner of England. Sam is a ‘country girl’ at heart, with a passion for nature and has worked for a number of wildlife charities. Having travelled extensively around the world and lived in the US for a number of years, Sam chose to settle in Southwest England with her husband and two boys 13 years ago, and enjoys nothing better than a fungi forage or fossil hunt along the Jurassic coast.