Langlebury Film Hub

Temporary stage since 2019.  New stages and other facilities from 2027?

 

 

The beautiful country mansion called Langlebury House is located just to the west of Leavesden Studios, close to the M25.  The house and its grounds have been used as a location for filming since the late 1990s.  Dozens of films and TV dramas have been made here.  Its history is quite interesting…

 

The house was built around 1725, with various additions in the 19th Century.  The mansion and its stables along with other outbuildings are Grade II listed.  It has passed through various owners, each adding to the facilities here including landscaping the extensive grounds and establishing a home farm with a dairy herd.

In 1947 the estate was sold to Hertfordshire County Council who converted the house into a secondary school, which opened in 1949.  In the 1960s, the school expanded in size and new buildings were constructed to the south of the mansion.  These are now in a very sorry state.

The school closed in 1996 and the house was for a while occupied as council offices.  The empty school buildings were then used for filming the BBC drama Hope and Glory.  Three series were made which were transmitted between June 1999 and November 2000.

In 2007 the house and its associated buildings were sold to Ralph Trustees Ltd. (RTL)  They are a family business who run several high class hotels.  They also own The Grove Estate, which lies to the south of Langlebury.  They purchased the rest of the Langlebury estate including the grounds and farm in 2019.  There is a popular children’s farm based here, which continues to operate independently in and around the old farm buildings and walled garden.

Since 2012, Langlebury House and grounds have been marketed by The Location Collective, working in partnership with the local management.  In addition to many dramas for the BBC, ITV and C4, Langlebury has been used by several high profile productions including St Trinian’s, Paddington, Grantchester, Downton Abbey, The Crown, Kingsman 2, Harlots, Men in Black and The Little Stranger.

ITV’s Inspector Morse prequel series Endeavour was based here for much of its filming.  A ‘MaxR’ temporary sound stage was built amidst the old school buildings for this production by specialist company Filmfloor in 2019.  It is 132 x 66 ft (8,650 sq ft).  In September 2021 RTL applied for retrospective planning permission for the stage and use of the house and grounds for filming.  This was granted for 3 years, then extended for another 3 until July 2027.

Some of the land here has also been used as a back lot – for example, an external set was built for Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast in 2023.

 

 

RTL have made it clear since purchasing Langlebury that they wish to establish the house and grounds as a ‘Film Hub.’  They have noted that most of the productions that have used this location are not big budget international movies but independent British films and TV dramas.  Having the temporary stage has been very useful but they hope to provide more sound stages and other facilities.  They note that most film studios around London are now block-booked by the big HETV streaming companies so facilities available to smaller-scale productions are consequently limited.

They are also aware that many productions need support space when they are filming on location here or elsewhere in the area.  To quote their document:  ‘Langleybury Film Hub therefore features a Craft Zone; a series of units available for long-term hire as a base for supply chain companies to best service their film production customers, wherever those customers are based in the London orbit. Typical users for this element of the site may include companies involved in: Prop Storage, Sculpting, Special Effects, Carpentry, Stunts, Location Supplies, Lighting, Camera Equipment, Grip, Costume or Wardrobe, Hair or Make-Up, Visual Effects, Generators, Rigging, Scenery, Photography, Catering, Plant Hire, Editing and Post-Production, Recycling and Environmental Work.’

An important part of the Film Hub is the establishment of a training/educational facility for the industry.  This will aim to provide opportunities for further and higher education students to gain experience by working on film and television projects through a combination of paid work and work experience.  This is supported by WB Leavesden Studios and the National Film School at Beaconsfield, amongst others.  It will be housed in a new ‘Propellor Building’ which will be located where the old 1960s school currently stands.  It will include two sound stages, each of 4,000 sq ft, enabling hands-on experience to be gained by the students.

 

An initial planning application was submitted in October 2022.  This included relocating the children’s farm to better facilities in the north corner of the site and building six sound stages with accompanying workshops and production offices to the south of the site.  A cafe will be built within the walled garden for the use of people working on site.  These plans were rejected and a more modest proposal was submitted in September 2024.  It was still recommended for refusal by planning officers but in fact was approved by a large majority of councillors on the Three Rivers Council development management committee on 30th January 2025 – so well done to them!

The new proposals have fewer buildings in the Craft Zone but still include the cafe, the training facility and the relocation of the children’s farm.  They have reduced the number of sound stages to four – two of about 22,000 sq ft. and two of about 16,500 sq ft.  The smaller pair are located on the southern edge of the site near the M25 slip road.  Each of them has a production office building attached and nearby workshops, along with hardstanding for unit vehicles.  There is also an area set aside as a back lot near the larger pair of stages for external sets.  

 

 

The development will be carried out in phases – restoring the mansion and its listed buildings and demolishing the school first.  Then relocating the children’s farm and constructing the training facility.  The new Craft Zone buildings will go up next, along with two sound stages.  (Interestingly, the planning permission states that the training facility must be up and running before the Craft Zone and new stages can be operational.)  Finally two more stages will be built in the southern corner of the site.  It is, however, worth pointing out that detailed planning permission has only been granted for the first phases.  The later phases including the Craft Zone and sound stages have outline permission but yet have to go through a ‘reserved matters’ application.  This could be lengthy as it will determine the precise details of the appearance of the buildings along with their scale, layout and associated landscaping.

So optimistically, we might expect the Craft Zone and first two stages to be available some time in 2027 and the other two maybe the following year?  This is all excellent news and I’m sure these facilities will be a godsend to many independent films and TV dramas.