Christie’s Luxury Defined – 5 Castles with Modern Interiors

Castles are the stuff of legend and lore, steeped as they are in legend, lore, romance—and the brute grim facts of history, of stony life in the late Dark Ages.    

A strategic, defensive fortress, the castle was the ultimate architectural symbol of authority in peacetime and in war. Built to withstand prolonged sieges, the earliest motte-and-bailey fortifications were ingeniously re-engineered over the centuries to fend off intruders in imaginative and wicked, wicked ways: a drawbridge across a dank, vaporous moat; a curtain wall with arrow-slit apertures; a spiked portcullis gate; uneven trip stairs spiraling up clockwise to pin right-handed swordsmen against the wall …    

As if that were not enough, the aptly named murder hole let defenders rain down unpleasantness in the form of boiling oil, arrows, and bolts from crossbows. We could go on. We won’t.  

Centuries on, the clash of arms echoes only in stone, but castles endure, figuratively and literally, as symbols of beauty, substance, and stature.    

Herewith, Luxury Defined extends its fond welcome to some castles of old and new, converted into luxuriously modern homes. Worry ye not, for safe entry and hospitality await within these ancient (and not-so-ancient) crenelated walls. Thoroughly modern interiors optimized for utmost comfort and luxury. Murder holes optional.