Hidden Treasures Of The National Trust | Series 4 Preview (BBC Two)

Hidden Treasures of the National Trust returns for another look behind the velvet rope at some of the country’s most beautiful and historic houses - and meets the people battling to save our priceless heritage.

Episode one opens the doors to two houses, each with links to celebrated British authors, and follows the expert teams racing to preserve them.

Overlooking the River Dart in Devon is Greenway, the beloved holiday home of the world’s most famous crime writer, Agatha Christie. The house inspired one of her Hercule Poirot mystery novels, Dead Man’s Folly, and today visitors come from across the globe to step inside the world of the 'Queen of Crime'.

Hidden among Christie’s personal belongings is a delicate heirloom with a deeply personal story - a beautiful Chinese silk robe that once belonged to her mother, Clarissa. Yet time has taken its toll. The fragile silk lining is splitting and disintegrating, putting the treasured garment at risk. Now the robe must leave Greenway for specialist conservation, to preserve both the garment itself and the memories it holds for the future.

The robe isn’t the only piece of history at Greenway that is under threat. During the Second World War, an American officer stationed at the house painted a colourful frieze on the library wall ahead of the D-Day landings. Today, the wartime artwork is blistering and peeling away from the wall, and conservator Ruth McNeilage faces the daunting task of stabilising the fragile paint.

Meanwhile in Dorset, attention turns to the home of another literary legend: Thomas Hardy. At Max Gate, which Hardy designed himself, conservators are tackling a curious and ingenious object also created by the author - a large wooden sundial mounted high on the front of the house which carries the mysterious Latin inscription Quid de Nocte? - What of the night?

Nearly a century of exposure has left the sundial rusting, flaking and, crucially, telling the wrong time. Metals conservator Peter Meehan must carefully remove it from the building and dismantle its complex parts before restoring its delicate metalwork and repainting Hardy’s original markings.

As well as Max Gate, the National Trust cares for much of the landscape that inspired Hardy’s writing, from the countryside around his birthplace to the famous figure of the Cerne Abbas Giant, whose chalk outline is brought back into focus by a team of rangers and volunteers working on the steep Dorset hillside.

Hidden Treasures of the National Trust returns Friday 15th May on BBC Two.