'The main focus of estate planning is directed towards the preservation and repair of its properties and landscape, the rediscovery of lost rural skills to bring back traditional practices wherever feasible, and innovation to reduce the carbon footprint of the community' (The Acton Family).
The ancient Acton Scott estate has an idyllic setting in a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the South Shropshire Hills. Owned by the Acton family for approaching 900 years, it remains in their hands today and consists of a number of small farmsteads, stone and timber framed cottages, ancient woodland and open pasture, amounting to some 1,500 acres. At its centre is Acton Scott Hall, a Grade II* listed Elizabethan mansion of 1580, built by the Acton family.
Eadric, known as Edric the Wild, is the earliest known holder of Acton, later Acton Scott, in 1066. Eadric may have fortified the manor for his rebellious attack on the King at Shrewsbury, although he was soon reconciled. 'Acton' means oak wood, whilst 'Scott' is derived from the medieval family holding a share in the manor, whose name, 'le Scot', was dropped in the fourteen century, in favour of 'Acton'. It is from Eadric that Reynold le Scot - who was Lord of part of the manor in 1255, and also the current Actons - can trace their ancestry.
There is a Scheduled Ancient Monument on the Estate, the site of a Roman Villa set within an Iron Age enclosure. During the Civil War (1640-1646) it is believed that a skirmish took place at Acton Scott and that Prince Rupert, the King's nephew, stayed at the Hall during this time.
The Acton family has long supported environmentally friendly practice in the management of the estate and its properties. In the 1980s Acton Scott Hall became one of the first private houses in Britain to install a woodchip burning boiler for its heating, using timber by-products from the estate's woodland. Today, an active solar farm on the estate plays a significant role in reducing the estate's carbon footprint and several of the estate's cottages are now fuelled by renewable energy.
