Jane Austen's House Museum

Jane Austen’s House Museum is the 17th-century cottage in the village of Chawton, Hampshire, where the novelist lived from 1809 to 1817 and produced or revised several of her major works.

Exhibits include the room where she wrote, personal letters and family possessions, period rooms and a small garden reflecting domestic life in the early 19th century. The house is presented as a writer’s house museum with interpretive displays about Austen’s life and work.

The building became a museum in the mid-20th century and is managed as a cultural site dedicated to preserving Austen’s domestic environment and manuscripts.

The house is in Chawton, near the market town of Alton in Hampshire, England.

• Austen residency: Jane Austen lived in the house from 1809 until her death in 1817 and completed or revised several major novels there.
• Museum: The building opened as a house museum in the mid-20th century and displays personal items, letters and first editions associated with Austen and her family.

What to See #

• Writing room: The room containing Jane Austen's small oak writing table where she wrote and revised novels while living at Chawton.
• Garden and cottage-plot: Garden and cottage-plot behind the house, maintained to reflect the period planting familiar from Austen's time.