Escape to the Chateau
A family renovates a French château and builds a business.
The programme follows the couple as they restore the derelict property while raising two children and building a wedding and events business. Its popularity led to ten series, with a tenth announced in October 2025.
Quick Facts
- Genre
- Reality television
- Narrator
- Tracy-Ann Oberman
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Language
- English
- Seasons
- 10
- Episodes
- 54
- Location
- France
- Runtime
- 47 minutes
Facts from the source article.
Cast information
Dick Strawbridge, a former Lieutenant Colonel in the British Army and engineer, had appeared on programmes such as It's Not Easy Being Green, Coast, Scrapheap Challenge, The Hungry Sailors, Saturday Farm and Dirty Rotten Survival. In Escape to the Chateau, his engineering and cooking experience is highlighted, along with his mechanical expertise. She runs The Vintage Patisserie hospitality business, for which she sought investment on Dragon's Den in 2010; the business relocated to the château in 2015. Adoree contributes creative flair, interior-decoration skill and an interest in hospitality. The couple have two children, Arthur and Dorothy.
Episode list
Series 7 takes place during lockdown in France due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with no weddings or events at the château. Series 9 is described as 'The Year of Celebrations' and is the final series. A second version of series 1 was shown on More 4 as an extended four-part version. Episode 1 of the original series is 'Hole in the Wall' (26 June 2016), episode 2 is 'They're our Flies' (3 July 2016), and episode 3 is 'Angel's Palace of Dreams' (10 July 2016). The More 4 episodes are described as: S1 Ep1/4 covering the purchase of the château; S1 Ep2/4 covering the family moving in and finding bats, birds and flies; S1 Ep3/4 covering Angel asking Dick to smash a hole in the wall for a honeymoon suite; and S1 Ep3/3 covering the couple's upcoming wedding with 200 guests. Episode 4 of the More 4 series appears to be the third episode of the original three-part Channel 4 series. An additional three-episode retrospective series began in late 2019: 'Escape to the Chateau : Restoring the Dream' (26 November 2019), 'Escape to the Chateau : Designing the Dream' (2 December 2019), and 'Escape to the Chateau : The Great Outdoors' (9 December 2019), covering events from the first five years.
Background and production
Dick Strawbridge and Angel Adoree invited production company Spark Media to film their house-hunting journey after they had spent four years searching for a home. The producers pitched the idea to all major broadcasters but were repeatedly rejected; Channel 4 eventually agreed to a three-part series as a test. It became an instant hit. Unlike many home shows, the television coverage was never planned, but Channel 4 paid to document the couple's journey, defraying some expenses through the presenter's fee and advertising exposure, which helped build the wedding and events venue business. The show's appeal may have been due to the apparent affordability and low demand for French properties, attracting British buyers. Dick and Angel initially looked at modest farmhouses until they realised they could buy a castle at prevailing low prices. In 2015, for £280,000, they purchased a château on 12 acres with 45 rooms, seven outbuildings, a walled garden and a moat, ten times larger than the average British house. The show made viewers aware of the restoration extent and running costs, as well as the personal effort required. Escape to the Chateau premiered in the United States on local PBS stations, and on 5 December 2020 episodes began airing on HGTV, with the first one-hour episode titled 'Meet the Chateau'. The site of the château was used as a fortified stronghold from the 12th to 14th centuries; in 1406 the Husson family named it Château de la Motte-Husson.
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