The Fitzgerald family, Earls of Kildare and later Dukes of Leinster, had already held this land near Maynooth for over five centuries when the 19th Earl hired architect Richard Cassels to build the present house in 1739. Cassels went on to design Leinster House, now home to the Irish parliament, for the same family six years later. Lady Emily FitzGerald, wife of the 1st Duke, shaped much of Carton’s interior in the 18th century, creating the Chinese Room that later hosted Queen Victoria during one of her three visits.
The estate stayed in FitzGerald hands until the 1920s, when the 7th Duke sold it to cover £67,500 in gambling debts. In 1923, a local IRA unit arrived intending to burn the house down, until a family member produced a portrait of Lord Edward FitzGerald, leader of the 1798 rebellion, and persuaded them to leave it standing. Carton became a golf resort and hotel in 2000.