Harry Connelly Groome, a Philadelphia native who’d served in the U.S. Customs Office under President Grover Cleveland, bought this rolling estate north of Warrenton in 1899 and built a three-story Georgian Revival manor he named after a castle in Scotland. A fire gutted the house in 1924, and Groome rebuilt it as the two-story mansion that still stands today.
In 1960, Dr. Murdoch Head bought the 1,000-acre farm and turned it into a nonprofit conference center, modeling it on Averell Harriman’s Arden House in New York. Airlie became known as an island of thought, hosting civil rights leaders and, in 1969, the planning meeting that led to the first Earth Day. The estate still operates a working farm, and its produce supplies Harry’s restaurant on-site today. It’s been a Historic Hotels of America member since 2015.