Antique French Giltwood Overmantel Rococo Mirror C1780 18th C149x95cm

Countess Veronica Munster was born Veronica Naylor-Leyland in 1932, only daughter of Sir Albert Edward Herbert Naylor-Leyland, and Marguerite de Belabre. She grew up in their family home, Nantclwyd Hall in Wales, as well as Hyde Park House in Albert Gate, Knightsbridge. 

When Veronica married Count Peter Munster in 1955, they moved to Germany and spent their married years restoring his ancestral home, Schloss Derneburg, near Hanover. Schloss Derneburg has a 1000-year history with a rich tapestry of uses and occupants. In 1815 the secularized monastery and its estate was given by King George III to Ernst Friedrich Herbert Graf zu Münster for his contributions at the Congress of Vienna, thus establishing it as the Munster family seat. Ernst Friedrich, as well as his son, Georg Herbert commissioned the renowned Hanoverian architect Georg Laves to redesign the aged monastery into a stately home, as well as landscaping the grounds in the style of a grand English country house. Veronica, Peter and their children lived in Derneburg in apartments decorated in English style, furnished with the collections amassed by their ancestors. In 1975 Schloss Derneburg was sold and Countess Munster moved to London where she resided until her death in 2019. Many of the items in the sale came with her from Derneburg. Schloss Derneburg is now an art museum owned by the Hall Art Foundation.