Photograph of Ascott House, owned by Leopold Rothschild. Annotated 'Ascott House. Mr. Leopold Rothschild. G. Devey'. In 1873 Lionel de Rothschild bought a farm at Ascott in Buckinghamshire for his son Leopold who decided to turn it into a fashionable country house. Devey, who had worked on other Rothschild projects, drew up plans for an Old English or Jacobean style house.