Lyme was originally part of the forest of Macclesfield and gets its name from the Latin ‘limes’ meaning frontier. It was held by the Earls of Chester until the Crown seized it in 1237.

In 1397, the estate was given to Sir Piers Legh, Steward of Macclesfield and the Forest.

Piers Legh inherited the Estate in 1478 and, predeceased by his wife [who had been married to Peter Warburton, see Arley Hall], Legh returned to Lyme in 1511 and became a priest. In 1524, he built the Cage out of timber to use as a hunting tower; allegedly it was also used for housing prisoners.

Lyme became the principal seat of the family in the middle of the 16th century when Peter VII made extensive alterations to the house. The work was completed by his grandson Peter IX who, knighted by Elizabeth I, replaced the timber fence surrounding the Park with a stone wall and built two banqueting houses, one of which survives.

In 1720s, the current house was enlarged and remodelled for Peter Legh XII by Giacomo Leoni, a Venetian born architect who arrived in England sometime before 1715. Leoni also rebuilt the Cage as a three–storey gritstone tower with attached square corner towers. 

From 1813–18, Lewis Wyatt replaced the formal gardens with a more naturalistic approach, added the Orangery (which was completed by Alfred Darbyshire in 1862) and built the West Terrace.

Legh’s nephew and successor, William John Legh, created 1st Lord Newton in 1892, employed Edward Kemp to redesign the gardens. Kemp had trained under Joseph Paxton at Chatsworth and he created the formal bedding schemes in front of the Orangery as well as redesigning The Fountain Garden – now called the Italian Garden.

In 1939, the coal mines in Lancashire were requisitioned and with increasing financial difficulties, 3rd Lord Newton was forced to give the Hall and much of the land to the National Trust in 1946. A year later, the Trust granted a ninety-nine year
lease to Stockport Corporation and after it reverted back to National Trust in 1994, Stockport continues to make an annual contribution to its maintenance.