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"  Photo: &amp;quot;From The Chronicles of Downton Abbey \u00A9 Carnival Film &amp;amp;amp; Television Limited&amp;quot; Jessica Fellowes, the niece of Julian Fellowes, creator of Downton Abbey, and Matthew Sturgis have written a second book on the popular series The Chronicles of Downton Abbey, which is out tomorrow from St. Martin&amp;#039;s Press. This lavishly illustrated, official companion to all three seasons (with the third premiering on PBS on January 6) examines the motivations, actions, and inspirations of each character. One chapter even goes behind the scenes, looking at the series&amp;#039;s shooting from the perspectives of everyone from Hugh Bonneville, who portrays the Earl of Grantham, to Jason Gill, the wardrobe master. We caught up with the London-based Fellowes on the eve of the new book&amp;#039;s publication to chat what it&amp;#039;s like to be part of the acclaimed cast and crew. ELLE: Tell us about Highclere, the real castle in West Berkshire that is used to depict Downton Abbey. Jessica Fellowes: The castle is on a privately-owned estate that&amp;#039;s been in the same family for hundreds of years. They live in a cottage on the grounds for the most part, staying inside of the house when they host their own parties there. They rent it out as a film location, a place for weddings and shooting parties. It&amp;#039;s quite fun when you go. Everything you see in the house on the screen is very much as you see it in real life. ELLE:Is the entire series shot at Highclere? JF: In the first and second series, the bedroom scenes were actually filmed in Highclere. But it was a nightmare, because everyone had to squeeze into the bedrooms. The logistics were much easier to recreate the bedrooms on a film set at Ealing Studios (as occurred in the third series). The downstairs scenes are filmed in Ealing. ELLE: How did the actors like filming in Highclere and Ealing? JF: Filming at Highclere felt like quite an intense thing to do. They were aware they were in a private house and that they had to be very careful of things. Everybody kind of tiptoes around, it affects your posture. In Ealing it was much more of a working atmosphere. You eat sandwiches on the set. It&amp;#039;s much more relaxed and much more jovial, really noisy when they were filming. Upstairs it&amp;#039;s a bit more serious. ELLE: How do the actors get along during filming? JF: They do all get on. They&amp;#039;re an astonishingly nice group of people. You have a mixture of old hands in the business who are experienced. They tend to be most charming and understand how great it is to have work. They&amp;#039;re enjoying it. The young members of the cast were pretty much unknowns before Downton. They&amp;#039;re finding it really exciting, the opportunities given them in the other six months of the year when they&amp;#039;re not filming Downton. It&amp;#039;s a very nice production, no tantrums being thrown on the set. The girls love the clothes they wear. ELLE: Speaking of clothes, what can we expect from the costumes in season three, which takes place in the 1920s? JF: The brief of the costume designer, Caroline McCall, was that the costumes had to be historic and authentic. She also had to find dresses that would appeal to today&amp;#039;s audience. She hired some costumes, found vintage clothing in the U.K. and Spain. She uses a lot of shimmer in the evening, a lot of sequins particularly for dinner parties. There are a lot of Downton Abbey parties getting thrown here, particularly by young people\u2014the elegance appeals.   Photo: &amp;quot;From The Chronicles of Downton Abbey \u00A9 Carnival Film &amp;amp;amp; Television Limited&amp;quot;  Photo: &amp;quot;From The Chronicles of Downton Abbey \u00A9 Carnival Film &amp;amp;amp; Television Limited&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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