Disley is a village on the edge of the Peak District at the point where Cheshire meets the high moorland, known primarily as the gateway to Lyme Park, one of the largest country houses in the north of England. The estate dominates the eastern side of the village, and the hall and its grounds give the area a depth of historic landscape unusual for a settlement of this size.

Both the hall and its grounds carry well-established ghost traditions, several of them tied to the long history of the Legh family, who held the estate for six centuries.