Early Life

Birgitte Ida Dinesen was born on January 12, 1958, at Aalborg Hospital, where she initially lived at Gl. Wiffertsholm. However, in 1960, the family moved to Kragerup Gods, where Birgitte grew up and was raised to eventually take over Kragerup Gods after her father, Erik Sophus Dinesen.

Journey back to Kragerup Gods

She completed her secondary education at Tølløse Boarding School in 1974, an English baccalaureate from Cranborn Chase, Wiltshire, England in 1976, and obtained a degree in business at Slagelse Business School in 1978. Birgitte also worked as a secretary and sales consultant at Lysta in Cape Town, South Africa, from 1978 to 1979. In 1983, Birgitte graduated as an academy economist, and after working for a year at Imerco, she embarked on a study trip to Australia. In 1979, she took over half of Kragerup Gods, where she worked with her father for 12 years until 1998 when he retired. At that time, the estate consisted solely of a large farm. Today, the estate still includes agriculture, but Birgitte, along with her partner Olav Ditlevsen, has revitalized the estate.

The Estate Today

Kragerup Gods is now both a conference venue and offers various spaces for events and parties. In the forest, there is Denmark's first climbing park, Go High, which opened in 2009. Denmark's first tree trampoline park, Go Bounce, opened in 2019. Additionally, there is an MTB single track, canoeing in the moat, archery attack, mega foosball, and much more. In the main building, Restaurant Blixen opened in 2015. Kragerup Gods is now CO2-neutral with its six large wind turbines, its own straw-fired boiler, and its own groundwater.

The First Rooms

In 1998, Birgitte opened the first 6 hotel rooms. Back then, Birgitte and her daughter Regitze still lived in the main building in the rooms. When all 6 rooms were booked, Regitze had to pack her suitcase so the guests could move in. In the kitchen, Birgitte prepared breakfast for the guests and took care of washing dishes, cleaning rooms, and all other practical matters. Today, the hotel consists of 57 rooms spread across the main building and the nearby farm buildings.

The Dream of an Ostrich Farm

Birgitte also had Denmark's largest ostrich production. The idea of the ostrich farm was good. The only problem was that Danes in the 1990s were not ready to eat ostrich. Regitze vividly remembers how she cared for all the little ostrich chicks when she came home from school. She also remembers how her classmates had liver pate sandwiches and salami while she had ostrich strips, dried ostrich, ostrich meatballs, and whatever else could be made from ostrich.

The Next Generation

Birgitte's daughter, Regitze Sophie Dinesen (b. 1990), took over the title of estate owner from her mother in 2021.