General Information

Weir House, set in its own pretty garden, is the biggest and most beautiful of all our cottages.  In fact it's so big, with five en-suite bedrooms, a games room, a drawing room and a dining room, as well as a big kitchen/dining room, that the word cottage is a bit of a misnomer.

The drive to Weir House is flanked by yew hedges, and leads to a formal gravelled forecourt with box hedges and topiary, and a huge magnolia growing up over the front door.

There is a flagged entrance hall with stairs leading up to a galleried landing lit by a round oeil de boeuf window and a large hall lantern.  There's a doll's house in a little cupboard in the hall, and under the stairs, the children's den, with dressing-up clothes and a puppet theatre.  Two windows look out onto the croquet lawn, and a door on the left opens into the dining room, which has a ten-foot antique pine-topped table and a massive sideboard.

Through the arch on the left is the kitchen, floored in the same honey coloured Cotswold-stone as the dining room, with Shaker units in Farrow and Ball off-white; a big island unit; a vast American-style side-by-side fridge-freezer with icemaker; a range cooker and two dishwashers. Doors lead out onto the terrace, so lunches and dinners outside under the vine-covered pergola are an enticing summer possibility.  Both rooms have underfloor heating.

To the left of the kitchen is the utility room and downstairs cloakroom, with space for muddy boots and wet macs by the back door.

Folding doors at the far end of the dining room lead to the oak-floored games room, which is dominated by a 42" plasma television with surround sound; and a wall of bookshelves. On a big evening, the folding doors can be pushed back and two five-foot tables added to the dining table, so that in effect the games room becomes an extension of the dining room.  (In addition, a round table to seat ten can go into the kitchen). We see Weir House as being the hub of big family gatherings in several cottages, like Cope, able to provide meals for up to 30 people.  Children have a cupboard full of toys, a special table to play on, and beanbags for flopping.

Opposite the television in the games room is a seating area, with down-cushioned seating units in rosy-red chenille grouped around a large, low, leather-topped table; it's a wonderful place to sit and chat over coffee or an ice-cold drink.  A French door to the right of the TV gives access to the North Terrace.

Big double doors and shallow steps lead down into the large drawing room; it has a Gothic arched fireplace in stone, big enough to burn a young tree in, a high-pitched ceiling and massive beams.  It occupies the width of the house: the two windows on the left look out onto the North terrace, lawn and flower beds, and the window and French doors on the right have a view over the South terrace, a deep woodland border and trees.

The drawing room is altogether softer, gentler and more elegant than the games room; it has pretty rugs, and is decorated in rosy-red, ochre and off white.  A huge ottoman sits between the fire and the long cushioned sofa; on each side of the fireplace are two small antique buttoned French chairs.  In addition, there are large comfortable armchairs, an elegant little eighteenth century bureau, and on each side of the double doors, this is the place to read, or watch a romantic comedy when there's cricket on next door in the games room.

A door to the left of the fireplace leads into a corridor, off which open the three downstairs bedrooms.  They all have en-suite bathrooms or shower rooms, and high-pitched ceilings.  The double room, the first on the right of the corridor, has two windows and a French door leading out onto the South terrace.  The magnificent king-size four-poster, which faces the South terrace, is hung with buff linen curtains from Chelsea Textiles, hand-embroidered with a trellis of flowers on the inside and a row of grey-green scallops along the valance and pelmet.  The walls are painted a Farrow and Ball ochre.  There are comfortable chairs and a desk: it's a good place to retreat to when there's a lot going on elsewhere.  The en-suite shower, tiled in buff marble to match the top of the vanity unit, has a shower big enough for two.  Next door is a ravishing twin room with a distinctly French feel: the two nineteenth century French beds and Louis XVI chairs are upholstered in a red and white Colefax and Fowler toile de jouy to match the curtains.  The walls are grey, and there's a sparkling Venetian glass mirror over the bureau.  Its en-suite shower room is tiled in grey and white Carrara marble.  The third, with two windows and a French door facing west onto the north terrace, has twin mahogany four-posters dressed in a Colefax and Fowler print of yellow roses on beige and off-white striped background and a beautiful nineteenth century secretaire.  The walls are a sludgy Farrow and Ball grey-green and the curtains off-white.  Like the other two, it has comfortable chairs and a writing table. The ensuite bathroom is tiled in beige marble: the bath has a Niagara tap and an overhead shower.

The other two bedrooms are on the first floor, up the stairs from the hall.  They occupy the full width of the house, with windows facing in both directions.  The twin room is wallpapered in a deep green stripe offset by white bed hangings, white curtains on the four windows, and a white chaise longue.  It is furnished with handsome antiques a campaign wardrobe with brass cockbeading along the pediment, two mahogany bedside tables and a nineteenth century campaign chest.  We think of it as the Empire room.  It has an en-suite bathroom, tiled in Carrara marble to match the top of a twin basined antique pitch-pine vanity unit found in France.  (It's a very rare piece and was a nightmare to plumb in).  There's a Carrara marble surround and splash-back round the bath, and a separate tiled shower enclosure.

The fifth bedroom is large and magnificent, with a high pitched ceiling and an impressive six foot wide half tester bed, hung in a blue and white Colefax and Fowler toile de jouy.  The walls are a Farrow and Ball tobacco brown, and the furniture upholstered and covered in blues and off whites.

Up a flight of narrow stairs facing the bed is the large en-suite bath and shower room, with a teak-topped vanity unit and bath surround.  Both bedrooms are places of peace and tranquillity; we believe that the more people a house holds, the more imperative it is for the bedrooms to be beautiful, comfortable and well-lit as a refuge when decibels levels soar.

The gardens on both sides of the house have formal bones - beech and yew hedges and topiary and exuberant planting.  The terraces on each side are perfectly positioned to get sun in the morning and afternoon, and there's enough space and sufficient hidden corners not to feel claustrophobic, even in a crowd.  Children will love the swing and seesaw; grown-ups will enjoy croquet, reading in the hammock, a quiet tête à tête in the Italian garden to the sound of splashing water, or a boisterous barbecue on the terrace off the kitchen.