![]() ![]() Jerry’s study was once the manorial court – there is said to be a secret tunnel, dating back at least to the 15th century, that leads to the adjacent Norman church – and portions of the original 11th-century edifice remain intact, including the vast stone fireplaces which are scattered throughout.ĭuring the 1920s, much of the manor was refashioned by the English architect Norman Jewson, who embellished the interior with his elegant arts and crafts handiwork. Every stone is imbued with history, giving rise to its own, very particular, time-worn charm. Originally known as Philibert’s Court, the eight-bedroom Grade II*-listed manor house dates mostly from the 16th century, with additions made in 1800, but the oldest Norman parts date back to the Domesday Book of 1086. Hibbert arranges flowers in the family kitchen © Maureen M Evans The hallway at Southrop Manor, with curtains in the new Bertioli Dahlia fabric © Maureen M Evans “It had this impossibly beautiful, wonderfully wild feeling.” “I remember going into the garden, standing by the river and seeing a kingfisher fly past,” she says. Covering around a third of the 150-acre estate, which includes a farm, kitchen gardens, spa, cookery school, restaurant, The Swan pub and a serenely chic 31‑room hotel set across a halcyon assortment of historic barns, houses and cottages, this landscape first compelled Hibbert to relocate from London to Gloucestershire’s Leach Valley more than two decades ago. “When you see the land from above, our water meadows are a little, lone island of greenness,” says Hibbert. Around this time the migrating birds arrive from sub-Saharan Africa, joining the resident kestrels, herons, kites and barn owls, one of which swoops across the field in snowy resplendence on its own hunt. At their most abundant, the water meadows of the Southrop Manor Estate will be teeming with delicate clusters of their pale-pink and purple petals. Wearing an ankle-grazing waxed Barbour coat and Wellingtons, her trusty cavachon Angelica (or “Gelly Bean”) by her side, she carefully scans the ground, which is scattered with sweet lady and meadow buttercups, before pointing out the dotted leaves of a common spotted orchid. ![]() ![]() On a dewy May morning, the quietly magisterial châtelaine of the Cotswolds retreat Thyme is head down in the long grass in hot pursuit of wild orchids. ![]()
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