The Pig hotel group – a collection of country houses across England, each built around a kitchen garden and a their famous 25-mile menu – found its natural home when it took over this 17th-century manor in the Cotswolds village of Barnsley. The house was formerly owned by Rosemary Verey, one of Britain's most celebrated garden designers, and her legacy is still very much in residence: a laburnum walk, a beautiful knot garden, a Tuscan temple and a kitchen garden that supplies the restaurant year-round. Four miles from the market town of Cirencester, with a village pub directly across the road and a spa tucked among the orchards, it's a very easy place to while away a few days in the quintessential English countryside.
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With original floorboards, panelled walls and a powder-pink drawing room with armchairs gathered around the fireplace, the interiors feel like a house that has been lived in and loved, rather than designed to within an inch of its life. The airy, high-ceilinged restaurant overlooks the kitchen garden and changes its menu daily whilst the bar, set behind a large front window with shelves of vintage glassware, catches the afternoon light beautifully. Across the road, the village pub is more cosy nooks and crackling fires with a menu of good, hearty fare.
Rooms are spread across the main house and the stable yard, the smallest of which are the Snug Rooms going up to Comfy Luxe. Some have beautiful antique four posters whilst others have enormous freestanding bath tubs, but each is decorated in Pig group's signature auction-found furniture and pretty, soft florals. The garden hideaways are the ones to seek out, however – private, secluded, and far enough from the main house to feel entirely their own. The Secret Garden Room, with a freestanding bath in the bedroom and its own walled garden, is perfect for a special occasion.
The gardens alone justify spending a morning – the laburnum walk in late spring is particularly special. Beyond the grounds, the Cotswolds is at its most classic here: Bibury, with its famous row of medieval cottages, is a short drive and so are Bourton-on-the-Water and Cirencester. Back at the hotel, you'll find the Fieldhouse Spa in the orchards. Down to earth and very relaxed, treatments are rooted in natural ingredients and you there's also an outdoor hydrotherapy pool should you have the weather.
The hotel takes Sundays seriously – newspapers, cake on the sideboard, a dog snoozing by the fire, and no pressure to be anywhere. In fact, it doesn't even need to be a Sunday!
Book a guided garden tour with the in-house gardening team. They'll walk you through the kitchen garden and ornamental beds and know the story behind every corner of Verey's original design.
The hotel is next to a working cattle farm, and on certain days the countryside makes itself known. It's authentic rural England, after all!
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800 square miles of honey-gold villages, winding lanes and quintessential English-ness.
