The perfect spot to put down roots
THIS WEEK: Old farmhouses, including this colourful charmer
IT LOOKS as if this charmi ng ol d house has j ust been repainted in a trendy and striking modern colour to give it a new lease of life. But Kents Farm has actually been this same yellow shade since the first time owner David Richardson clapped eyes on it more than 30 years ago.
David moved there aged 18 with his parents and, apart from a few years after he first got married, he has lived there ever since. And he and his family have never wanted to change the iconic colour.
‘ It’s actually called orpiment,’ says David proudly – a pigment with a history dating back to ancient Egypt. It was also very popular with 17th Century painters – but slowly fell out of fashion because of the toxicity of chemicals used to make it at the time. David and his wife Caroline get about half a dozen people a year knocking on the door to enquire about the colour. ‘And when we tell them, they’ve usually never heard of it!’ says David.
The couple run the Springwell Nursery & Garden Centre in Little Chesterford, Essex, and this year they are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the company David started. David, 52, and Caroline, 49, do not have to travel far for work – the greenhouses and gardens that make up the nursery are located behind Kents Farm.
The company is called Springwell because homes in Little Chesterford are fed by water from a spring and, David says, some do not have a mains water supply.
Although the couple love their spot, which is close to the Cambridgeshire border, they are selling because they would rather move a bit deeper into the countryside.
Kents Farm’s main house has five bedrooms, four bathrooms and three reception rooms. And outside there are various outbuildings, one of which has planning permission to be turned into a residential building. As you would expect from a nursery owner, the front garden is immaculate.
Over the years, David and Caroline, who have two daughters, have made numerous changes to Kents Farm, which is on the market for £900,000. As it is Grade II listed, they have had to adhere to certain restrictions, but in their renovations they have also willingly used as many locally sourced materials as possible. But rather than bringing it up to date, the couple have taken Kents Farm back to its roots. ‘Many of the original features had been covered in plasterboard in the 1970s, so we removed all that and exposed the beams,’ David says.
‘In a way we’ve turned back the clock – not back to the 1970s, but back to the 1500s or 1600s.’
Former farmhouses like Kents Farm can be particularly desirable homes to buy because of their adaptability, says Cheryl Swallow, of Abbotts estate agents.
‘ Farmhouses offer a versatile way of suiting every family, from those longing for privacy and space to those who need to accommodate larger families all under one roof,’ she says.
In a way, we have turned back the clock – to the 16th Century