Long Barn Brandiers

Ninety minutes from London, blessed with a walled garden and an untamed wood, is a long, lovely, timber-clad barn, a quirky annexe and a cottage where the owners live. With a tipi in the long grass for kids and several sofabeds there’s tons of potential for friends and family to pile in. Kim and Peter greet you warmly and generously, and leave you to your own devices. Enter to find a wonderful kitchen (scrubbed table, polished concrete floor, jug of wild flowers), a lobby flooded with light, walls vibrant blue, and a Cuban bedroom with turquoise shutters. Up the steep spiral stair is a fabulous chill-out living room under the eaves – pool table, rocking horse, graffiti wall, cool bar – and a long, large, wood-floored bedroom/playroom, its doors opening to a balcony for breakfast, and a view of the yurt in the meadow beyond. This is a relaxed, unfussy place: you can stride out to pubs; cycle to the water park; drink cocktails in the wild garden; take a boat out on the pond; make dens in the woods. For arty friends, families and lifelong bohemians, Long Barn is unusually special.