The Cotswolds never disappoints

Glorious country houses in two ‘golden triangles', a village of woodpeckers, T. S. Eliot and a secret garden

- Penny Churchill

LOCATED within the Cotswold 'golden triangle' between Burford, Chipping Norton and Stow-on-the-Wold, dreamy Grade II*-listed Finstock Manor stands on high ground on the edge of the village it's named for. Finstock is bounded to the north-east by the River Evenlode on the southern edge of the ancient parish of Charlbury and overlooks the Cornbury Park estate of which it was, until recently, a part. Nowadays, this much sought-after area of Oxfordshire boasts an even more exclusive 'golden triangle'—between Estelle Manor, at North Leigh near Witney, Soho Farmhouse at Great Tew, near Chipping Norton, and Daylesford Organic Farm Shop, near Moreton-in-Marsh-located respectively 4½ miles, 10½ miles and 12½ miles from Finstock Manor.

From at least 1135, the village of Finstock—the name means 'a place of woodpeckers'—was part of the manor of Charlbury, a vast episcopal estate held by the Bishop of Lincoln at the time of the Domesday survey. Charlbury was later owned by St John's College, Oxford, from the late 16th century until 1857, when the lordship of the manor passed to Francis Spencer, 2nd Lord Churchill of Wychwood, the owner of Cornbury Park.

Acquired from Cornbury by the current owners in 2005, Finstock Manor is now for sale through the Oxford office of Strutt & Parker (01865 366660). Selling agent Giles Lawton quotes a guide price of $4.25 million for the charmingly unspoilt, 17th-century manor house and its picturesque outbuildings set in almost five acres of west-facing formal gardens and grounds, which include a series of garden rooms, a paddock and a large outdoor heated swimming pool. In the early 1900s, the manor was home to William Force Stead, who came to England as an American consul, but discovered literature and religion at Oxford University, where he was ordained and appointed chaplain of Worcester College, and, in June 1927, baptised fellow American T. S. Eliot in Finstock’s Gothic Revival parish church.