ORIGINAL DECORATIVE ART by SUMMER JOY
HILL FARM FOR SALE
Photos and Information
Welcome to SummerWare, home of the Animal Tea Cosies , and also now the home site of HILL FARM FOR SALE ! photos and information. Summer and Jim have finally decided to leave England and move to Vancouver Island in Canada, where Summer is from. Thus HILL FARM , where Jim was born and raised and has lived all his life, is now up for sale.
The farm is located on top of a hill in Warwickshire, midway between Rugby and Coventry, on the Fosse Way and A428. The site offers fabulous panoramic views of the Avon River and surrounding countryside, which are much admired by everyone who visits. The location offers wonderful privacy and seclusion while at the same time being very conveniently located for shopping and commuting.
The property includes a large old house, a productive organic apple orchard with a variety of heritage apple trees, mature berry bushes, a big fertile veggie garden, and fabulous, unusual large flower and shrub gardens with many interesting plants and flowers. All gardening at Hill Farm has been done organically for many years.
There are barns and stables and workshop spaces surrounding a big courtyard at the back of the house as well as a huge roofed shed area for machinery, hay, firewood etc. At the moment, one of the barns houses a large vintage diesel engine made by Mirrlees, Bickerton & Day in 1939, coupled to a generating set. This will be removed to the Internal Fire Museum in Wales unless the farm is bought by an enthusiast who wishes to retain it and run it in situ. It would run well on used vegetable oil as well as diesel and ensure that the new owners would have no problems with future power shortages. We have three phase electricity to the property so no difficulties running any type of machinery.
The property includes a seven acre fenced ancient ridge and furrow meadow complete with a large pond in an old claypit, which is managed solely for the local wildlife. It supports a wide variety of flowering plants, grasses and fungi and is frequented by many native and migratory species of birds, including buzzards and on one notable occasion for a week by a young male hen harrier, which caused consternation to the rabbits! It has been grazed every summer by cattle belonging to a local farmer. The pond is frequented by moorhens, several species of ducks, herons, great crested newts and a wide variety of dragonflies and other creatures and is an idyllic spot. The meadow is bordered on the north and east sides by pre-Norman hedges belonging to the farm and ancient trackways, giving access to miles of bridle paths. On the western side, the meadow includes a belt of young trees planted in 1986. Hill Farm is registered as an agricultural holding with the Rural Payments Agency and receives payments under the Single Payments Scheme. In addition, the many historic and natural features of the meadow qualify the holding for Entry Level Stewardship which would enhance the payments.
If you didn't decide to renovate the house, you could always build the house of your dreams on this amazing and very unique site. The existing house has been much added to over several hundred years and has many rooms which could be put to multiple use. There are four bedrooms upstairs, kitchen, dining room and three sitting rooms downstairs, as well as a large conservatory still under construction which overlooks the garden. Most of the windows are double glazed, most of the roof space has at least some insulation and some of the walls are insulated internally. There are two solid-fuel old Rayburns in operation for heating, cooking and hot water as well as an equally old wood-fired boiler connected to radiators throughout the house. A good supply of firewood will be included in the sale and probably a circular saw bench too. Provision has been made for installing solar water heating panels. Two windmills generate electricity to charge batteries which helps power the household, running most of the lights. Most of the house has not been changed since the 1980s so you'd want to renovate and decorate to suit your needs, but a large family would certainly find plenty of room in this house, where Jim's extended family all used to live while working the dairy farm in the old days. Needless to say, on a hilltop site like this, flooding has never been an issue!
With some work this property could be developed into a wonderful set-up for horses and/or a great smallholding/hobby farm for a family of any size. It would also appeal to anyone with a strong interest in alternative energy and technology. We are inviting offers around £450,000, and if we haven't received an acceptable offer by September we will be considering either auction or informal tender. We will be living at the farm until we leave for Canada sometime in October. We're currently working hard clearing out the accumulated collections of several generations in preparation for selling. We've posted lots of photos on this page and on the HILL FARM page so you can get a good idea of the place. As you can imagine, we're very busy at the moment clearing everything out and preparing for our big move. Please read the website carefully so you can get a good idea about whether HILL FARM is the sort of place you're looking for. If you genuinely think you might be interested, we'd love to hear from you, so please feel free to email or ring us and have a chat. Our number is 024 7654 2596, and you can email us at HillFarm@SummerWare.co.uk .
Some of the Glorious Views from the Farm!
Part of the Front Garden
South-facing Conservatory under Construction
To see many more photos go to the Hill Farm Page.