Inside A Beautiful Cotswold Home Designed By Renowned Arts & Crafts Architect Norman Jewson

With William Morris prints still found on everything from blankets and cushions to mugs and rugs, it seems our national obsession with the Arts and Crafts movement is still going strong over a century on.

Developed at the close of the 19th century and the open of the 20th, it was the Cotswolds – and specifically the county of Gloucestershire – which served as the aesthetic’s epicentre. And no wonder, for that’s where its founder William Morris lived and worked.

Though Morris’s Kelmscott Manor is now a museum, this stunning Cotswold home is a deadringer. Designed by renowned Arts and Crafts architect Norman Jewson in 1931, on land formerly owned by the same estate, this Grade II listed property is a beautiful relic of its era.

Discover Aycote House

Who Was Norman Jewson?

Born into the renowned Norwich timber merchant family, the Jewsons (as in the same builders’ merchants Jewsons we have today), it seems Norman Jewson was always destined for a life in construction. Raised in East Anglia and educated at the University of Cambridge, he went on to serve in the architectural practice of his cousin Herbert Ibberson in London – a city he ‘disliked as a place to live in permanently the longer [he] stayed there’. 

Having finished his apprenticeship in 1907, he made his escape from the big smoke and set out with a donkey and trap on a sketching tour across the Cotswolds – then ‘a part of the country little known’ (a stark contrast to its celeb status of today). 

During his tour, Jewson visited the workshop of pioneering Arts and Crafts architect and furniture maker, Ernest Gimson. Gimson soon took the young man on as an ‘improver’ (i.e. unpaid assistant), putting him to work making sketches, woodcarving, designing metalwork, and studying the crafts of modelled plasterwork. As part of his training, Jewson was even encouraged to draw a different wildflower every day, noting its essential characteristics and adapting it to a formal pattern suitable for modelled plasterwork, woodcarving or needlework.

Moving to the Gloucestershire village of Sapperton, he was soon absorbed into the renowned Sapperton Arts and Crafts group. He became an invaluable member of the society and went on to marry the daughter of renowned Arts and Crafts practitioner Ernest Barnsley.

Eventually, he set up a practice of his own in 1919 and soon gained a reputation for his sympathetic conservation and adaptation of old buildings. He wrote of his practice: ‘My own buildings I wanted to have the basic qualities of the best old houses of their locality, built in the local traditional way in the local materials, but not copying the details which properly belonged to the period in which they were built… I hoped that my buildings would at least have good manners and be able to take their natural place in their surroundings without offence.’

Jewson’s repair of the Tudor Owlpen Manor in 1925–26 is often regarded as his most representative and successful project, though it was his work on Rodmarton Manor (one of the largest he ever completed) that had the well-to-dos of the Cotswolds flocking to him with their housing commissions. 

And even this home, Aycote House, has gone down in the history books. It is featured in a number of publications, including Pevsner Architectural Guides’ The Buildings of England: The Cotswolds (David Verey, 1979) and The Country Houses of Gloucestershire, Volume Three 1830-2000 (Nicholas Kingsley).

Step Inside Aycote House

Today, many of the period features introduced by Jewson remain, including stone mullioned windows, tall beamed ceilings, open fireplaces, generous proportions and a crafted timber staircase leading to the galleried landing. Most impressively, the panelled timber doors to the principal rooms and the oak floor boards in the drawing room are said to come from the historic Leeds Castle, confusingly located in Kent.

The interiors boast an array of both informal and formal reception rooms, plus eight double bedrooms including a principal suite with an en suite and dressing room. Meanwhile, additional accommodation, whether for guests or staff, is provided by The Tallet. The two-bedroom property over the garage was built in 2007 by the architect-owner of Aycote House. Constructed with natural and ashlar stone as per Cotswold tradition, this additional space was heavily influenced by the main home’s Arts and Crafts design.

Located on the upper Churn Valley opposite Rendcomb Park, this house and its elevated perch enjoys views over four counties: Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, and its own, Gloucestershire. There are rolling hills to be spotted to the south, the gently sloping gardens from the terrace, the home’s 14 acres of agricultural land, and the valley beyond. The grounds also include a tennis court with an original pavilion, while planning permission has previously been granted for the installation of an indoor swimming pool building.

On the market for £5m. Find out more at search.savills.com