Discovering a honey-hued stone farmhouse nestling in a Gloucestershire valley has made the dream of living in the country a reality for this London-based family
WORDS JULIET BENNING PHOTOGRAPHY MIKE GARLICK
The wicker sofa and chairs are from Neptune.
It was on a warm night during Easter two years ago that Monica Simpson first broached the idea of a relocation. “Why don’t we move here permanently?” she asked her husband James. Looking at the flickering fire pit, the surrounding valley and the house of Cotswold stone above, James found himself succumbing to the idea. A few minutes later Monica had emailed the school in Kensington their children attended to say they would not be returning for the next term. “It was a shoot-from-the-hip kind of decision, but it’s definitely worked out,” James says of the family’s move to the country.
The family, like many others, had been moving in and out of London since the first lockdown of 2020. James, who works in private equity, and Monica, a property developer, had transplanted themselves from their native United States 17 years previously and had begun raising and educating their three children, Adam, 10, Hannah, 7 and Imogen, 4, in London. “We had always loved getting out to the country and took on holiday rentals longer term so we could have our belongings somewhere,” James explains. “But during the lockdown, we’d been bouncing from one place to another when Monica said, ‘Why don’t we just buy a second home?’”
Setting their geographical parameters in a quiet area of countryside outside Cirencester, about an hour and a half from London, the couple began their search. “It was a sought-after location with not much on the market. We visited a couple of other properties but one was too close to a busy road and the other needed too much work doing,” James remembers. Then, one hot and sunny day in July, the couple found their way to the 18th-century cottage that was to become their future home. “It was down a long road and the drive itself went on for at least a third of a mile. We then found ourselves passing into the valley where the house stood, backed into the side of a hill. The whole setting just blew us away.” Despite such an auspicious beginning, Monica had to convince James the house would be a worthwhile investment. “Monica has a lot more vision than me. I just saw a money pit! I’d envisioned something statelier, like a manor house, but she was keen on a farmhouse or cottage,” he adds.
The couple failed to make an offer but the
