Burton Street, Marnhull, Sturminster Newton, DT10

The Grange is an impressive and fully refurbished family home, with six double bedrooms all with an ensuite/adjacent bath/shower room, self-contained ground floor annexe, garaging, heated swimming pool and hard tennis/pickle ball court.

By the mid to late 19th century Marnhull had become a favoured home for former, prosperous inhabitants of the colonies on their return to the United Kingdom. As such, the village came to contain a greater number of large, impressive houses than one might expect. Positioned off Burton Street as it passes through the village, The Grange is just such a house. Built of local sandstone with distinctive Ham stone dressings, the house has two storeys, a fantastic suite of attic rooms and a cellar beneath the kitchen. It has been the family home of the current owner for the past 15 years and over that period has been completely transformed to an extremely high standard and today it is an enchanting, comfortable home with a wonderfully light and airy feel throughout. All the rooms are well proportioned and generously sized, with the two main reception rooms, the kitchen/breakfast room and five of the house's six double bedrooms facing south west, with views over the grounds to the surrounding countryside. The interior has several fine fireplaces, impressive joinery, moulded coving and window seats, along with spectacular stone and timber flooring, a mass of fitted wardrobes and cupboards and a superb kitchen fitted with handmade, painted timber units and a four-oven AGA. Upstairs there are four double bedrooms on the first floor and two more in the attics. All the bedrooms have their own ensuite or adjacent bath/shower room and the main bedroom also has an ensuite dressing room/occasional bedroom.

Outside has four entrances onto Buton Street. Two provide vehicular access to the front and rear parking areas respectively, whilst the remaining two are pedestrian gates, one to the service courtyard off the boot room and the other providing dedicated access to the ground floor, self-contained annexe. The garden and grounds amount to just under two and three quarter acres and extend out on the three sides of the house, backing onto unspoilt countryside and providing a high level of privacy. They have been created from scratch by the current owner and provide a perfect setting for the house. A broad, deep terrace with a fountained lily pond at its centre fringes the back of the house providing a perfect environment for entertaining or for spending a quiet summer afternoon. A wide flight of stone steps rises to a sizeable, level lawn, which is ringed by a horseshoe of “garden rooms”. These are characterised by a wonderful variety of trees and incorporate a heated swimming pool and adjacent pool room contained within a hedged crab apple orchard, an arboretum of specimen trees, a small wild flower meadow, an apple orchard, a hard tennis/pickle ball court, a hornbeam avenue, a kitchen garden with garden store, raised beds and soft fruit cage, a stand of Cedars containing a magical tree house and finally a line of mature willow trees standing sentinel along the rear boundary hedge line.

The Grange is situated on the edge of the village of Marnhull, which is an active community with excellent amenities including three churches, village hall, two primary schools, GP surgery/pharmacy, garage, two pubs and several local shops (see day to day needs can be met in the nearby towns of Sturminster Newton, Gillingham and Shaftesbury. There are direct rail services from Gillingham to Waterloo (2 hours) and from Castle Cary to Paddington (90 minutes), with Bristol, Bournemouth and Exeter airports all within a reasonable driving distance. Dorset, particularly the local area around Marnhull, is renowned for its wide choice of excellent schools from both the state and independent sectors. Gillingham School for secondary education is highly regarded attracting many privately educated Sixth Form students and there are many independent schools nearby. Those within a 10-mile radius include Port Regis, Clayesmore, Hanford, the Sherborne schools, Knighton House and Bryanston.