Chestnut Farmhouse

About The House cont'd

The house has approx. 3,178 sq. ft. of accommodation arranged over two floors. The front door opens to a beamed entrance hall that leads into the sitting room, which has one of the two staircases that rise to the first floor. The sitting room leads into the family room, which opens to the study, which in turn opens to a back hallway with a door to the cloakroom and a door to the drive. Another door bedside the sitting room staircase, also opens to the back hallway. The front entrance hall also accesses the kitchen/breakfast room which leads into the pantry and through to the games room. There is also a door from the drive into the kitchen. A secondary staircase in the kitchen also rises to the five first floor bedrooms, one with an en suite bathroom, the family bathroom, and the stairs continue up to the loft.There are two separate barns, one contains the swimming pool, the other is the listed agricultural barn now used as a snooker room and for storage. Extending from the end of the games room is a barn comprising a double and two single garages.

Kitchen/Breakfast Room

The triple aspect kitchen/breakfast room, with a mullion window with wood shutters and lead- glazed windows, has a pamment tiled floor, and an exposed ceiling beam. The room overlooks the gravel drive and a small courtyard. There are hand- made painted wooden base and wall units with wooden worksurfaces and a double inset stainless steel sink. The gas Aga is set into the original chimney breast, which retains the deep bread oven on one side and the timber lintel. Further storage is in a base units beside the Aga, in a built in dresser, and in the understairs coat cupboard with its original door. There is space and plumbing for a dishwasher and an integrated wine fridge as well as ample room for a kitchen table seating more than eight people. An original door, with authentic latches, opens to the wooden staircase leading to the first floor bedrooms.

Utility Room

A glazed door leads from the kitchen area to the utility room which has a window overlooking the drive, and a brick paved floor. There is a range of base and wall units with wooden worksurfaces and an inset, elongated sink. Integrated appliances include an induction hob and an oven with an extractor hood above. There is room for an American style fridge/freezer and space and plumbing for a washing machine and dryer.

Games Room

The utility room leads into a narrow space devoted on one side to a walk-in pantry, whilst the other side is currently used for wine storage. A further door leads into the games room. Built by previous owners, this room, with a half-pitched roof, is a nearly 22 ft. long barn-like structure with two sets of double French doors with flanking windows opening to the drive. The room has a beamed ceiling, wood effect laminate flooring and an exposed brick wall along one side, which has tongue-and-groove panelling to dado height. There is ample room to play around the margins of a standard sized table tennis table.

Sitting and Dining Rooms

Part of the 1750s building, the sitting room has double casement windows overlooking the front with wooden shutters, and another overlooking the drive. There are vertical exposed beams and further beams in the ceiling that cross above the middle of the room. There are exposed pine floor boards and a large, restored inglenook brick fireplace with an inset wood burning stove with a metal hood on a brick hearth and a wooden lintel above. On the right of the fireplace, a door opens to a cupboard, which turns into the void under the stairs. There are built-in bookshelves on the walls beside the window overlooking the drive.The dining room, like the family room and sitting rooms, is at the front of the house, in the earlier part, and is accessed from an angled door in the kitchen. There is a single exposed ceiling beam. It has a triple casement window and chequered encaustic tiles on the floor. There is a comparatively modern, large brick inglenook style fireplace with a brick grate.

Family Room, Study and Cloakroom

In a part of the house thought to date from the 1800s, the family room has a parquet floor, two windows overlooking the front, with wooden shutters and narrow window seats. The entire room has painted, wooden moulded panelling and cornicing. Across one corner, the open fireplace has a painted Victorian wooden mantelpiece, a metal grate with a copper hood and a tiled hearth. In another corner is a period, arched, built-in corner cupboard with doors opening to shelves above dado height and cupboards below. A panelled door opens to the study, which has double French doors with flanking windows to the drive and contemporary oak desks and shelves fitted along two of the walls.The study accesses the back hallway, as does a door from the drive. The back hallway accesses a cloakroom with a window overlooking the drive, a tiled floor, a WC and a pedestal basin. Opposite the cloakroom is a storage cupboard with shelves and beyond in the hallway, with a small window above, is the Honeywell gas boiler which heats all the radiators.

Principal Room, En Suite Bathroom

Reached directly from the sitting room staircase, the principal bedroom has two sash windows overlooking the front and stripped pine floor boards. There are two sets of double doored pine wardrobes. The 1800s moulded fireplace surround has a Victorian metal grate. This is one of the four bedrooms on this floor that overlooks the front, and consequently has a view of Whiteleaf Hill (bedroom five is the exception), but all five bedrooms have built-in wardrobes.The principal en suite bathroom was added in the 1980s and has casement windows overlooking the drive, a wooden floor and exposed beams. It has a refitted four piece suite which includes a stand-alone roll top bath with decorative feet with taps at one end and a hand- held shower, a single shower cubicle, a pedestal basin and a WC. The hot water tank is housed in one of the four built-in tongue-and-groove cupboards lining the end wall, which are used for airing and storage.

Bedrooms Two, Three and Four

A door near the top of the sitting room staircase (with a small window opposite), opens to bedroom three which has a casement window overlooking the front and a leaded window over the drive. There are ceiling beams, a modern brick arched fireplace and a built-in wardrobe. This room has a door into bedroom two, which could be locked to discourage walking through, since bedroom two can also be accessed directly from the landing at the top of the kitchen staircase.Like bedroom three, bedroom two, runs the full depth of the house and has two casement windows, one overlooking the front, the other the drive. There is a built- in wardrobe (with a light), which runs half the length of the dividing wall between bedroom four. Bedroom four has in effect the other half of this built-in wardrobe, also with a light. It has a casement window overlooking the front and a filigree Victorian metal fireplace with a plain surround. This room is accessed from the kitchen staircase landing.

Bedroom Five, Bathroom and Loft

The landing from the kitchen also accesses bedroom five, the family bathroom, and a continuation of the staircase (behind a door as in the kitchen), to the loft. The loft has a dormer window and is used for storage.Bedroom five, has two casement windows overlooking the rear, one with leaded panes, and a mullioned window low down in the east wall. The room, with numerous exposed vertical beams, reflects the shape of the eaves with restricted head height and has a built-in cupboard.Off the landing with a diagonal wall is a family bathroom with oak floor boards. Like the en suite bathroom, it has an airing cupboard housing another hot water tank. There is a free-standing roll top bath with claw feet and taps with a hand-held shower at one end, a corner shower cubicle, a pedestal basin, and a heated towel rail. A leaded window with authentic latches overlooks the drive.

Garden

The front of the house is enclosed by estate railings. A timber gate opens on the left hand side to a circular gravel drive with ample parking for about 14 cars. There is the original Victorian pump by the entrance to the kitchen. In the centre of the drive is an ornamental area of concentric paving and pebbles, planted with low-lying shrubs with a central area of indigenous flags. The rear garden, lying beyond the barn, is laid to lawn, with the boundaries enclosed by panel fencing or hedging. There are established herbaceous borders and mature plum, apple and damson trees. Features in the garden are a topiary acorn, a willow tree and a children’s timber climbing frame.

Barn

Integral to Chestnut Farm House is the old timber framed barn. Like the house, it has a Grade II listing and is believed to date from the mid-18th century and has been restored with the same sensitive approach, retaining the original cattle feed troughs and mangers. The exterior has black painted weatherboarding, there are two windows and three timber doors. Within the last year the hipped roof has been given a new thatch (in genetically unmodified Devon wheat as stipulated), and the internal structural timbers include queen post trusses and curved braces. The barn is divided into three and one of the internal walls has unusual elm cladding. The section of the barn on the right is currently used for storage, as is the brick-based section on the far left, accessed via an internal door. The central section is currently used as a snooker room and easily houses the full-sized snooker table– there is light and power. (The listing for the barn is 1332022, for the house, 1159366, this early listing dates back to 1955).

Swimming Pool Barn

uilt in 1989, the pitched roof pool barn has black timber cladding, in keeping with the old barn. There are three double French windows which open to the rear lawned garden, two casement windows in each gable end and a slate roof. The separate, black, timber clad pump house, is at the back of the pool barn. The interior of the pool has a vaulted pine lined ceiling, a dehumidifier and a new floor; other recent refurbishments include a pool liner and a heat retention cover.

Four Garages

Continuing from the end of the games room, and opening to the drive, are a double garage and two single garages with up and over doors and concrete floors. With black painted wooden cladding and slate rooves they integrate with the weather boarding of the barn, the pool barn and wall of the neighbour’s barn which forms part of the boundary to the drive. The single garages are currently used as a tractor store and for general storage.

Situation and Schooling

Monks Risborough is a village at the foot of the Chiltern Hills. The church hosts craft, lunch and walking clubs; the scout hut is also used for fitness, baby, toddler and pre-school groups. Princes Risborough (1 mile) has shops, restaurants and supermarkets, a tennis and bowls club, a golf club and schools. Monks Risborough Primary School (Ofsted rated Good) is 0.1 miles away and the property is in catchment for Aylesbury’s grammar schools.