Tusmore Road, Souldern, OX27

A classic car/ equestrian/ home-workers paradise. Set in circa 3 acres, C.2,500 sq ft of period house with circa 6,000 sq ft of outbuildings inc stables, paddocks with menage, garaging for 10+ vehicles, architects' studio, B&B rooms plus further storage spaces. Unrepeatable!

Souldern is a small village on the North Oxfordshire border, seven miles south-east of Banbury with roots going back at least 900 years. There is an excellent pub/ restaurant The Fox Inn, a Norman church and chapel, a village hall, plus play area and playing field. Banbury and Brackley are both within easy distance with a good range of shopping and leisure facilities, plus there are shops in many of the nearby villages. Bicester also offers unrivalled shopping at Bicester Village as well as a 45 minute rail service to London Marylebone. The M40 motorway at junction 10 is about three miles away and access to both Northampton and Milton Keynes is also straightforward.

Possibly one of the hardest properties to describe adequately, Tower Fields offers the hobbyist/ home worker possibilities and options that nothing else can. The main house is a charming, comfy, and pretty spacious property with beams and stone, a fantastic family home - which is what the current owners have enjoyed for 30 years. But in addition they have the property set up to provide B&B income in separate buildings, an office large enough for a draftsman/ architect, stables with a huge feed store, rare breed pens, paddocks, menage... And then there's the classic car barns, with so much space and height that hydraulic ramps, lathes, compressors and all the other equipment normally associated with a professional restorer are swallowed into the spaces with barely a blink. To those craving space to spread, potter, hoard, and enjoy family life at the same time, this is the one!!

First, the main house. Built of stone, the barn was converted and renovated by our clients around 30 years ago. The entrance leads into a lobby. From here a door on the left connects into tack rooms, garages etc (more of that later). This lobby in turn opens into the kitchen complete with units and an Aga, wrapping round a space that is ample for a family table with room to spare for dressers, chests and even easy chairs. It has been divided to the front to provide a rather charming snug/ tv room that looks out towards the stables and the fields beyond. On the left of the kitchen the dining room is surprisingly large, and characterful with a vaulted ceiling and doors opening out to the walled garden. Behind the kitchen a pleasant hallway, above which are beams, leads past the stairs to a utility room as well as a cloak room. Thoroughly inviting, the living room at the rear is large by most standards. Further beams and a lovely stone fireplace reinforce the character, and unusually for a house of this type, it's extremely light as there are windows down both sides - in addition a door on each side leads to gardens. Beyond, a bedroom includes an en-suite shower.Upstairs, three further bedrooms provide very good accommodation with character. To the rear, a vast double room features cupboards and beams. Connected to it is another room which could be an en-suite, or a fantastic dressing room, or even the largest of walk-in wardrobes. At the other end of the landing, another large double already includes an en-suite shower room. And from here the view across the fields is truly stunning. Between the two, the smallest bedroom is still a practical double. Serving all, the bathroom is well presented with a white suite.

Now, the outbuildings. From the lobby, a door opens into a store which is lined with shelves and generally used as a pantry etc, and next to it is the tack room. Though the next door is Aladdin's cave! An oblong garage provides perfect space for every car enthusiast's dreams. There is a large sliding door to the front providing excellent access, and another garage door plus pedestrian entrance to the side. Ten vehicles would fit in here, but with just six or seven it would be easy to conduct serious restorations with ease. Walking through the side door leads into the entrance arch under the building, and the other side of it are a stable and a large store room with a vehicle door. Behind this the building splits into another large garage with an entrance door onto the front parking, connected to yet another garage, and this in turn is connected to a further barn with various cattle stalls - which could be further accommodation (planning permission allowing) or yet more garaging. Also in this same building, a rather charming and large double bedroom has been created. Exposed timbers overhead frame a vaulted ceiling, and there's a hidden sink plus wardrobes and a shower room to make it a self-contained unit. Across the terrace a further bedroom is similarly equipped. Both have provided the vendors with a flexible secondary income, and they have a website already in existence that provides frequent requests for bookings (unsurprisingly often from classic car tourers visiting Silverstone or Bicester Heritage). Next door, the office is a large enough space that several people could work within it if desired.

The outside space is fantastic. The main house sits in a mixture of paddock grazing and rare breed pens, with a garden either side of the main house as well as a terrace in front of the main door. A large concrete driveway runs up to the front of the house, also providing access to the yard in front of two stables that are attached to a tall feed barn. The afore-mentioned arch through the centre of the main barn leads up to a concrete hardstanding outside the office and car port. Also included is a paddock and purpose-built menage which are directly opposite the stables on the other side of the lane, ideally placed for swift access but conveniently separate from the other pens and paddocks. NB if desired there is a second entrance gate leading off the road into the property to the right of the house.