Some National Trust houses feel like museums you walk through politely. Upton House feels like stepping into someone's extraordinarily well-furnished weekend, circa 1935. It sits on a ridge south of Banbury, about half an hour from the cottage, and it rewards a slow visit.
The house was remodelled in the 1920s and 30s by Walter Samuel, 2nd Viscount Bearsted, who made his fortune through Shell and spent a good deal of it on art. The collection is genuinely remarkable: Stubbs, Hogarth, El Greco, Bruegel, and a set of porcelain that could hold its own against any London gallery. What makes it special is the setting. These paintings hang in the rooms they were chosen for, above the furniture they were meant to complement, with light falling through the same windows Samuel would have looked out of on a Friday evening after the drive from town. You get a real sense of how a collector actually lived with his pictures, rather than seeing them lined up on neutral walls.
The gardens are the other reason to go, and they catch first-time visitors off guard. From the house you look out over what appears to be a gentle lawn sloping towards open countryside. Walk to the edge and the ground drops away into a deep, hidden valley: terraced borders, a mirror pool, a bog garden, and a kitchen garden that could feed a small village. It's a theatrical piece of landscaping, designed to surprise, and it still works beautifully. On a warm afternoon you can easily spend a couple of hours wandering the terraces before settling into the tea room. The drive home takes you back through quiet lanes north of Banbury, past stone walls and long views, which is no bad way to end the day.
“You think you're looking at a flat lawn, then the whole garden reveals itself below you like a secret. It's one of those places that gets better every time we go back.”
All of this on the doorstep, and your own thatched cottage to come home to. Sleeps seven, less than a mile from Soho Farmhouse.