{"id":18798,"date":"2023-02-14T10:10:07","date_gmt":"2023-02-14T09:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homesandantiques.com\/?p=40163"},"modified":"2023-02-14T11:37:09","modified_gmt":"2023-02-14T10:37:09","slug":"a-17th-century-home-in-gloucestershire","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/homesantiques\/rss_feed\/a-17th-century-home-in-gloucestershire\/","title":{"rendered":"A 17th-century home in Gloucestershire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Georgie and Sam Pearman\u2019s Cotswolds hotel group sets a new standard, mixing antiques with modern art. In their own home, their style takes on a more personal character, interwoven with the history of the house itself. Photographs Rachael Smith <\/p>

By Jo Leevers\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Tuesday, 14 February 2023 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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Classic English antiques<\/a> are teamed with striking 1960s abstract art and vibrant Asian embroidered textiles in Georgie and Sam Pearman\u2019s Gloucestershire home, with the odd 20th-century industrial piece thrown in for good measure.<\/p>\n

The property dovetails several architectural styles, so it\u2019s apt that Georgie\u2019s style is all about the mix: the hall boasts 1920s chequerboard tiles and carved oak newels, while the living room is pure 19th-century decorative rosettes and cornicing<\/a>. Then, in the study, you travel back to the house\u2019s 17th-century core, with a huge inglenook fireplace, deep window seat and dark beams.<\/p>\n

That sense of history, of a home with stories to tell, was one of the draws. Georgie and Sam first visited the house when friends lived there. \u2018I was struck by its character and the amazing view,\u2019 remembers Georgie. When said friends eventually moved to America, Georgie and Sam first rented the house and then ended up buying it. Once the couple had moved in at the end of 2012, more information came to light about the house\u2019s intriguing history.<\/p>\n

The property sits in a hidden dip, midway up a very steep hill and, so the story goes (which is most likely apocryphal), it was where the Duke of York set up camp during the English Civil War in the 17th century. \u2018From here, he\u2019s said to have marched those 10,000 men up the hill \u2013 and then down again,\u2019 says Georgie. \u2018I\u2019m not sure historians would agree but it does make a good story.\u2019<\/p>\n

More reliable sources reveal that in the late 19th century the house was the home of one George Holloway, a reforming MP and industrialist, and that from the 1950s it was a boarding school \u2013 hence some of bedroom doors still bear quaint dormitory nameplates from that period.<\/p>\n

Today, Georgie\u2019s study walls are lined with wallpaper swatches, Moorish tiles and squares of sisal and seagrass, samples for the boutique hotels she runs with Sam. \u2018Our home sometimes gets the offcuts,\u2019 jokes Georgie. \u2018Or we look after the art that\u2019s too bland or too full on\u2019.<\/p>\n

Georgie\u2019s interior style on home turf is just as engaging as its more public face. The rooms in their boutique hotels are a mix of Vivienne Westwood squiggle motifs, antique furniture<\/a> and contemporary art. At home, Georgie has adapted boutique chic to family life and then added a generous dose of the personal by adding vintage<\/a> prints, fabrics and antique heirlooms.<\/p>\n

As she points out, \u2018Designing a room for a luxury weekend break is quite different to what works in a family home. Unlike a hotel, a family home has to fit together and to work as a whole. Even with the huge scale of this house, there\u2019s still a flow and ease to these rooms and I want the decor to bring that out.\u2019<\/p>\n

Sam, whose career path has progressed from being a professional rugby player to a chef to running front of house operations, oversees the foodie side of their business, while Georgie\u2019s remit includes the decorating schemes and the art. Her sister, who used to be a contemporary art expert at Christie\u2019s, gave Georgie some steers on buying paintings<\/a>, and her own love of antique furniture and fabrics came to the fore too.<\/p>\n