A beguiling country house in Oxfordshire that combines fascinating period architecture with pretty gardens
'Wonderfully eclectic and individual', Blenheim House fuses Georgian and Victorian architecture to form a unique and totally charming family home. Annunciata Elwes takes a look.


Grade II-listed Blenheim House, in the village of Warborough, not far from market town Wallingford, has long been a much cherished family home.
A mixture of two 18th-century cottages, combined with a Victorian hexagonal tower in 1910 and another hexagonal wing added in 1912, the result is an airy six-bedroom property, with a lovely drawing room and dining room, both of which open into the garden, a west-facing conservatory and a lantern roof flooding the upper floor with natural light.
The property is currently on the market via Savills with a guide price if £2.75 million.
A two-bedroom cottage at the end of the drive is attached to two enclosed stables, one of which provides further accommodation.
The nearly 1½ acres also include a swimming pool, semi-circular pleached hornbeam hedge echoing the shape of a stone fountain and a paddock currently frothing with cow parsley, through which mown paths meander.
Blenheim House is currently on the market via Savills with a guide price of £2.75 million — see more pictures, or enquire with the agent for further details.
Warborough: What you need to know
Location: South Oxfordshire, 9 miles south of Oxford and 2.5 miles from Wallingford.
Sign up for the Country Life Newsletter
Exquisite houses, the beauty of Nature, and how to get the most from your life, straight to your inbox.
Atmosphere: The pretty village is home to a popular pub — The Six Bells, a post office, village shop, primary school, village hall and a cricket and rugby pitch.
Things to do: There are a number of walking trails along the banks of the River Thames that can be accessed from the village, and neighbouring Wallingford is home to independent shops and a 000market. Oxford is also within easy reach, with a large selection of restaurants, pubs, the Botanic Gardens and Medieval architecture.
Schools: Plenty of excellent options to choose from in the area, with St Laurence Church of England (A) School, Cranford House, Radley College, Abingdon School and Headington School.
See more property for sale in the area.
Credit: Strutt and Parker
Best country houses for sale this week
An irresistible West Country cottage and a magnificent Cumbrian country house make our pick of the finest country houses for
Annunciata grew up in the wilds of Lancashire and now lives in Hampshire with a husband, two daughters and an awful pug called Parsley. She’s been floating round the Country Life office for more than a decade, her work winning the Property Magazine of the Year Award in 2022 (Property Press Awards). Before that, she had a two-year stint writing ‘all kinds of fiction’ for The Sunday Times Travel Magazine, worked in internal comms for Country Life’s publisher (which has had many names in recent years but was then called IPC Media), and spent another year researching for a historical biographer, whose then primary focus was Graham Greene and John Henry Newman and whose filing system was a collection of wardrobes and chests of drawers filled with torn scraps of paper. During this time, she regularly gave tours of 17th-century Milton Manor, Oxfordshire, which may or may not have been designed by Inigo Jones, and co-founded a literary, art and music festival, at which Johnny Flynn headlined. When not writing and editing for Country Life, Annunciata is also a director of TIN MAN ART, a contemporary art gallery founded in 2021 by her husband, James Elwes.












-
Eight bedrooms of unlisted Edwardian elegance with sweeping views of Somerset
Ashton House sits near the market town of Chard and comes with a wealth of amenities both inside and out.
By Arabella Youens Published
-
A waterside cottage in Devon with a private quay, idyllic views and the prettiest summerhouse we've seen in years
Right beside the picturesque Yealm Estuary, No 1 Noss Mayo is an idyllic home that feels like an escape from the world. Annabel Dixon takes a look.
By Annabel Dixon Last updated
-
This elegant Greek villa offers would-be buyers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to live in the shadow of the Acropolis
Athenian Legacy consists of two houses in walking —and almost touching — distance of one of the world’s most famous and precious landmarks.
By Rosie Paterson Published
-
Six charming homes up for sale, including one dubbed 'one of the most picturesque in Dorset', as seen in Country Life
Our look at the finest houses to come up for sale through Country Life in the past week is full of delights, from a new-Georgian mansion to a perfectly-sized Hertfordshire estate.
By Toby Keel Published
-
A Buckinghamshire mansion built for the speech therapist who set Churchill on his path to greatness
Penny Churchill takes a look at Rignalls, a classic Arts-and-Crafts home that looks like it's stepped out of the pages of an EM Forster novel.
By Penny Churchill Published
-
An idyllic Hampstead mansion whose price has risen nine times faster than inflation — and it's not hard to see why
Cloth Hill is even more beautiful on the inside than it is on the outside.
By Carla Passino Published
-
Some of Scotland's most beautiful churches are being sold off for as little as £40,000 — but a word of warning before you take the plunge
Lucy Denton examines how best to help former church buildings thrive as times move on and property changes hands.
By Lucy Denton Published
-
Inside the £28 million mansion designed to 'shake things up' and 're-define the English country house of the 21st century'
With everything from helicopter parking and a 1000-bottle wine cellar to bespoke wallpaper designed by Christian Lacroix, Harford Manor is a country house like no other. Annabel Dixon took a closer look and spoke to the man behind its creation.
By Annabel Dixon Last updated