Country Life has long had a healthy relationship to Royalty, but usually only the family in charge of these fair isles. But no longer. We are spreading our wings to other, more eastern, isles, by bringing you the glorious Old Rectory in Besselsleigh, Oxfordshire.
For sale with Knight Frank for £1.95 million, the property was the former home of Crown Prince Naruhito, now known as His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Japan. He wrote about the house in his book The Thames and I: A memoir of two years at Oxford. I never expected to have anything in common with the Emperor of Japan, but now we’ve both written about the Old Rectory. Always good to have something in your back pocket should I accidentally get sat next to him at a dinner.
To the house! As discussed, it is called The Old Rectory, it is in Oxfordshire, and comes with five bedrooms, five reception rooms and 2.5 acres of gardens and grounds. It is about as typical an old rectory as you would expect to find in this part of the world, with lots of spacious reception rooms, dry-stone walling and glorious gardens.
Set over two floors, the property is laid out in an L-plan, with the ground floor comprising a gym, study, sitting room, family room, kitchen and utility/boot room. The five bedrooms can be found on the first floor. There is also a wine cellar, because what self-respecting emperor doesn’t have a wine cellar.
The gardens are of exceptional quality, with lawned areas, well stocked borders and shrubs, and a selection of specimen trees. Further afield, the property benefits from tremendous views over the surrounding countryside, as well as privacy from the stone wall to the front of the home.
Oxford city centre is just a few miles to the north east, while London is accessible by train in under an hour. A home fit for a king? Who knows, but certainly one for a future emperor.
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