Polly Nicholson's flower-filled Georgian house in Wiltshire
The journey down a long drive towards an unknown house is always exciting. The approach to Ed and Polly Nicholson's Wiltshire home passes through parkland dotted with mature trees and populated by sleek black Hebridean sheep. As the single track loops towards its destination, anticipation is rewarded by a tall Georgian façade rising into view, four-square and handsome.
The house is as lovely inside as out. A generous porch opens into a wide entrance hall with a sweep of staircase, beyond which, through an open door, you can see the glint of a river and the green of woods and hills behind the house. If you turn left at the back of the hall, you enter a playroom, which in turn leads through to the kitchen. The latter is in a late-twentieth-century extension by architect William Bertram. It has a pitched ceiling supported by sturdy oak beams, french windows opening onto a terrace and that same view of the river.
MAY WE SUGGEST: A garden overflowing with flowers for cutting in the Wiltshire countryside
Polly and Ed previously lived in London, and have adjusted to full-time country life with style and enthusiasm. 'We first viewed this house five years before we bought it,' says Polly. 'We weren't ready to move, but when it came on the market again we were able to make a quick decision.' That was eight years ago, when Iris, the youngest of their four children, was a baby. 'The kitchen had already been added,' says Polly, 'but the Georgian part needed structural work due to a fire that had gutted the top floors in the Forties.' Under the direction of Simon Morray-Jones Architects, the second and attic floors were rebuilt. This allowed them to restore the original profile of the roof and to replace the steep stairs between the first and second floors with a new staircase that makes a more graceful descent to the landing.
Like the hall, this landing extends from front to back and is unusually wide. 'I love this "wasted" space, which makes the house feel so much bigger than it really is,' says Polly. As you take a tour, you understand what she means. On the ground floor, two reception rooms on the right of the hall - a formal drawing room at the front and a sitting room at the back - are mirrored by a dining room and the playroom opposite.
Then, on the first floor, the same layout comprises a bathroom and main bedroom on the right, facing a spare bedroom and dressing room. The children have bedrooms on the second floor, and there is also a self-contained flat under the roof. The house feels capacious, but never cavernous.
Ed, who works in finance and has more recently also become a competitive cyclist, took charge of the structural changes, but it is Polly who has overseen the decoration. 'I had fantastic help from my friend Malcolm Winyard, who is an interior designer, but the style is mine.' Certain themes recur: there are several large paper cuts by Rob Ryan and collections offramed paper stencils for kimono prints. Antique endpapers, which were presents from Polly's brother Edward, who runs the established family bookshop and bindery George Bayntun, in Bath, are framed and hung in the main bedroom and one of the reception rooms. What Polly calls 'proper antiques', such as the eighteenth-century table in the hall, were sourced by Edward Hurst. There are vintage pieces, such as oak-leaf Fontana-Arte wall lights in the main bedroom, and dashes of modernity, such as the sleek cream lacquer used in the kitchen, by David Shields, and the abstract oils by Michael Bennett in the hall.
The most distinctive feature of every room is flowers; not just pictured in botanical prints, or embroidered on curtains, but cut flowers from their garden. Today, a huge blue glass jar of purple verbena and bronze fennel sits in the hall, a row of delicate bottles and pots with mixed posies runs the length of the dining table, and a cluster of jugs span the bedroom, each with a bunch of blooms. There are also flowers on the side of the bath, on the landing, on the kitchen counter, on the garden table. This is Polly's passion - growing and arranging flowers - and she has turned it into a successful business in the form of Bayntun Flowers, which she runs from home in one of the old walled gardens, redesigned as a cutting garden with the help of Arne Maynard.
MAY WE SUGGEST: The heavenly Monmouthshire garden of Arne Maynard
'I sell mostly to private clients,' she says. 'I aim to grow unusual varieties, and I always use what is best on the day. When we come back from Mozambique (their house there is featured in the July 2015 issue of House & Garden), the first thing I do is go into the garden and pick. When the house is full of flowers - and children - it is alive and breathes.'
Alexander James1/13At the back of the Georgian house is a river and woodland.
Alexander James2/13Michael Bennett oils hang above an eighteenth-century table in the hall. A chair from Edward Hurst and a rug from Edward Marnier decorate the rear of this space, which leads out to the garden.
Alexander James3/13A large sofa from George Smith, with cushions covered in hand-embroidered linen from Ranjit Ahuja, provides a comfortable spot in the drawing room.
Alexander James4/13Flowers cut from the garden adorn the Georgian table and original chimneypiece in the dining room.
Alexander James5/13French windows open onto the garden from the sitting room, which is decorated in an early hand-painted de Gournay wallpaper.
Alexander James6/13Oak beams support the pitched ceiling of the kitchen in a twentieth-century extension at the rear.
Alexander James7/13The previous staircase to the second floor was replaced with this gently winding design.
Alexander James8/13In a spare room, an elegantly simple four-poster bed from Max Rollitt ensures the focus is on the 'Adam's Eden' wallpaper from Lewis & Wood.
Alexander James9/13In the main bedroom, an eighteenth-century lacquered chest stands between windows
with curtains in 'Secret Garden' by Raoul Textiles.
Alexander James10/13Mirrored panels and Carrara marble keep the main bathroom light.
Alexander James11/13In a greenhouse in the walled garden, Polly propagates flowers and grows vegetables.
Alexander James12/13Flowers ready to be delivered sit in the former coach house (below) which is now Polly's workshop for Bayntun Flowers.
Alexander James13/13A walled garden, redesigned by Arne Maynard, adjoins the coach house
