SPECTACULAR SEA VIEWS ON THE ISLE OF WIGHT

Agent: Spence Willard

Beautifully converted from stone outbuildings that were formerly part of the East Dene Estate, this property occupies a wonderfully quiet and picturesque location just above Monk’s Bay.

Underley sits on the rural eastern fringe of this sought-after village, accessed by a private drive shared with only a few other properties which also benefit from this particularly quiet setting, only a short walk down to one of the Island’s most attractive bays. The area around Underley, including the grounds of East Dene, has recently been listed at Grade II on the Register of Parks and Gardens of Historic Interest in England. The area benefits from a great microclimate and became very popular in the Victorian era, regularly visited by the likes of Charles Dickens, and retains The Bonchurch Inn, which dates back to the 1840s.

There are superb coastal walks including to nearby Ventnor, where there are a good range of shops, bars and restaurants as well as a popular fish market. The accommodation is cleverly designed with the main conversion housing the reception rooms and kitchen to take advantage of the southerly sea views. Underley has a superb principal bedroom suite including a dressing room, along with a potential second bedroom/study. There is additional bedroom accommodation set just across the path, which both forms the approach to the house and divides the property (with potential for this to be joined subject to the necessary consents). Most rooms have vaulted ceilings and large windows/glazed doors providing a beautifully light feel and easy access to the series of terraces and gardens which also take in the views.

There is parking along with a single garage and the gardens include a pool with large terraces as well as an easily maintained garden enclosed by the converted stone outbuildings and mature hedging, making for a highly private setting.

Spencewillard.co.uk

Agent: Hose Rhodes Dickson

Superb sea views are visible from this predominantly single-story home that has been extended and upgraded throughout. It is slightly elevated and overlooks the mature grounds that measure just over one acre. This sociable property has a large sitting room that arcs around the fireplace, maximising the the vista across the English Channel.

This home also benefits from a double bay, oakbeamed open barn garage with a workshop and separate cloakroom. The ground floor boasts a solid wood front door with glazed insert opening to the entrance hall featuring quarry-tiled flooring. A large, bright sitting room with glazed double door opens out onto a railed, elevated terrace with exceptional views of the gardens and English Channel.

Wish House is well placed in this private plot as the gardens wrap completely around the property, mainly laid to lawn and surrounded by hedging. There are a variety of flowering shrubs, mature trees, fruit trees, sitting areas, and a large vegetable plot. You’ll also find a 4–5-person hot tub with an outside hot/cold shower located adjacent to the elevated terrace with superb channel views.

Hose-rhodes-dickson.co.uk

Agent: McCarthy & Booker

An impressive, detached, chalet bungalow with a large sitting room, dining area, and kitchen that all have fabulous views out to the verdant garden. As well as having a downstairs ensuite bedroom, there are also three further bedrooms and a bathroom on the upper floor. The gravel driveway has space for many vehicles with a garage at the far end that is currently used as a workshop. In a highly desirable location, within this historic area is The Fishbourne Inn, which dates from the 1900s, and the famous Quarr Abbey which is a fully working Benedictine monastery. As well as a place to worship, it is renowned for its tea room and the pigs and piglets that live there.

This beautiful area has many woodland walks and paths and has red squirrels in abundance. The Royal Victoria Yacht Club is at the head of Wootton Creek and an excellent starting point for all water-based activities. The property is found off a wooded lane, within an expansive plot with wraparound gardens. A long, gravelled drive flows up to the house with a turning area, and the garage to the right-hand side. A large lawned area is to the left and the perimeter is formed of mature trees, an idyllic woodland enclave.

A few steps lead up to the glazed porch with a further entrance door into the property. This fabulous plot is everything you could want from a woodland, peace and quiet with gentle birdsong. It is utterly relaxing and calming. The gardens also have nestled within them a garage that is currently used as a workshop, a large greenhouse, vegetable plot and borders of beautiful flowers and plants. There are several patios at the rear, one adjacent to the house, curving around two sides of the property with steps up to the further paved area that leads to the workshop. This could be redesigned to a garden room or office (subject to any necessary permissions).

Mccarthyandbooker.co.uk

Rare to the open market, Week Farm is an attractive and well-equipped residential farm, set in the centre of its own ring-fenced land with views to the sea. It comprises a substantial Georgian Farmhouse, modern and traditional buildings, and approximately 370.9 acres (150.13 ha) of arable, pastureland and woodland.

Available as a whole, or in two lots, Week Farmhouse consists of domestic buildings, a stone barn, paddocks, gardens, and grounds extending to 5.56 acres. The second lot consists of Pastureland and Woodland extending to 359.80 acres, together with modern and traditional agricultural buildings.

Week Farm sits in a secluded enviable south-facing position, enjoying distant sea views and surrounded by its own land. It is accessed from the highway along a private drive. Settled within an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, the area is renowned for riding and walking. Week Farmhouse enjoys high ceilings throughout and is constructed of local Isle of Wight stone with a slate roof. The house benefits from being largely double-glazed and is not listed.

Week Farm enjoys a large, secluded driveway, gated from the main access. The formal grounds and gardens are centred around a partially walled garden, with well-established borders and shrubs. There is a large pond and an orchard with apples, pears, white willow, walnuts, and sweet chestnuts, along with a separate woodland area and paddock.

Bcm.co.uk

With 40 years experience Anne Ginger and her dedicated team are happy to assist in making the right choice of soft furnishings for you, from helping you choose the perfect product through to installation. Our service is based around giving excellent advice combined with quality products. Come and see us and turn your dream into reality.

Dusting off our bookmark, ready for a new round of reading, we’ve stepped back through the door of Babushka Books in Shanklin to see which hand-picked titles Reuben has assembled for us this time. Opting for an all-female literary line-up that celebrates the talent of women writers, his choices this issue include poetry, short stories, and a brief history of women’s suffrage.

The 19 poems that make up this posthumous collection were all penned in the final months of Sylvia Plath’s short life. The writing is beautifully dark and so exquisite in its rawness that you almost feel like you shouldn’t be allowed to read it. Staring through a strong feminist lens and touching on issues of love, family, motherhood, and death, the poems drip with an emotion that leaves you with a clear insight into her state of mind, trapped in the bleak reality of her world.

Once described as ‘the nearest thing British publishing has to a cult’, Persephone Books has almost become a lifestyle brand. Founded by Nicola Beauman in 1999 in a room above a pub, they have a simple strategy to unearth and reprint long-forgotten gems written by the female authors that history has overlooked, and place them at the fingertips of a new generation of readers. The novels they publish are clever, thought-provoking, and always beautifully written. “We only publish books that we completely, utterly love,” Beauman says. A wide selection is always stocked at Babushka.

Du Maurier was well known for her books, ‘Rebecca’ and ‘Jamaica Inn’ by the time she penned ‘The Apple Tree’. A collection of short stories, she pushed beyond her tag as a ‘Romantic Novelist’ (a term she deplored) and explored genres such as fantasy, science fiction, and horror. The most famous of these is ‘The Birds’, made famous by the Alfred Hitchcock film starring Tippi Hedren. The six stories here show a darker side that was both shocking and thrilling to her readers in equal measure.

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“The torch which was lighted by Mary Wollstonecraft was never afterwards extinguished,” Fawcett states in the opening pages of her book, recounting the founders and history of the movement through their writing and activism. Unrelenting in her pursuit for progress and further gains for suffragettes, she embraces logical, political campaigns over violence. “I cannot say I became a suffragist. I always was one…”