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Buy our £25 million stately home and we will throw in half the village

 

telegraph.co.uk

Buy our £25 million stately home and we will throw in half the village

With rolling countryside stretching to the sea, a pheasant shoot and ornamental lakes, Kelling Hall is a stunning estate even by the standards of the great stately homes.

 By Richard Alleyne 
Kelling Hall is surrounded by 1600 acres, includes 10 properties from the nearby Kelling villagePhoto: ALBANPIX

But the £25 million price tag for this Norfolk country pile, built by the Shell Oil dynasty, comes with an extra bonus – most of the next door village as well.

The 13-bedroom Arts and Crafts manor house, surrounded by 1600 acres, includes 10 properties from the nearby Kelling village as well as most of the land around the settlement.

Built by Dutch oil industrialist Sir Henri Deterding, who founded Royal Dutch Shell, the Grade II listed manor house was re-built in 1914 in the style of a grand hunting lodge featuring trophy room and banqueting hall.

The estate itself has seven cottages, a seven-bedroom converted barn in 40 acres and a mini-emclave of 11 second homes and holiday cottages set in 14 acres of land.

A portfolio of 10 properties in Kelling village, its playing field and a development plot are also up for sale.

Sir Henri’s grandson James Deterding and his wife Shirley are selling up because the sprawling estate has become too big to look after.

“It is with great sadness that we have found it too much to cope with and we want to retire” Mrs Deterding said.

“It has been a very difficult decision – my husband was born in this house – but we want to retire to a smaller property.

“Farming is difficult – we have had a good harvest this year but it goes up and down and it is a huge estate.”

The Kelling estate was designed to be the finest sporting estate in Norfolk with the Grade II listed flint and brick hall built for entertaining shooting parties.

As well as farming, with the land growing oil seed rape, malting barley, sugar beet and potatoes, the Deterding family has diversified the business to cater for hard agricultural times.

Being by the sea, the family saw its potential as a tourist attraction and converted a number of farm buildings into the Lowes holiday cottage development, also up for sale.

James Laing, a partner at Strutt & Parker in London, which is selling both the Kelling and Westacre estates, said yesterday: “It is very unusual for an estate like this to come to the market.

“Not only does it overlook the sea but is a fine example of arts and crafts architecture. Being built in the 20th century it has another great advantage over older houses – plumbing.”

The sale comes as another major estate, High House at Westacre in West Norfolk, has gone on the market with the same estate agent, Strutt & Parker, for offers above £9.5m.

Louis de Soissons, of Savills, said it was “unprecedented” for two massive estates to go on to the market at the same time.

He said: “The sales are perhaps indicative of the fact, which many people believe, that the agricultural market is peaking.”

Owner Shirley Deterding outside the Main Hall Photo: ALBANPIX

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2688080/Buy-our-25-million-stately-home-and-we-will-throw-in-half-the-village.html

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