LATE BLOOMER

Not for Pierre Lagrange the heady days of high summer. He wanted a garden that hits its peak just as the days shorten and the first frosts fall

- CAROLINE DONALD

AT HOME WITH…

Owners Pierre Lagrange and Ebs Burnough, who live here with their one-year-old daughter.

House A Grade-II Georgian redbrick farmhouse in West Berkshire with outbuildings and barns used for guest accommodation.

Garden Contemporary perennial and meadow planting in 12 acres, surrounded by woodland and fields. A small ferme ornée houses rare pigs and hens, and a couple of Airstreams sit in the long grass of an orchard.

Rusted Corten-steel planters in the north garden give a nod to the agricultural past of the buildings and reflect the scudding clouds

As one of Britain’s top financiers – not to mention owner of Huntsman, the stylish Savile Row tailor featured in the Kingsman films – Pierre Lagrange could have bought any number of gloriously grand country houses when he sold the Malverleys estate in Berkshire in 2009. Instead, what he was looking for was a modest ‘Beatrix-Potter cottage with a view’ nearby, as his family loved the area and wanted to keep up their ties there.

He had mentioned this to a friend long established in the parish, who called him when he was on holiday and told him about Hatch House, a Grade-II Georgian red-brick farmhouse with outbuildings and 12 acres in the next-door village, which was about to come on the market: not exactly a cottage but in the quiet, vernacular style he had been hoping for. Having sent round his architect to have a look (he approved), Pierre bought it, sight unseen, before the For Sale sign had even gone up. On his return, Pierre came to inspect his new purchase, which had wonderful, far-reaching views of the nearby downland and West Woodhay estate.