The only thing cosier than curling up by the fire in a grand, countryside hotel is cosying up in your own luxury holiday cottage on the grounds of a grand, countryside hotel. Allow the world to shrink to just yourselves and your cocooning (yet stylishly adorned) walls with our edit of the UK’s most romantic cottages for couples.
The Secret Garden
The Pig in the Cotswolds
The Pig hotels stylishly rewrote the rulebook for cosy weekends away for two, so we’re somewhat surprised it took them 10 years to open an outpost in the UK’s capital of cosy, the Cotswolds. The late Rosemary Verey, garden designer to the stars (Prince Charles, Elton John…), conceived the listed arts-and-crafts-style gardens within which standalone lodging the Secret Garden lies hidden. It’s an entranceway that makes it all the more special to sink into its squishy, carefully chosen armchairs or (even better), the steamy, freestanding bath tub.
Gardener’s Cottage
Updown Farmhouse, Deal
Its gorgeous gables and crumbly red-brick exterior seems to suggest that quainter-than-quaint Updown Farmhouse is about to fall asleep standing up, but this is no slouch of a hotel. Not in its bracingly contemporary interiors, nor in its fabulous terrace restaurant serving up locally-famous roasts. Plus, on the Victorian-style grounds, a short stroll from the house, is the Gardener’s Cottage, a peaceful and private space à deux which inside pops with wild colour and eccentric art.
Hive
Wildhive Callow Hall, Peak District
You’ll be cosseted like queen bees at Wildhive Callow Hall, a Gothic manor house at the southern edge of the Peak District National Park. Especially in one of the hotel’s treetop ‘hives’, which may not strictly be cottages, but do come with Isabella Worsley-designed interiors, we’re-never-getting-out king-size beds, ensuite rainfall showers and outdoor decks with seating areas from which to reconnect with nature.
Crab Cottage
The Crab & Lobster, West Sussex
It’s not crustaceans but birds that take centre stage at The Crab & Lobster, a rustic-chic pub with rooms overlooking West Sussex’s RSPB-approved Pagham Harbour. Its newly-built, self-catered Crab Cottage is comfortable in an unfussy way, and is crucially right next door to the hotel’s restaurant, where seafood is the main draw: baked crab and other fishy dishes delight here against a backdrop of flagstone floors and roaring fireplaces.
The Den
Retreat East, Suffolk
There’s a mix of original and recently-built barns at Suffolk’s Retreat East; and while the originals have had more time to ‘bed in’ to their surroundings, the more modern lodges offer equally indulgent perks. One of them, the Den, features a fully stocked kitchen with Miele appliances and a Grind coffee machine, a private deck with tons of outdoor space, and plush curtains that you can close around your linen-draped four-poster.
One-Bedroom Cottage
Schloss Roxburghe, Kelso
We’d almost wish for blustery weather on arrival at Schloss Roxburghe, a towering Gothic mansion on the Scottish borders. A modern extension here doesn’t detract from this atmospheric, stone-clad pile, around which a string of slate-roofed dwellings have been dotted across its well-manicured 300 acres. And sure, some of the two-bedroom outposts have saunas and fire pits, but even the one-bedroom cottage is a charming prospect for hunkering down out of the rain.
Writing Studio
Boath House, Nairn
An enclave for creatives in the Scottish Highlands, Boath House is where you could easily pen that long-awaited novel…if you weren’t so drawn to snuggling each other. Set apart from the gorgeous Regency-era main house, the Writing Studio has its own walled garden with a fire pit and sunloungers beside a babbling brook, and inside bespoke artworks, vaulted ceilings and bonnie exposed beams ignite the imagination.
Tiny Boat
42 Acres, Somerset
Okay, yes, it’s a boat — and a tiny one at that — but this cute-as-a-button craft, set at a mooring on 42 Acres’ private lake, is as cosy as any cottage. Repurposed wood panelling and dark teal make for the warmest of interiors — perfect for escaping into as the sun sets over your lakeside deck. Keep your eyes peeled for otters, beavers and kingfishers here…if you can keep your eyes off each other.
Muntjac Tree House
Tree House Retreats, West Sussex
No, technically this wood-built dwelling in a patch of ancient Sussex woodland isn’t a cottage, but for its cosiness quota we couldn’t not include these lofty digs at Tree House Retreats. Child’s play this is not: Muntjac features indoor and outdoor bath tubs (the outdoor one is made of wood), tiled bathroom, vintage interiors, fully-equipped kitchenette and calm-inducing views of the nearby polo grounds and Tudor ruins.
Rather be in the main house? Check out our collection of castle and manor-house hotels…
