Readers who recognise the classic Georgian façade of Grade I-listed Ven House at Milborne Port, on the Dorset/Somerset borders, should not be surprised Knight Frank are selling the house for the fourth time since 1993, this time jointly with Savills (020?7499 8644) at a guide price of £8.5m. The guide price was £6.5m when the present owners bought it in 2004, since when the house has been impeccably maintained, but hardly lived in.
Ven House was built in the William and Mary style between 1698 and 1730 for James Medlycott of The Manor at Milborne Port by a local architect, Nathaniel Ireson. More than a century later, Decimus Burton redesigned the south range, the hall, the staircase and the orangery, to bring greater symmetry to the house as a whole. The beautifully proportioned main house has five splendid reception rooms, an upstairs library, two sumptuous first-floor bedroom suites, and seven bedrooms plus five bathrooms on the second floor.
The 34 acres of magnificent gardens and grounds, linked together by a serpentine stream which forms part of the River Yeo, are a notable complement to this remarkable house.
