When you walk into the hall at Castleman Hotel you are in what would have been the original small house built circa 1580 for the bailiff. The staircase was added around 1730 when the house was enlarged. Subsequent additions include the Regency style drawing room and the Oak room, a Victorian addition with much older carving and panelling incorporated. The dining room was extended in 1995 involving the skills of local specialists to recreate the decorative plasterwork ceiling. The house you see today is an amalgamation of various periods and styles, a relaxed house with a friendly open feel.

“Carefully converted, the house retains period features - porticoed doorway, galleried hall. Carved staircase, plasterwork ceilings, a Jacobean fireplace; there are some interesting 17th century paintings. Bedrooms are ‘plain but not sparse’; service is ‘attentive without pomp’ The ‘excellent, relatively simple’ food is admired, eg pigeon breast and mushroom salad; roast venison with poivrade sauce and celeriac puree; rhubarb compote with cream and pistachio macaroons…. Vegetarians are catered for. No breakfast menu; orange juice is freshly squeezed and you ask for what you want (within reason)”

The Good Hotel Guide 2003 ed Caroline Raphael and Desmond Balmer

“The prices are friendly, and for accommodation, too. Its unlikely that there is a hotel to match it in this still remote area of southern England.”

Jonathan Meades, The Times, June 22, 1996