LINE OF BEAUTY

When Richard Nye’s parents bought Orchard End near Horsmonden in Kent in 1992 it was in a parlous state: “To get in, you had to climb over a giant conifer that had been felled across the entrance, a garage on the drive had burnt down, and there was an old, dilapidated aviary on one side of the house. The place spoke of sadness and lost opportunity.” Even so, Hugh and Pauline Nye could see the potential of the run-down Arts & Crafts revival-style house, built in 1936, surrounded by two acres of grass dotted with neglected fruit trees, in an area of woodland and orchards in the High Weald