Deep-pocketed Americans are swarming the bucolic Cotswolds outside London to live like lords, renting estates for pheasant shooting weekends for an eye-popping $250,000.
“Americans will pay up to $250,000 for a shooting weekend. A lot of these places do it. You arrive at tea time on Friday and leave after lunch on Sunday, with shooting all day Saturday,” says bestselling author Plum Sykes, whose new book, “Wives Like Us,” chronicles the over-the-top lifestyle of Americans and Brits through the eyes of a butler named Ian.
Sykes, a “Vogue” contributor, is no stranger to the worlds that she satirizes with love and glee. She made her name as an “it girl” in New York with her twin sister Lucy, capturing a certain class of women in her 2004 bestseller, “Bergdorf Blondes.”
Now, it’s as if Sykes’ “Bergdorf Blondes” grew up, got married, and moved to the British countryside.
Just about 90 miles northwest of London — about the same distance that Southampton is from Manhattan — the Cotswolds was once known for its sleepy-chic ways.
Amanda Brooks, the former fashion director at Barneys, set a new tone when she launched Cutter Brooks — a clothing and antiques shop — in the market town Stow-on-the-Wold in 2018. The spot was soon serving as a gathering place for Americans and Brits in the region, Sykes said.
Then came the pandemic, and rich Londoners flocked to the Cotswolds’ rolling hills and quintessential English villages dotted with stone cottages. “It’s like what happened to the Hamptons,” Sykes said.
Among the celebs who might be spotted in towns like Tetbury — just a five minute drive from King Charles’ beloved Highgrove House estate — is soccer legend David Beckham, who has a Cotswolds estate with his former Spice Girl wife, Victoria.
“The joke is he wants a knighthood,” Sykes said.
Ultra posh spas and hotels followed the wealthy Londoners to the region, led by Soho Farmhouse Spa in Oxfordshire. Among the latest is Estelle Manor, a country house hotel and private members club in the same county.
Also for rent nearby is the 600-acre Churchill Manor in Oxfordshire, owned by Annabel Brooks, Amanda’s sister-in-law and a former LA-based actress married to Oscar-nominated British film director and “Fatal Attraction” screenwriter James Dearden. Annabel Brooks also owns Avenue Properties, which lists a curated collection of some of the world’s most exclusive rental homes worldwide, and rents to many American celebs and Hollywood stars — though it does not offer shooting.
Among the boldfaced names who have rented the 19th-century Georgian home — which features nine bedrooms, seven baths, a pool, tennis court and two coach houses starting at about $38,000 a week — was Rebecca Hessel Cohen, the owner of cult-fave LoveShackFancy, who produced a photo shoot on the grounds.
“Vouge” model Adwoa Aboah recently hosted her 30th birthday party at the Coombe End Estate in Gloucestershire, a historic manor house set in 2500 private acres. Booking the 12-bedroom, 11-bath manor house, which includes a spa area with a massage room, sauna, plunge pool and hot tub, asks around $38,000 a week to start.
Add in a shooting party at a manor like this, and the tab can skyrocket to $250,000.
Other famous homes in the Cotswolds rent not only to well-heeled partiers, but also to film and movie productions.
Badminton in Gloucestershire, home to the Duke and Duchess of Beaufort, is where streaming series like Guy Ritchie’s “The Gentlemen” and the BBC’s “The Pursuit of Love” were shot, not to mention serving as the interior of the Duke of Hastings’ estate for many steamy scenes in the first season of “Bridgerton”
Badminton’s website says it is available for rent for “weddings, corporate activities and filming.” There’s also “The Badminton Shoot,” which, as described on the site, is available starting with partridge season in October and “focused on delivering high quality shooting and hospitality in a stunning landscape in the South of the Cotswolds.”
Sykes’ home was built from the ground up, on a remote sheep farm in the Cotswolds Hills on the edge of a valley. The fact that it is modern is also part of its charm — a charm that attracts more than just fat-cat Americans and celebs living large.
Lord Evgeny Lebedev, the son of a Russian oligarch and KGB operative who helped put Vladimir Putin in power, is also a press baron in Britain known for hosting controversial parties in Perugia, Italy, where then-prime minister Boris Johnson once arrived following a NATO meeting.
Evgeny once asked to rent Sykes home for two weeks. She declined, as it was during a time when she was in the house with her kids.
However, while on holiday, Sykes did rent her home to a “lovely” Chicago family.
“They were inspired to come here after watching “The Holiday,” and they said they felt like they were in the movie the whole time,” she said.
For a “bargain” $38,000 a week, there’s several other spots available online for a luxe vacation or a stately wedding.
Cornwell Manor is located in the “golden triangle” of the Cotswolds, near Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire.
The original Manor house is Jacobean, however a Georgian façade was added in the late 17th century. The 12-bedroom, six bath home sits on 2000 acres and comes with a pool, ballroom, gardens and tennis — along with a “shared shoot.” This is where the 2006 Cameron Diaz /Kate Winslet house-swapping flick “The Holiday” was partly filmed.
Finally, there’s Belvoir — pronounced “Beaver”– Castle, the ancestral home of the Duke of Rutland, David Manners and his wife, Emma, the Duchess of Rutland. It’s actually a faux castle built between 1801 and 1832 on the site of multiple earlier castles. The first was built after the Norman conquest in 1066. Films like “The Da Vinci Code” and streaming series like “The Crown” were shot there.
The grounds and gardens are open to guests. You can take tea in the tea room, view the castle and the art and even stay on the estate. There’s camping and glamping with views of Belvoir Castle and the Vale of Belvoir, as well as luxury country houses and apartments to rent.
When Americans rent there, the Duke and Duchess of Rutland may attend the shooting weekends, or at least pop in to say hello.
“It’s one of the things the Brits are selling,” Sykes said. “It’s like an export — the English countryside.”