Stanway House & Fountain

Stanway House is a Jacobean manor in the village of Stanway, just south of Winchcombe in the Cotswolds. The house has been in the same family for around 500 years and is one of the few privately owned manor houses in the area that opens to the public, which gives it a character quite distinct from the managed heritage properties nearby.

The centrepiece of a visit is the fountain, which rises to around 300 feet and is one of the highest single-jet gravity-fed fountains in Britain. Water reaches it from a reservoir on the hillside behind the house rather than from a pump, which is what makes the height possible. The fountain plays at 2.45pm and 4pm for roughly half an hour each time, and both showings are included in the admission price.

The house itself contains family portraits, furniture and objects accumulated over the centuries, and is genuinely lived in rather than preserved at a fixed historical moment. The grounds include a baroque waterway, a restored cascade, an eighteenth-century tithe barn and views across the Cotswold escarpment.

Opening is restricted to Tuesday and Thursday afternoons through the summer, so plan carefully around that. The site works best for children aged three and upwards, and older children tend to be genuinely impressed by the fountain performance. The setting on a clear summer afternoon is exceptional.

Good for: history, outdoors, fairytale. Ages: 3–4, 5–7, 8–11, 12+.