You are invited to bed and breakfast at our Tudor home in the heart of the Weald of Kent.
Godwin House is an Elizabethan farmhouse, built in 1580 and Grade II listed.
It lies in the lustrous countryside minutes from ancient Cranbrook and Sissinghurst.
Godwin House is set in lovely grounds looking across its own meadows. You have a choice of en suite accommodation in the stylish Garden Cottage or our beautiful, unique Oast House, the oldest in England, a listed 16th Century building from the days of Shakespeare’s boyhood.
The Garden Cottage with its peg tiled roof and weatherboarding is pure Kentish style, a spacious and relaxing en-suite double room. Exposed beams and antique furniture create a welcoming and interesting space which is completely private.
GODWIN HOUSE 1580
Our ancient, oak framed home was built when William Shakespeare was a teenager, the year that Francis Drake returned from sailing round the world, claiming California for England while he was doing it. A new fangled drink, beer, was coming into the country so they built the Oast House, a kiln for roasting hops.
The house is a traditional Kentish, tile-hung, hip-roofed farmhouse which was eight years old when the English Navy faced down the Spanish Armada; it was 225 years old by the time Napoleon cast covetous eyes upon the Kent coast and past three and a half centuries when the vapour trails of Spitfires and Hurricanes were scribing the skies above it in the Battle of Britain.
It’s tall chimney has survived those other hurricanes in 1704 and 1987, as has its equally ancient Oast House. They are a tribute to the craftsmanship of the men who built them to last, more than twenty generations ago.
Breakfast offers the convenience of self-service in your room. It’s a good, full breakfast to set you up well for the day. See more details on our Places to Eat page.
Godwin’s Oast House is special. There’s nowhere like it. In here you are in the heart of Kent’s rural history but with en-suite comfort, antique furnishings, king sized sleigh bed and mod cons. It is a Kentish experience evoking the best of times, past and present.
Quill Drawing by Jane Grierson 2013
The history sets the style but we don’t neglect the 21st Century. The Garden Cottage and Godwin Oast have:
IN THE HEART OF KENT’S LANDSCAPE; AT THE HEART OF ITS HISTORY
Godwin House is set in its own five acres of meadows. You are very welcome to take your breakfast as a picnic into them, if the weather is kind.