Cotchford Farm is a farmhouse building to the southwest of the village of

Hartfield Hartfield is a village and civil parish in the Wealden district of East Sussex, England. The parish also includes the settlements of Colemans Hatch, Hammerwood and Holtye, all lying on the northern edge of Ashdown Forest. Geography The main ...

East Sussex East Sussex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England on the English Channel coast. It is bordered by Kent to the north and east, West Sussex to the west, and Surrey to the north-west. The largest settlement in East ...

, in the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, in southern England. The building stands on Cotchford Lane, TN7 4DN, a private lane off the B2026 between Hartfield and Duddleswell. It is located close to the

Ashdown Forest Ashdown Forest is an ancient area of open heathland occupying the highest sandy ridge-top of the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is situated some south of London in the county of East Sussex, England. Rising to an elevation ...

, and roughly equidistant from

East Grinstead East Grinstead is a town in West Sussex, England, near the East Sussex, Surrey, and Kent borders, south of London, northeast of Brighton, and northeast of the county town of Chichester. Situated in the extreme northeast of the county, the civ ...

about to the west on the A22,

Royal Tunbridge Wells Royal Tunbridge Wells is a town in Kent, England, southeast of central London. It lies close to the border with East Sussex on the northern edge of the High Weald, whose sandstone geology is exemplified by the rock formation High Rocks ...

to the east on the

A26 A26 or A-26 may refer to: Roads * List of A26 roads Transportation * Douglas A-26 Invader, a light attack bomber built by Douglas * Aero A.26, a Czech reconnaissance aircraft of the 1920s * Focke-Wulf A 26, a German Focke-Wulf aircraft * Blekinge- ...

, and

Uckfield Uckfield () is a town in the Wealden District of East Sussex in South East England. The town is on the River Uck, one of the tributaries of the River Ouse, on the southern edge of the Weald. Etymology 'Uckfield', first recorded in writing as ...

to the south. Its owners have included author

A. A. Milne Alan Alexander Milne (; 18 January 1882 – 31 January 1956) was an English writer best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh, as well as for children's poetry. Milne was primarily a playwright before the huge success of Winni ...

and musician

Brian Jones Lewis Brian Hopkin Jones (28 February 1942 – 3 July 1969) was an English multi-instrumentalist and singer best known as the founder, rhythm/lead guitarist, and original leader of the Rolling Stones. Initially a guitarist, he went on to prov ...

, who drowned in the swimming pool at the house in July 1969. It is listed Grade II on the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, a ...

. The building is a timber-framed farmhouse, with "L" plan, possibly dating to the 17th century or perhaps the mid-16th century. It was probably originally built with

wattle and daub Wattle and daub is a composite building method used for making walls and buildings, in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called wattle is daubed with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, animal dung a ...

infilled walls and a

thatched roof Thatching is the craft of building a roof with dry vegetation such as straw, water reed, sedge (''Cladium mariscus''), rushes, heather, or palm branches, layering the vegetation so as to shed water away from the inner roof. Since the bulk o ...

, but was later refaced with red brick on the ground floor, and the roof rehung with tiles. The main block has three storeys oriented approximately north–south, with a two-storey wing to the south, and the kitchen in a single storey addition off the north end of the main block. Inside, the house has a split-level drawing room with

inglenook An inglenook or chimney corner is a recess that adjoins a fireplace. The word comes from "ingle", an old Scots word for a domestic fire (derived from the Gaelic ''aingeal''), and "nook". The inglenook originated as a partially enclosed heart ...

fireplace, and views in four directions but mainly over the garden to the east and south, and also an oak-panelled dining room. Upstairs are six bedrooms, four on the first floor and two on the second floor. The building was bought as a country home by the author

in 1925. Milne wrote all of his

Winnie-the-Pooh Winnie-the-Pooh, also called Pooh Bear and Pooh, is a fictional anthropomorphic teddy bear created by English author A. A. Milne and English illustrator E. H. Shepard. The first collection of stories about the character was the book ''Win ...

books at the house, often inspired by the local landscape, and died at Cotchford Farm in 1956. There are statues of Milne's son,

Christopher Robin Christopher Robin is a character created by A. A. Milne, based on his son Christopher Robin Milne. The character appears in the author's popular books of poetry and ''Winnie-the-Pooh'' stories, and has subsequently appeared in various Disney ...

, and his character

Owl Owls are birds from the order Strigiformes (), which includes over 200 species of mostly solitary and nocturnal birds of prey typified by an upright stance, a large, broad head, binocular vision, binaural hearing, sharp talons, and feathers a ...

in the garden, and also a sundial with a

gnomon A gnomon (; ) is the part of a sundial that casts a shadow. The term is used for a variety of purposes in mathematics and other fields. History A painted stick dating from 2300 BC that was excavated at the astronomical site of Taosi is the ...

in the shape of a quill and a base carved with images of Pooh characters, including Piglet,

Tigger Tigger is a fictional character, an anthropomorphic stuffed tiger. He was originally introduced in the 1928 story collection '' The House at Pooh Corner'', the sequel to the 1926 book ''Winnie-the-Pooh'' by A. A. Milne. Like other Pooh chara ...

and Roo, the initials "AAM", the words "This warm and sunny spot belongs to Pooh, And here he wonders what it's time to do". A stream runs through trees along the southern boundary of the garden, with

Poohsticks Bridge Poohsticks is a game first mentioned in ''The House at Pooh Corner'', a Winnie-the-Pooh book by A. A. Milne. It is a simple game which may be played on any bridge over running water; each player drops a stick on the upstream side of a bridge a ...

approximately upstream to the west. After being owned by an American couple, the Taylors, who installed an outdoor swimming pool, the house was bought by

Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the rock era. In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones pioneered the gritty, rhythmically d ...

band member

. He drowned in the swimming pool in July 1969, aged 27. The house retains some of the fittings he installed, including coloured lighting and glazing. It was bought by Alistair Johns in 1970 and became a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

in 1982. The house was put on sale by Johns's wife, Harriet Johns, for £2m in April 2012, including its plot with the heated outdoor swimming pool and fishpond. It failed to sell, and was put up for sale again in 2016, and was sold for £1.8m in June 2017."New owners want to refurbish 'Winnie the Pooh home'"
The Argus, 1 September 2018.

References

Rightmove, 5 October 2012
Cotchford Lane, Hartfield, East Sussex, TN7 4DN
Savills,
No interest in Rolling Stones pool tragedy house
The Argus, 3 February 2013
You can buy the house where Winnie the Pooh was born (if you’ve got a spare £1.9m)
Metro, 14 March 2016 {{coord, 51.09025, 0.10707, format=dms, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title A. A. Milne Farmhouses in England Grade II listed buildings in East Sussex Grade II listed houses Hartfield Ashdown Forest