Picture perfect
With its rustic charm and stunning views, this renovated farmhouse and former home of an artist sparked love at first sight
INTERIORS/ PROPERTY/ ANTIQUES/
GARDENS/ TECH/ BEAUTY/ PETS
the couple keep chickens and ducks
Even before she stepped inside Moorhouse Cottage in the wilds of Nidderdale, in the Yorkshire Dales, Jules Brohier knew she was going to live there. 'It sounds weird but I'd had this vision in my head since I was a teenager -a house on a hillside with its own land and with doors all around so you could open them up and be straight outside. And here it was,' says Jules, now 66 and a retired English teacher.
'We viewed it one dark, rainy, winter's night in late 2014 when life wasn't being kind to us. I thought, if only we could move somewhere new and have an adventure.' That's exactly what happened: they immediately put their townhouse in York on the market and have lived at Moorhouse ever since. The stunning stone farmhouse near Pateley Bridge hugs the hillside in three tiers: the lead miner's cottage at the top dates from 1780, the old barn in the middle was built in 1864 and there's a 1904 cottage on the lowest level. 'That day I walked into the old barn with its huge picture window and minstrel's gallery I literally fell in love,' says Jules. 'That was it -a done deal.'