The best hotels in Britain for autumn colours
Autumn is a splendid time to visit Britain's finest hotel gardens: think carpets of crisp leaves, pumpkin gardens, apple orchards, russet-coloured forests and saffron hills. Here are a selection of the best hotels for autumn colours, where vibrant views can be enjoyed on heart-racing estate zip wires, from four-poster beds with a glass of sherry, in outdoor infinity spa pools or simply on a walk around the grounds.
Barnsley House
Cirencester, Cotswolds, England
9Telegraph expert rating
It's home to one of the most splendid hotel gardens in Britain, and in autumn it's all about the Laburnum Walk with its trees that resemble yellow rain. There's also an ornamental fruit and vegetable garden, which bears huge and delicious apples as winter approaches. On milder days, The Potager restaurant's doors and windows onto the grounds are thrown open, and a resident robin even pops in from time to time. The spa with outdoor hydrotherapy pool and glass-walled relaxation room offers more of those cracking garden views – think carpets of giant fallen maple leaves; scarlet spindle; and white autumn flowering snowdrops. Deluxe garden rooms have bathrooms with double tubs overlooking the lawns. Read expert review From £181 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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The Gleneagles Hotel
Auchterarder, Perth and Kinross, Scotland
9Telegraph expert rating
Autumn is special at Scotland's historic (and newly hipsterfied) golfing hotel. Guests who book a round on one of the three championship courses can expect dramatic scenery, as the estate's trees turn rusty red and the Ochil Hills glow gold. Heather-clad mountains and crisp country air are the perfect backdrop to the raft of country pursuits at the 'Glorious Playground', from clay shooting and horse riding to spending time at the estate's gundog training school. After romping around the estate, guests can sip on a warming signature whisky cocktail sprinkled with gunpowder from the shooting school in the cosy, freshly renovated Century Bar, complete with the kind of scarlet cuddle chairs that wouldn't be out of place in a cover shoot for Vogue. Afternoon tea in the Glendevon room, with its antique silver tea sets on loan from the British Museum and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the glens, is also the ideal place to take in frost-glazed views of the glens as winter draws in. Read expert review From £337 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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Cliveden
Taplow, Berkshire, England
9Telegraph expert rating
In autumn, the grounds of Britain's most infamous country house hotel are aglow with copper colours. Guests should head for The Water Garden first, with its Chinese Golden Rain Tree, and yellow and red sweetgums; the radiant ancient Gingko Biloba trees also give a glimpse of autumn 200 million years ago. The surrounding woodlands, with their hazel beech trees, offer bracing longer walks. It's all about the stupendous sloping views down to the Thames Valley, a fat silver tongue of river punctuated by saffron hills and reddening foliage. The later months of the year may get nippy, but it's worth braving a dip in the swimming pool where model Christine Keeler first met Secretary of State for war John Profumo in July 1961, sparking an affair that would bring down a government. Bagging a seat by the window in the Library bar with views of the parterre is also recommended. Order a Profumo hibisco-infused champagne cocktail. Appropriately, it’s rather fruity with a very bitter aftertaste. Read expert review From £436 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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Gravetye Manor
East Grinstead, West Sussex, England
9Telegraph expert rating
Gravetye Manor is an almost implausible phantasm of loveliness — a scene from A Midsummer Night’s Dream floating in the spicy vapours of roses and azaleas. Although the property is best known for its tulips in spring, autumn brings magenta dahlias galore, apple orchard harvests, red hot poker plants and a showstopping efflorescence of burning bushes. There's a packed schedule of events for the green-fingered from October through to Christmas, from a tulips masterclass with Anna Pavord to autumn flower workshops and a special Guy Fawkes dinner. Speaking of food, this autumn is also the final chance to enjoy the hotel's outstanding Michelin-starred restaurant before it closes in January 2018 (a new restaurant overlooking the flower garden will open in May next year). Expect home-grown apples with caramelised white chocolate mousse on the dessert menu, and figs from the kitchen garden plated with smoked venison. Read expert review From £375 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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The Horn of Plenty
Tavistock, Devon, England
7Telegraph expert rating
This mid-Victorian house makes a stirring autumn getaway, with its views of River Tamar cloaked in bronze-leafed trees and vestiges of 19th-century copper mines poking through the amber foliage. Bag a room with a balcony overlooking the valley, which inspired painter JMW Turner in all its sepia splendour. Other rooms have vistas of the Devon and Cornwall countryside. It makes a cracking weekend foodie break, thanks to its 2AA restaurant with more of those valley views, and menu emphasising delicious game, from wood pigeon with blackberries and fig jam to Cornish wild rabbit with garden sage and nasturtium. On milder autumn days, opt for afternoon tea on the patio overlooking meadows and hills (still startlingly green in September). Read expert review From £155 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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Hotel Endsleigh
Tavistock, Devon, England
9Telegraph expert rating
Worth a fall-time jolly if only for the chance to read Devonshire poets (Tennyson, who had a house in the county, perhaps?) on the chaise longue, with its rousing russet colours and vistas of the River Tamar. Visitors may not be guaranteed a glance of owner Alex Polizzi, Channel 5's Hotel Inspector, but at least 108 acres of flaming woodlands, follies and grottos are assured. The evenings may be drawing in, but the expansive gardens at Hotel Endsleigh offer new delights, from swelling red berries in thick clutches of bushes to glowing yellow shrubbery, scurrying squirrels, and flowers exploding into a final bloom. In the restaurant, Devonshire ingredients are served with an Italian twist and incredible views of the parterre. If money is no object, it's got to be the thatched gatekeepers lodge suite with own private garden for an overnight stay. Read expert review From £216 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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Lucknam Park
Wiltshire, England
8Telegraph expert rating
This estate – home to one of the country's finest hotel stables in the country – comes into its own in autumn. Horse riding through the 500 acres of beech trees and lavender gardens that flower well into the later months of the year is a must. The one-hour instructional hacks are a fantastic way for even inexperienced riders to explore the colours of the surrounding Cotswolds countryside in fall. Spa-seekers will appreciate the spanking new ESPA wellness centre. The indoor pool, hot tub, and open-air saltwater pool are the perfect places take in the chestnut and pop-green colours of the rolling gardens. Book a table by the window at Restaurant Hywel Jones (complete with cheese trolley!) and reserve a Parkland room for maximum exposure to those bronzen bucolic views. Read expert review From £248 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
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Four Seasons Hotel Hampshire
Winchfield, Hampshire, England
8Telegraph expert rating
Country pursuits is a notable strong point at this supremely sexy hotel estate. This year it's all about the zip wire (think Tough Mudder meets Downton Abbey), complete with parachute simulator ominously named Power Fan, offering – shall we say – stirring views of the red-and-yellow canopy below. Country pursuits is a notable strong point at this supremely sexy hotel estate. This year it's all about the zip wire (think Tough Mudder meets Downton Abbey), complete with parachute simulator ominously named Power Fan, offering – shall we say – stirring views of the red-and-yellow canopy below. Read expert review From £257 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
Llangoed Hall
Powys, Wales
9Telegraph expert rating
What a vision Llangoed Hall is in autumn, with its turmeric-hued meadows leading down to the River Wye, and moody Black Mountains looming behind. The hotel's handsome 17-acre gardens, which are ablaze with wild flowers as Christmas approaches, also have a mini farm with chickens, ducks, quail, a kitchen garden and a smokery to explore. Master Suites have the best views, which can be enjoyed from a four-poster bed, glass of sherry in hand. A candlelit tasting menu showcasing the hotel's autumn produce is a must; tables by the windows in the restaurant have glorious estate views. Master Suites have the best vistas, which can be enjoyed from a four-poster bed, glass of sherry in hand. Read expert review From £123 per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons
Oxfordshire, England
9Telegraph expert rating
Lavender season may be over until next spring, but come autumn the vines that envelop the honey-coloured estate turn tawny, the wild mushroom garden swells with produce and the Japanese garden radiates ethereal golden hues. Inside, guests will find cosy nooks with crackling fires and a two-Michelin-starred restaurant offering produce from the garden, such as white asparagus, beetroot terrine and spiced roast cauliflower. The cookery school also offers everything from autumn dinner parties, to a workshop on how to whip up belly-warming sauces and stocks. The Garden One Bedroom suites are the ones to bag; some have private terraces where guests can enjoy a glass of red while also drinking in the surrounding toast-coloured foliage. Read expert review From £756 per night