Ockenden Manor

In the middle of the pretty redbrick village of Cuckfield you find Ockenden Manor, in part Tudor, with Victorian and contemporary additions. Viewing the manor from the garden, you appreciate that this combination of building styles is very pleasing. The spacious sitting room overlooks the garden and the adjacent dining room, with its dark-oak paneling and low, decorative-plasterwork ceiling, is most attractive. A maze of winding corridors and stairs leads to the atmospheric rooms in the older wing with their paneled walls, uneven floors, and plethora of four-poster beds (mostly queen-sized). I particularly enjoyed the Charles room with its large stone fireplace, Elizabeth for its third-floor isolation atop a narrow staircase, and Master, a spacious, paneled twin-bedded room with an adorable little parlor overlooking the garden. Avoid the possibility of getting lost in the maze of corridors and opt for easier-to-locate rooms in the Garden Wing with its new rooms made to look old. Less than a half-hour drive finds you in Brighton where seaside honky-tonk contrasts with the vivid spectacle of the onion domes of the Royal Pavilion, the Prince Regent’s extravaganza of a home. Enjoy browsing in Brighton’s Lanes where old fishermen’s cottages are now antique and gift shops.