Babington House

• NR

  This hotel has not yet been rated by Tablet Hotels guests.

• 0 Guest Reviews

  This hotel has not yet been reviewed by Tablet Hotels guests.

Style: Contemporary Classic

Atmosphere: Lively

28 Rooms

Text size:

Pre-dating by a moment or two the new rush of country-house design hotels, Babington House was opened in the late Nineties as a sort of rustic sequel to the London members club Soho House. As such it’s quite understandably less about pining for the bygone days of shooting parties and fox hunts, and more about fast-living urban types (read: Soho House denizens) getting a moment’s rest from the city.

This is not to say it’s short on old-world charm — it’s an absolutely authentic Georgian manor house, and its exterior may look familiar to fans of Jane Austen adaptations. But the Babington House experience is a loose and unstructured sort of country excursion, where meals are available at all hours and recreation is of the do-it-yourself variety, whether it’s a swim or a game of tennis down at the Cowshed spa, an afternoon or evening film screening in the cinema, or a child-free hour in the billiards lounge.

Most everywhere else around the house you’ll find children running free; not the best place for a honeymoon, perhaps, but as a family retreat it’s tough to match, with a comprehensive kids’ care program, and the family suites in the old stable block come with spare bedrooms and kid-sized beds. Adults find plenty to play with in the guest rooms as well, including plasma-screen televisions with DVD and CD players and lavishly equipped bathrooms that threaten to make the Cowshed spa almost redundant. Public spaces, including the bar and the two restaurants, buzz with activity, as the hotel is most often full. It’s never lonely here — although you’re quite in the middle of nowhere, in the Somerset countryside, there’s always a bit of London to keep you company.